Comment by monkeycantype
5 days ago
I'm the white cis male with grey hair, but in my n of one experience I have encountered very few situations in which not taking the bait on the first provocation, showing a bit of empathy and respect didn't quickly get the same empathy and respect in return.
> worth looking into just why this causes people to go into a mouth frothing rage.
I agree with this, it's not nice to be dehumanised or disrespected, it's awful. I saw someone speak recently who dipped into this kind of broad anti-male language to get a sneering laugh from the crowd more than once. With friends, with people who matter deeply to me, I'd want to speak to them about the petty provocation in their choice of language, but right now, I still think that following down the path of chasing down that language in public is a dead end, because a person speaking in that way is scratching for a fight, probably not a productive fight but a let the fury out fight. There may be a legitimate reason for that fury but I don't want to be the bucket it gets poured into. I am up for a sincere difficult conversations about real problems, and usually people pick that up and respond accordingly. Most people aren't sociopaths, and can't resist reciprocating sincere empathy and respect.
I’m going to add a caveat here : people reciprocating respect is my personal, subjective experience, I don’t believe everybody gets this same treatment. I think people who look like me, who are used to at least a tiny bit of status - the pool from which must of the upset about woke is coming - we generally get respect reciprocated. When we don’t get treated with respect it’s a bit of a shock. I think reflecting on how unpleasant it is to be treated poorly, what a frequent experience it is for some people and how it might affect them is the way to go.