I believe that the intention is to belittle those arguments by using a pejorative to make ad-hominem attacks on those postulating the aforementioned arguments.

But what do I know? I'm just a ditzy bunny. :D

Because the people that this term refers to aren't people who are doing any good. SJW's are the kind of people harping on about how "cishet scum" are ruining the world, that all straights should die, and that sort of hatespeach. Basically how it works is; Social justice activist; someone that takes good steps towards making a better world, and actualy make a good difference. Social Justice Warriors are dumbasses that try to cover up their hate under the banner of "justice" When they're simply misandrists/racists/heterophobes

But cishet scum ARE ruining the world.

Nahbro, SCUM is ruin' the world. Don't gotta be cis or het to be a terrible asshole. Case in point; SJW's HEYOOOOO

It's not about who's the biggest asshole, because sometimes you have to be an asshole to change things! I don't really understand your distinction between "activists" and "warriors" to be anything except the difference between people you personally agree with and like and people whose tone you don't like for w/e reason.

I think that you need to see how the SJW's behave to understand why they're a joke to so many people. I can accept an offensive tone if the message behind it is a good one. But it's no exaggeration to say that many SJW's will proudly tell any straight, white, person to kill themselves simply for being straight, and white. THAT'S where I draw issue from.

I actually do see how they behave! A lot of my friends have reputations as SJWs but don't do the things you describe, so why are they still called SJWs?

I guess the criteria changes from person to person? In my book just being abrasive doesn't make you an SJW; being downright hateful does.

So like, is Anita Sarkeesian a SJW? Because that's who the term is being levelled at.

She;s always been more of a feminist I think. Whether she's an effective one or not is up for debate though

Some randos are getting more than $2500 a month for updates on a film they're producing about how Anita Sarkeesian and SJWs are ruining the gaming industry. And they want more. They want $15,000 before they even start filming. Anita Sarkeesian asked for $6,000 to make a set of five videos, which would cover rent and food and expenses like that while she was researching/producing. Of course, she raised much more than her initial target.

Anita: $1,200 per video
Those guys: $2,500 - $15,000 per video before their project even starts.

Anita got very, very visceral and death/rape threats and had a game made about her where you beat her up because people thought she was ripping folks off. Those guys??? *cricket chirp*

It seems so clear to me.

I'm normally 100% lurker (no icon, keyboard mashing, etc), but since I care about games, misinformation and to some extent the social justice movement I thought it would be important to add a bit to the discussion here.

First off: I'm really against personal attacks and threats of violence. I also agree with Sarkeesian that there are issues in gaming, and I can see a lot of the problems she thematises. I think it's important to create debate about these topics and that's something she succeeds at.

Unfortunately though, the way she makes her videos is really problematic. Many of the concrete examples she brings up are really exaggerated or down-right made up. She even demonizes a lot of games that thematise social justice issues in a positive light. I have not yet seen it personally, but in her latest video she seems to use a very short clip from Deus Ex: Human Revolution about the player dragging a dead prostitute. What she doesn't mention is that the game doesn't incentivise this in any shape or form, even the presence of these NPCs is justified because they are there to highlight social issues of poverty and desperation. (They are portrayed as average women who were forced into a desperate situation, not as despicable sluts.)
The game has a 'kill' interaction because it is a violent video game in which the player fights against corrupt or downright criminal organizations. It stays active in the (very long) non-violent passages because deactivating it would make about as much sense as anyone being physically unable to punch a random passers-by in the middle of the street in real life. It's a matter of player-freedom and it's entirely the player's choice if they even kill at all to progress in the game. (I think there are a few instances of 'implicit' or unintended killing that are difficult to avoid though.)
The intended interaction with the prostitutes in Deus Ex would be to talk to them. Their and other dialogue highlights real social issues very in-depth in a fictional context, I think the general theme may even be the point of half of the game's story.

It's disheartening, because if she did better research she could find much better (but less explicit) examples of the problems she wants to highlight, and avoid riling up people against a whole form of expression. There are other issues with her approach, which this post by someone who isn't part of either community talks about a bit more. (I don't necessarily agree with everything he says, but a lot of it is backed by what little research exists in this direction.)

This is mostly what "SJW" means when gamers use the term: People who unjustly villify things and try to instigate violent reactions through untrue allegations. Sarkeesian is still fairly harmless in that regard though, she doesn't lie nearly as much as some other people. The problem comes in because SJWs (gamer here!), reinterpret the term to frame it as an attack against all social justice and feminism movements. There's a dangerous "you either completely agree with everything we say or you're part of the problem/our enemy/against us" mentality in those circles. Here's a TwitLonger by a gamer and social justice activist that goes a lot more into details, but also talks about Quinn and is the most recent link here so maybe it should be read last. (It's also a bit of a plea to activists to please think critically so it fits better as closing statement. I'd have put it at the end if it didn't fit better here.)


The situation with Quinn is an entirely different matter, because she is an abusive and extremely dishonest person who doesn't even seem to honestly care for the causes she stands up for. When Adam Baldwin (He coined the term #GamerGate because of the amount of corruption revealed in journalism.) tweeted two videos by InternetAristocrat about the issue, she accused him about defaming her for her sex life and propagating nudes of her. The first accusation is tangential at best, since the discussion has long moved on from there and only Quinn herself is trying to yank it back into that direction. The second accusation is a blatant lie: The photos are not mentioned at all in the videos, they are (as far as I have seen) not exactly nudes (but I didn't try to look them up) and they were made somewhat publicly available by Quinn herself in the first place by uploading them to a porn site. It also has been proven that the first doxxing incident was forged by Quinn to get herself into a victim position. The data was falsified and she accused Wizzardchan, which seems to be a board for depressive people and therefore an easy target. (It's anonymous like 4chan and as such prone to false-flag attacks.)
She almost destroyed The Young Fine Capitalists with over 40 tweets full of harrassment and lies and by instigating a media blockade using her journalism contacts. TYFC is a feminist charity that actively tries to make a difference by bringing women into video games and highlighting their positive contributions in order to combat stereotypes. If /v/ hadn't noticed there would be no way their Indiegogo campaign would get funded. Quinn is now lying about the issue, saying she tweeted only four times. (I don't have the evidence on hand right now but it shouldn't be difficult to find.) The producer/founder of TYFC is handling the whole thing with admirable calmness, they've made multiple videos highlighting women in gaming in just this week too.

From a gamer's perspective, most of the issue is false reporting and continued demonization of gaming as a whole, even from mainstream media. A few days ago there was a TV report about "incredibly realistic" virtual rape in GTA V. The incident really did happen, but over half of the things stated in the voice-over and interview were blatantly fabricated. The player being attacked in the footage they used was a man for example, and he was quite upbeat because it was clear this was someone trolling players arbitrarily rather than a personal or sexual attack. He could have quit or changed servers at any point of the half hour this went on for (with lots of different hacks, the "rape" part was just a fraction of it), and it started relatively harmlessly. (For the record: I don't condone anything of that, but there's a long stretch from this to raping someone through a video game.)
It's also a thing isolated to this particular game because most don't have "rape" animations coded in. (This one doesn't really either, they were repurposed by the hacker.) The voice over said hackers could reprogram "any" game to create the actions, which is a complete lie.

It's terrible that that there's so much hatred coming from both sides (SJWs compared gamers to ISIS, accused them of sending a bomb threat to a plane and flat out told them to die), but I think it's even worse that manipulative people could rile up a whole community in this way in the first place, using only no or badly fabricated "evidence". The activist who (iirc) at first called /v/ a "cathedral of misogyny" and was very vocal about defending Quinn changed their mind when they found out what was actually going on. Here's their recap from a few days ago.

I recommend you check out @TFYCapitalists for things regarding that charity, including their latest statement. (They aren't entirely central to the issue, just one of the victims of misguided social justice activists. I can understand why they'd distance themselves from anything Quinn related, but I won't stop talking about this as long as misconceptions and lies are being propagated this much. I'm not really an advocate by any stretch, so I just try to inform people I respect, if it comes up.)
@SdoctmdPlays and @MissAngerist talk about the things that must change in social justice circles (which I'm not part of, so I don't have an inside-view there. I think they are very rational about the whole topic though).

*second-most recent link here

I found the statement by TFYC only when linking their Twitter account, so that was published somewhat later.

Thanks for the long and thoughtful reply!

I don't know Zoe Quinn from Adam, TBH, there are a lot of accusations out about her that I don't know if I believe or not. However, as a fellow depressive, I'm inclined to be sympathetic. I've done TONS of stupid shit when I'm depressed that could be seen as manipulative. People look bad under the microscope. I don't really know how to address the specifics of what people are claiming, so I'm not really ready to form an opinion.

The skepticism I have about the usage of "SJW" in describing people has less to do with the bad apples and more to do with the arbitrariness of its definition and the results of its application. Nobody is drawing a line in the sand in the same place. With such a loose definition, it means people can apply it whimsically to anyone fighting for social justice in a way they personally don't like. With SJWs being destructive, scamming, hypocritical, whatever, people find it fair to do whatever it takes to marginalize everything that person stands for. In other words, we're making an active choice about who we marginalize when we dismiss someone as a SJW. The problem is that the stakes are not symmetrical. Women, for instance, are already marginalized within the gaming community. The established "gamer" community is overwhelmingly male, and going by numbers alone, the bros will outnumber the feminists in any flame war, not to mention the consequences for a man criticizing a woman are not the same as a woman criticizing a man. The disparity between Tropes vs. Women's KS goals and The Sarkeesian Effect's goals are a pretty vivid example of how this tends to shake out. There are severe consequences for being a SJW and I don't think people really realize just how asymmetrical the sides are (social justice is about being fair to the marginalized, 'cuz being marginalized you are gonna be in the minority) and pretend like it's some sort of Oxford debate. Meanwhile someone made a video game where you beat Anita Sarkeesian to a bloody pulp for having the audacity to talk about the lackluster portrayals of women in mainstream video games. Social Justice Warriors don't send visceral and incredibly personal rape threats either.

I don't feel like gaming is in any danger of being destroyed. Films and novels are still going strong despite the fact that there's been a rich tradition of feminist criticism. That criticism has only lead to the diversification of the media. So I don't understand how it follows that stuff like Tropes vs. Women is anti-gamer. In games, you can only do what the programmers allow you to do; they're writing the rules of the universe from scratch, and will have to write the code that says you get your money back if you kill a prostitute in GTA. So I think it's fair to criticize game developers over capabilities the players have, even if the players choose not to use them.

I can see a lot of what you're writing about, TFYC also only recently did a post about whom exactly they mean by SJW and why they'll keep using the term. To my knowledge this is the original usage, and the term was only adopted for self-identification by some activists later on. (It does sound kind of cool on the surface, after all...) Some argue that people fitting the original definition don't actually exist at all, but I very much doubt that considering what I've seen people say on Twitter and Tumblr in the last few years. I try to stay clear of those particular topics since I can't read a lot of it without becoming terribly aggravated myself.
Services like Twitter and Tumblr do a lot of "bubbling", which means you normally won't get to see a lot of posts outside your established circle except for the largest trends. (I don't have a Tumblr account, but as far as I know the dashboard works similarly to the default Twitter stream in that it only shows things relating to people or themes you're already subscribed to.)

I fully agree with you on there being an unhealthy gender disparity, but I think this doesn't go in the same direction in every single context. For example, it's definitely easier for a woman to find support regarding alleged abuse than it is for a man. In the context of this debate, there have been many publications that repeated unverified allegations about men committing harrassment or rape, but refuse to cover the same kind of story when men are speaking out about women doing these things.
I think one reason why you're not seeing the same threats of violence against gamers or those who side with them is that the opposing attacks go more towards character assassination. In one case, JonTron was attacked in a tag started by his supporters. Last time I checked, he didn't even "side" against any social justice people in general. This is his latest longer post, which in my opinion reflects this part of the issue really well.

Obviously there are problems with mislabeling people as SJW, but the same thing happens in the opposite direction whenever someone tries to speak up about unfounded allegations, or abuse inside social justice. They get branded as misogynist or apologists and their public image is systematically destroyed by discrediting them through possibly unrelated matters.
This goes so far that other marginalized groups are weaponised to further the cause of dishonest "activists". Quinn using people who are transgender to attack a charity is only one example, and she knew she was in the wrong when she did this. (@legobutts (Maya) is also one of the people implicated in this scandal, but there isn't anyone speaking up about them publicly yet except for this one source, from what I can tell.)
I've seen people harrass others over "cultural appropriation" of fashion originating in cultures the accuser has no relation to. (Maybe I'm going a bit off topic here, so I'll drop the thought. I just figured it may be relevant in light of other discussion on this page.)


I don't fear that games are going to be destroyed, but I'm afraid they may become worse if player freedom is limited to only what is "socially acceptable" based on a slanted popular opinion of games corrupting the character of people who play them. What distinguishes them from other media is their interactivity and agency, which makes it much easier for the player to experience the story standing in their own shoes. In any other presentation this requires an author with extreme skill, which I have only seen very few times so far. It's becoming increasingly important as technology improves and lets developers accurately portray the emotions of game characters.

If a player decides to act unlawfully in a game, for example by stealing or robbing, they can experience the regret of doing so in an environment that won't have irreparable consequences on their life. (GTA is maybe a bad example here, but even in that game the police will come after you if you kill anyone outside of gang wars. It's definitely still desincentivized even if it lets you pick up a bundle of money from the ground.)
On the other hand, if the player decides to act morally right they also get to reflect on that decision, what it means to them and how their actions affect the game's environment. I'm not a fan of games that let the player completely get away with excessive violence or other objectionable behaviour, but in practice those titles are far rarer than some people want to make it seem.
Telltale Games make incredibly good portrayals of both choice and consequence, and they don't shy away from portraying violence where appropriate, or allowing the player to act abusively towards other characters where choice is important.

If the choice to act this way is removed, or made trivial by skewing the balance in one direction too much, all of the above is stripped away from the experience. The game then turns into a very expensive film (which can still be good, but is missing a lot of the potential it would have otherwise).
Some countries actually have laws that go in that direction. In Germany games were ruled categorically as not being art by court of law, and so don't benefit from the same protections as other media. This means that violence is censored more strongly than for example in films, also often preventing the player from killing or gaining from killing innocents, and increasing the ramifications for doing so to sometimes absurd levels. It effectively removes the player choice to the point where nothing can be gained from it, sometimes even allowing them to carelessly fire into a crowd or run people over because everyone is invincible or will just jump out of the way.
It's also practically not allowed to portray nazis in games no matter how negatively, but that may be irrelevant here.

What I'm trying to say is: The possibility of doing something bad in a game can be used as powerful incentive against it, and this is the case in many of the examples Sarkeesian uses. Most people don't attack her only because she wants women to be represented better in gaming, because that's a view a lot of gamers (myself included) strongly agree with.
The issue is a bit larger in "just for fun" games that have only an excuse plot, since there the player can't meaningfully choose to affect the story and as such won't reflect as much on the things being presented. However, that sector has been moving away from stereotyping women since quite a while before Tropes vs. Women came up, even if it hasn't reached equality so far. In many (but not all) of the recent Nintendo games, the princesses have become selectable player characters or play a strong and independent role in the story. Hyrule Warriors looks like it may end up with more female than male player characters, and since it's at least partly a Nintendo game I don't expect them to be objectified for fanservice.


(I'm really not used to writing about these issues, so I'm sorry if I'm using any loaded terms other than SJW here.)

Like I said I don't really know the ins and outs of the Zoe Quinn thing, but from all of the evidence I've seen mounted I'm simply nonplussed by the negative reaction. What's not conjecture is stuff I could see myself doing, potentially, under similar circumstances, being similarly informed. TFYC and she seem to have spoken, and she hasn't doxxed them, as is being reported. TFYC lost $10,000 in support, and that sucks, but they were able to brush it off. Zoe Quinn's probably lost her ability to exist as a public figure on the web without having to constantly fend off harassment. Even TFYC will cop that she's suffered far more than they have over this.

I'm not saying that both sides don't use dismissive tactics. Some people use activist methods that I personally wouldn't use. I actually used to be pretty anti-SJW, I was constantly on edge about using the wrong terminology and incurring the wrath of some of my more socially active friends. It came to pass that I finally got frustrated by the whole "men are scum" angle of feminism, and said what you'd expect, #notallmen and all that. It turns out they were coming out of an abusive relationship and were venting on Twitter, and I got all up in their face and made them feel awful about it because I felt personally attacked. After freaking out for about a month over it, I cooled down and realized that yeah, just because it was on my twitter timeline doesn't mean it was meant for me, and being a guy I had no idea why anyone would say we were scum. It turns out that month of anger over my perceived slight was unwarranted. The amount of times I've been criticized for being a man is far outweighed by the times my friends have been criticized for being a woman, and the anger I felt in that one instance is multiplied. Males aren't the only people who get REALLY UPSET by being accused of doing something they didn't intend to do.

As for video game theory, there's not going to be any censorship. They don't have the power. All that will happen is more variety. If there is a decline in certain subject matter, it'll be because the culture of gaming has changed, and based on what I've seen happen over the last few months I'd be really happy if it did.

Thank you.

Also getting hurt for getting labeled "cishet" is not equivalent of oppression. This seems to slip people's mind a tad bit too often.

I don't think feminists changed things back in the day without being "annoying".

I think that the term itself is what's become toxic. People can do good and call themselves an SJW, but doing so hurts them because of the numerous assholes.

neat now i feel better about identifying with my birth gender and my heterosexuality : D jokes aside yeaaa sjw's don't really help whatever cause they are aiming for..

Without them... nothing gets better.

See also the majority of American history.

if you say so dude

Every person in history who has stood up for justices for others has been demeaned and told they were too loud or too strident.

It's only later - and not always then - that their actions were redeemed.

yea but there is a difference between fighting for a good cause and taking it to an extreme where you aren't even helping your own case any more

Alas, there is no difference.

People always told Dr Martin Luther King he was making things worse, after all.

And people don't use 'SJW' as a slur against those who are engaged in infighting, after all.

ah. ok so if that's the case then what's up with the sjw who make the assessment that someone like me who is perfectly ok with his birth gender and sexual preference is bad, if the thing they're fighting for is the acceptance of sexual preference? are they helping their cause by pulling a double standard like that? also is that an unfair question i feel like i made an unfair hypothetical just now

Did you just say there's no difference between "fighting for a good cause" and "extremism"?

What do you think "extremism" is? How extreme is "extremism"? For example, do you support terrorism?

SJWs are like the Westboro Baptist Church in how they handle things. They do their cause more harm than good and tend to lash out. Educating people on why something is wrong is good. Shouting into their face to do so... not so much.

which is why real life activists are better because they are doing the act in front of people, and not behind a computer screen

The internet is a part of real life, just because we're behind a computer screen doesn't mean we're not real people capable of doing the same things as a group of people in conversation in a room. What do you want activists to do in front of people that they can't do more easily from a keyboard?

"just because we're behind a computer screen doesn't mean we're not real people capable of doing the same things as a group of people in conversation in a room."

I wish this can be said to people who just follow social stuff and then drop them when they get bored, like some sort of trend.

When I think of the term I think of people who make images like this http://mrdappersden.tumblr.com/image/95942292047

And I'd laugh and laugh but they seem to like threatening women's safety on twitter, so...

That's what it conjures up for me too! The people I see using it most don't really use it in the limited definition I've been seeing in this journal.

it's being employed as a very effective dog-whistle audible to a certain kind of dude on the internet. The internet's shorthand for "get her!"

Wut? Is this the Westboro-lite's gaming arm or something? I dislike EA and avoid their products because I have major issues with their business model and draconian DRM and so forth...but that made me feel just a little more favorable toward them.

This is what people who get called SJWs are privileged to put up with.

harping is the natural state of the internet and doesn't really concern me, as I have so much more important shit to worry about. Anyone using valuable real estate to care about people who complain on the internet has a way easier life than me, and I envy them.

Now, the doxxing, the death threats, the spamming of gruesome images, the career-ruining, the massive blogs detailing byzantine relationship struggles for purposes of witch-hunting the ex, the continuous burner-account threats of graphic rape towards anyone (and their children) the internet identifies as a "social justice warrior" (just to give an example: any woman in game development, game journalism or tech who dares have an opinion about the sorryass sexist state of the industry) seem to actually be more concerning to those of us who want a society that functions as a society. The internet as a whole is a really hostile and shitty place for women, any reasoned adult can see that.

I see this term "Social justice warrior" being used to attack anyone who observes and states this obvious fact. Especially women. It's a meaningless term. it's like saying "smurf", it's a rorshach test, it's whatever one wants it to be.

Seconded.

TBH it's become a bit of a shibboleth to me.

agreed

It's often used to accuse critics of 'reaching' for something to be offended by in an otherwise innocuous topic.

Whether or not it's correct varies on a case-by-case basis.

Social justice isn't bad, but SJWs take it to the extreme, lash out against people for unintended usages and tend to swarm in packs. The tend to ignore the idea that there are multiple sides to a story and automatically assume people to be guilty.

SJWs are fairly extreme in how they approach others. Social justice can be good, but the extreme of any situation can have a negative effect.

I'm friends with a lot of people who've been described as SJWs, and they've earned that term mostly for arguing against the status quo. They don't do any of the things you described, that's why I'm confused about the term.

It's become a broad and very loaded term applied to anyone who is loud enough, often meant to make light of or belittle activist.

You'll notice its really hard to get a clear explanation of what a SJW IS, specially when its negative. It's lost what little coherent meaning it had and is more of a negative meme now for "loud annoying people on the internet with a cause" I think.

too right

Yeah I think the comparison to "hipster" is apt, albeit the term seems mostly for discrediting the legit beefs people have with pop culture.

So, they're like the Spanish Inquisition only with less devotion to the Pope?

Extremists, huh. So which side of this debate routinely DDoSes, doxxes, and uses thousands of burner accounts to harass women and queer gamers with rape and death threats? Which side sends SWAT teams to your house for lulz? Is the anti-sjw side known for its civility and calm discourse?

That's another kind of extreme altogether.

I dunno. What side tries to deport the husband of someone (who is in the country legally) because they disagreed with them on the internet? What side makes up allegations of attempted child kidnapping at a con despite even the parents of the kid repeatedly denying it happened? Etc.

Both sides have crazy fucking assholes. *the more you knoooooow*

Yes, both sides have crazy assholes. One side has a few idiots and one side has THOUSANDS of idiots and if you want to call that equivalent I don't know what to tell you.

Actually scratch that comment, you're clearly biased and defensive and unwilling to acknowledge when something is fucked up if it's inconvenient for you to do so, no point in trying to convince you, just talking to a brick wall.

Hello, we're all biased. You're biased. I'm biased.

Cargo's right though. There's no collusion to these sides, that would make it easier to say "oh these people are bad, these people are good". It's hundreds of thousands of individual people making individual decisions. The problem is, when you pile all of those decisions together, one side is a ripple and the other is a tidal wave.

Neato. I'll still continue to call shitheads out on both sides. All I ask is that people who have taken one side or the other do likewise.

Tim Schafer, the video game developer, was tarred as a SJW and told to kill himself because he dared say positive things about Anita Sarkeesian's game tropes videos. That's basically where I stand on the term, and illustrates my suspicions as to its use.

As a jokey thing to describe a certain kind of tumblr blog or a certain kind of Arguer On The Internet, it's one thing. As a rallying cry to send rape threats to Anita Sarkeesian and Zoe Quinn, it's something quite different and far more horrible! The term is meaningless as a label, but it sure makes an effective "pointer" for terrible behavior towards women.

SJWs do not give an inch. It is essentially like having a debate about the existence of God with someone. There is no debate to be had apart from what either party chooses to believe in.

If someone has a fault, then they are deliberately blind to it, or act as apologists to a fault in defense of it. Ultimately, social justice is good, but their style of debate usually takes the form of attack that, like poor riot control, acts to escalate the violence of their words, and the words of the other extreme they are trying to... uh........ educate...

Some SJWs do not further their own education on topics, and like, for example, a lot of fad-driven 'feminists' don't even realize that bigotry existed against trans people within their movement.

So yeah. That is what an SJW is, and why it's pejorative.

I always thought it was synonym for slacktivist. And I guess they're kind of similar, but with more of what 'Neer mentioned.

Also if you're confused as to why some people call SJ people SJWs, uh.. well.. duh.. They're using it as a slur and a parachute to keep themselves from caring. It's the boogeyman, dont trust them, etc.

If you're confused as to why some people call THEMSELVES SJWs, then .. well.. lol.. People like to wear slurs because they believe it weakens the power of the word by wearing it proudly.

I've just never seen someone call someone else a SJW as anything but a way of dismissing them. It's kinda like hipsters, I'll hear tell how awful they are but when it comes down to naming individuals or specific instances, if that even happens, it's usually just a list of people whose opinions they don't like because those opinions make them feel icky.

Context mattterrrrs, but the most popular use of it is as a handwave and exit like you describe yes.

Sry. Sleepy. Some of my writing might not line up.

Same reason "furry" is still used as a pejorative?

a term to homogenize anyone who speaks out against social injustice into an imaginary strawman, thus allowing them to immediately dismiss anything they say out of hand

every time i see someone jumping to "evidence" of sjws being evil and bad and nonsense they are almost invariably pointing at someone pretending to be an overblown caricature of said strawman

That's what's troubling me! As much as we want to believe it describes a specific subset of people, the term is used pretty indiscriminately.

"Imaginary strawman"
Lucky you, you've never been on Tumblr.

i spend 90% of my time on there try harder

"Try harder"? Aah, you don't notice them because you're one of them. Got it.

SJW is like hipster, a term when applied says more about the person doing the applying than the target of the label. Except where hipster is "anyone under 35 who wears clothes or likes anything", SJW is "anyone who says anything about feminism/GLBTQ issues/racism"

The 'warrior' part is supposed to be the perjorative but it's really lost its punch ever since regressives tried using it.

The phrase "Social Justice Warrior" is a pejorative because it almost always refers to a set of negative stereotypes prevalent in the darker corners of the internet. Anyone described as a SJW usually exhibits one or more of the following traits:
- Intolerance of opposing viewpoints
- Intolerance of diversity
- Forms an opinion without having all the facts, and then ignores or dismisses all facts that don't fit this opinion
- Quick to judge others harshly
- Quick to take offense
- Quick to respond to any perceived injustice with threats of greater severity (for example, sending death threats to a complete stranger just for breaking up with another complete stranger)
- Tendency towards vigilantism and/or terrorism
- When in groups, prone to violence and rioting
- Usually addicted to this kind of drama
- May be serious, may be trolling, or may be just trying to make fun of other SJWs even though this isn't really possible.

idk, it just sounds to me like you're describing the average internet commenter rather than 'SJWs'

Hah. Yeah, pretty much! (Especially on tumblr, YouTube, and any news site, am I right?)

The main difference is that the SJW is using "social justice" as an excuse for extreme versions of these behaviors. Being an idiot on the internet is one thing, but being one "for great justice" is another!

Wait, the Ferguson protests are riots now?

There was some looting and violence at the beginning, but things have calmed down quite a bit after that first night, now that additional police are on the scene in military gear.

That timeline's not quite right... The police in military gear were there looooong before anyone looted, firing tear gas and rubber bullets into a crowd of peaceful protestors and members of the media! That abuse of power is why it's such a big news story, yo!

Where did you hear that? That's not what I heard!

What was that you were saying about "forms an opinion without having all the facts" again?

I knew shit was gonna get ugly in the media, so I watched the livestreams before they were chopped up into sound bites. There have been looters for sure, but they were far from representative of the people who ultimately ended up being targeted by the militarized cops. You can look this up if you want, it's on the record. The folks who WERE in the community actually had to do the heavy work of preventing the looting; the cops were too focused on firing tear gas at the people protesting peacefully.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/.....n_5684042.html

These are law-abiding Americans we're talking about, innocent being tear gassed and fired upon with rubber bullets by police at the drop of a hat, their only "crime" being that they are black. While there were a few looters, they did not represent the majority who are innocent, who have been betrayed by the police force that was meant to protect them. If they can shoot an unarmed, surrendering teenager for walking down the middle of the street and get away with it, it kiiiind of sends the message that the cops in Ferguson are not to be trusted, since they're far more dangerous than the looters.

Replace "surrendering" with "supposedly surrendering". We know what a few eyewitnesses say, but we don't know what actually happened. (Are any of the witnesses white? This may, unfortunately, be an important detail!) Besides, this was after he had already injured the police officer (allegedly). From Huffington Post: "Jackson ... also said Wilson was treated for injuries after the incident." (And, of course, there are conflicting reports about the severity of these injuries. There may or may not be a broken eye socket involved...)

Official investigations are still underway, and everyone's in suspense...

As for what happened afterwards, though, that's a completely separate matter. I agree that the police force totally screwed up, by focusing on the peaceful protesters instead of the violent looters (one TV news show reported on a 911 call from a store owner complaining about being looted, and being told by a dispatcher, "It's not our problem!"), and then having additional police showing up in military gear and threatening pretty much everyone around. (Even the United Nations is condemning that!)

And now I gotta wonder, just how many of the crimes over there are a direct result of people sacrificing their immediate ethics for what they think is "The Greater Good"...

Dorian Johnson was with Michael Brown when the incident happened. Piaget Crenshaw saw it all happen from her apartment window. Tiffany Mitchell was on the ground in front of Piaget Crenshaw's apartment building.

All the eyewitnesses said exactly the same thing. Yet you're assuming that the multiple lines of corroborated testimony are suspect because of the colour of the witnesses' skin. How many people need to come forward before their blackness stops being a reason to suspect them, for you?

There was no broken eye socket.

<sarcasm>How many? Five.</sarcasm>

Seriously, though, replace "are suspect" with "might be suspect". I used the word "may" for a reason. Nothing is certain yet, and no one can "assume" anything.

This isn't even about the color of their skin. It's about the witnesses being a member of the same minority/ethnicity/group as the victim. It doesn't matter which minority or group it is; it could be as broad a category as "anyone not a policeman". If there's even the slightest chance that they share an "us versus them" mindset, there may be a corresponding chance that this mindset would cause some bias in their testimonies, memories and/or perceptions. (I watched a show on PBS once that demonstrated just how easily this can unintentionally happen. It's essentially a combination of "nobody's perfect" and "confirmation bias".)

(This is also about the fact that their stories seem to contradict both Wilson's story and the autopsy evidence, but I'd rather overlook that than argue on the internet about it.)

Again, I'm not "assuming" anything; I'm open-minded enough to know that I don't have enough information to rule out the possibility. Or any possibility.

This probably deserves some emphasis: We don't have enough information to rule out any possibility. To paraphrase the famous Sherlock Holmes quote, "Only the impossible can be eliminated."

That's why the case is still being investigated in the first place, by people with more credibility, more authority, and probably more importance, than either of us.

There's only so much info you can gain from an autopsy. Not sure where the contradictions you're talking about lie tho, I searched for some but the best I could find was a discrepancy between the amount of shots and the amount of hits. Maybe... maybe some of them missed. Not to mention that killing an unarmed man for walking in the middle of the street is what the officer did. Also it's hard to trust an authority figure to be credible when they have the power to exonerate themselves. You can't overlook that.

You're assuming tons of stuff, man. You seem skeptical of the eyewitnesses on account of they are black like Michael Brown, but you don't seem to be skeptical of the police force for their race. After all, Darren Wilson's white, the Ferguson police chief is white, the guy running the investigation into whether Michael Brown's shooting is also white, the mayor of St. Louis is white, and the majority of the police force is white. Their credibility should be just as much in question (even moreso IMHO) but you seem to trust them more than the black folk for whatever reason.

Believe me, I'm not overlooking anything, I'm skeptical of everyone, and everyone's credibility is in question.

Even yours, especially when you say, "killing an unarmed man for walking in the middle of the street is what the officer did."

You sound pretty dang sure of that. If you're going to make that kind of statement, you need to acknowledge the well-documented-and-possibly-true reports that Brown attacked the officer and lunged for his gun, causing injury (but no broken eye socket). Even if this was in response to some unjustified verbal abuse (and it probably was), it's still a very bad thing to do, no matter what color anyone's skin is! Do you deny that the officer was injured? Do you deny that this is an important detail?

Do you even realize what I'm trying to argue for here? Neutrality! Neutrality in the absence of hard facts. And you're practically accusing me of racism because of this. At the same time, you're expressing a distrust of every single white guy involved, but apparently taking the eyewitness accounts as gospel, even though they seem to contradict each other with some details. I would suggest the possibility, sir, that you're being more racist than I am right now! (And that's not easy to say, because I do respect you as a person, as an artist, and as someone actually able to argue intelligently on the internet. Besides, I don't know what color your skin is. I don't care either. It's irrelevant.)

Here, have another eyewitness. This guy's version, regardless of how true it may or may not be, I consider to be the closest match to the evidence I've seen and heard. What do you think?

Ugh is this still going?

It's not well documented that he attacked the officer. That information comes from one source: the officer in question. I do deny that the officer was injured. You can find Brigitte Crenshaw's video showing the cops right after the shooting, and the guy's fine. He's walking around like "what the fuck did I just do".

You nitpick the fuck out of the multiple black eyewitnesses and excusing the traumatic violence against black citizens and the intimidation tactics and all of that but you're claiming to be neutral on this issue??? You can claim you're as neutral as you want to but your posts say otherwise.

Excusing the what now? You think I'm excusing violence? Where did I say that?

I'm starting to think you're just trolling me here.

You know what? As soon as I start suspecting deliberate trolling, it's probably a good time to stop. You clearly have your biases, and you're convinced that I have mine, and it should be obvious to both of us by now that no amount of logic or rationality or doubt (or profanity) is going to change any of this.

I have one and only one reason for continuing at this point, and that is this: I can't stand the thought of someone out there thinking I'm a racist.

So here's what I want right now: Admit that not every white guy in America is racist. A few are (and I don't like them any more than you do), but most aren't.

I have always considered it a universal truth that "there is room for doubt in all things". That is all I've really been trying to demonstrate here (apparently very badly). You don't have to share the same belief, but if you're willing to acknowledge it, and try to understand and respect it, I am willing to forgive your human failings and ask you to forgive mine.

Do you agree?

Everyone is unconsciously racist.

I'm sorry that bugs you, but it's a fact.

And it's something to strive against.

Not whine about possibly having that uncomfortable fact exposed.

Way to come to the rescue with gasoline while I'm trying to put out an argument fire.

Not everything the stand-up comedians say is true, y'know!

"Something to strive against", however, I fully agree with.

I'll just leave this here.

https://twitter.com/ShaunKing/statu.....525056/photo/1

Yes, racism sucks.

That's something we can both agree on.

Also note that the first two bullet-points are a cute way to describe the old "You're being so intolerant of my intolerance!" line.

Y'know, after accidentally learning slightly more than I wanted to about "Social Justice Warriors" and the people who get described with that term, I'm pretty sure that I defined the wrong thing here. I had "Social Justice Warrior" mixed up with some similar phrase... which isn't occurring to me right now but I know there's a word for it!

I've never even seen the term, but here's my guess:

Some people are socially conscious because it's "cool" to be that way now, which is on a grander scale perhaps nice, but it really feels supremely shallow in some cases. They don't just go "yes, I support this" but instead try to grab onto it like some sort've special thing that they are better for lauding over people as being more respectful of; but they are in no way truly invested with the subject matter. They only jump on the ship because it's presently the cool thing to be accepting over. An example: A friend o f mine knows a guy who, a few months back, was suddenly super pro-trans. Anyone who didn't agree with him 100% in every way on trans things was transphobic; in fact my (trans)husband got called transphobic but this individual for joking about it. This individual also suddenly was trans, despite having no legitimate dysphoria or the like, and so on so forth. A week later he completely abandoned any and all notion of any of it. So, obviously he was just running with whatever was cool that day/week on tumblr or whatever. I'm not sure if that sort of thing is what qualifies as "SJW" but, to me, it seems like it would.

To me, that's someone who is just kinda being a dumbass about things; you can be supportive without being some obnoxious crusader; and if you ARE going to be a crusader, be the good and positive kind, don't be an obnoxious fart about it, like he was.

With that said, I think someone who is actually reasonably socially aware and conscientious of the social ridiculousness in our society is a great thing, hands down; but some people can make even being accepting of something into a silly thing it doesn't need to be. It's kinda like the term 'white knight,' being used derogatorily. I don't particularly think it's a useful negative term, but some folks use it. I imagine SJW falls into that same realm.

Anyways, best bet is to just ignore anyone brewing up fuss for stuff like that. Dealing with trans and such is bad enough with TERF and other ridiculousness, much less with a battle of who is warrior-ing the right or wrong way. :D Easiest thing is to just not sweat stuff and support people when you can, don't have to warpath it.

pretty much most of what has already been said

and then the news that its instigated by an anti- social justice department spearheaded by none other than those who profit off this status quo

http://www.theguardian.com/environm.....ivil-breakdown

how much does anyone want to bet that the pejorative was coined by them?

I don't really understand what's wrong with even the more extreme SJWs. Like the most that they do is hold some rather silly or extreme opinions, it's not like they're banning heterosexuality or murdering people in the name of their ideals. And when SJWs are vocal about their causes, well, it kinda gets you to listen and think about it yourself, doesn't it?...

Either way, I'm glad to see that you're not one of those people that criticizes those who happen to be a bit overzealous about their beliefs.

Social Justice Warriors sounds like the name of an awful kids cartoon that tries to teach kids lessons and gets cancelled after one season. XD

it's a term used by people who don't like being made to feel uncomfortable to dismiss and demean the people who actively seek change in the status quo

personally, I find myself incapable of taking anyone who talks about 'SJWs' seriously, it says a lot about what they think and how easy it might be to reason with them

perhaps it is an exercise in hypocrisy, but I'd rather take the side that has to do with yaknow improving people's rights

no doubt some people take it to the extreme, but 'SJW' is not the word for them, that would be 'extremists'

The 'SJW' ideal seems to be a utopia where everything caters to their needs and everything is entirely perfect, which the world isn't and will never be. These people seem to thrive on people trying to prove them wrong, seem to have an ever expanding range of insults and names for groups of people who disagree with them, can literally prove people wrong through totally fabricated logic, or claim that the ones disagreeing are 'triggering' them. As someone who's been through post traumatic stress disorder, this tends to annoy me - fear can be triggered, fear can also go away after a while if you sit down and think things through rationally, or learn to deal with fear through therapy or similar. We carry things around with us, but we can overcome them.

I've heard 'triggers' being used in a kind of 'oh god that made me want to kill myself, literally, don't think I won't do it!' kind of way, which makes it some kind of urgent threat to that person's existence on this earth and really pushes the guilt on the person who 'triggered' them. There's a reason for trigger warnings sometimes, and cuts in journals with warnings, but I've heard of this being pushed into education and study due to SJW culture too. Isn't college supposed to be where your thoughts and reasoning are challenged and you learn to open your mind more? And no I'm not talking about an instance recently where a bunch of students massed, chanted, and forced a guest speaker out of a lecture simply for talking about rape from a feminist point of view.

I wish I could talk about why SJW culture is bad more without feeling at risk of offending people. The 4chan way of doing things is obviously dumb. A kinder approach is needed. I'm literally sad things like the transgender community are being tarred with this stereotype all the time online.

I'm just not really familiar with that stripe of activism. Most of the people I'm familiar with who have been called SJWs don't fit that description.

There is a bit of a silly list going around the tumblrs identifying furries who are 'known SJWs', which is silly and a lot of people on there I actually know don't fit the stereotype made in my previous post. This stereotype is what people are so against, rather than people who do constantly talk social justice issues and try to let people make their own decisions. I'm all for issues being brought up to create conversation and thought. I just dislike being told I am a terrible person for not agreeing with someone.

Yeah, nobody does!

I got real mad at one of my friends for saying stuff like cishet men were scum, you know. And I remember being all like #NotAllMen at them, because I consider myself a good person! But their opinion was based on the evidence of past experiences, how they were treated among cishet men, and comparing their experiences with the experiences of others. Ultimately, they KNOW that not all cishet men were scum, and deep down I knew that, and in retrospect it was really rude of me to butt in. People say things when they're mad, they make generalizations, w/e. But like, I can brush my shoulders off and say haters gonna hate because there haven't been any negative consequences to being cisgender, heterosexual, or male. People who are transgender are literally murdered for walking down the street because a bunch of drunk bros wanna beat someone up after leaving the bar.

I always thought the "warrior" part of Social Justice Warrior was the pejorative part, the implication being "oh you sit at your computer and try ever so hard to change the world" when the thought is that if you really wanted to change something you'd be out on the streets actually trying to change it. It wasn't so much a comment on social justice, more on the fact that these people acted like they cared and talked about it online but when push came to shove they never really did anything. I'm not saying that's actually the case, I just always thought that was what people meant when they called someone a Social Justice Warrior, like how people call other folk Keyboard Warriors for arguing on the internet. Like someone else said, I took it as something like a more theatrical synonym for slacktivism. Reading the rest of the comments though, maybe I got it all wrong.

The concept of 'slacktivism' is highly ableist, classist, and even transphobic or sexist. Many people are simply, for whatever reason, not capable of meatspace activism. The internet is what they have; the internet is REAL regardless of what 4chan trolls might claim, there are real people on the other side of the screen and their views may very well be affected by what they read and engage with. Some people might be physically disabled and unable to attend rallies; some might suffer severe agoraphobia and be unable to leave the house; some might live in fear of rape, abuse or murder if they leave the house due to being visibly transgender or even just a woman in the wrong area. The list goes on. 'Slacktivism' is a nasty term.

I didn't say that I agreed with the term slacktivism, just that that's what I thought people meant when they used the term Social Justice Warrior. Reading my comment back, I can see the problem, I should have made it clearer that I was trying to make my point from the perspective of someone who actually uses these phrases. Also, the same kinds of people who use the term Social Justice Warrior also cringe when they hear words like "ableist", so I daresay that your comment might have fallen on deaf ears if we weren't on the same side of this.

Ah, yeah, I gotcha.

One thing I always try to keep in mind when debating on the internet - argue for the audience, not the opponent. So I'll happily explain ableism and whatnot, knowing that someone might read it and learn something even if my opponent insists on keeping their head up their ass X)

Are we even allowed to use phrases like "falling on deaf ears" these days?!

Yeah "slacktivism" works sometimes! I know I'm sitting at my desk writing a comment at you and not inviting homeless people into my apartment to get out of the cold in the winter, which is one of those Jesusy acts of kindness we could be doing or whatever. I dunno about that for myself. I'm not an extremist in that regard! I think dissecting pop culture and talking about what's being presented and what's not being presented is a form of activism. This slacktivism helped me understand a lot of concepts that I had never been introduced to before. I got yelled at, I got called privileged and all that stuff, but in the end they weren't hatred, it was just the best description of how I was acting and how they felt about how I was acting.

There will always take their beliefs to ridiculous extremes (like a post I once saw that basically equated calling an old man trying to be nice as "harassment" worthy of ridicule), but once I see folks like Tim Schaefer called a SJW because he was supporting women's rights and making light of people telling him to kill himself for it, yeah, eff off.

Also the minute one of those people gets a phone call threatening their children's life is the minute I will say he "sent his army out at them. If you dunno where I am getting at with that, look up the DnD 5e controversy.

Also it's five am and I wrote this on my phone, forgive my many typos

For me, "SJW" is a term that, after someone uses it as a pejorative, let's me know I can ignore everything that person says.

They are no friends of justice
THEY ARE THE WARRIORS OF INJUSTICE

True changing of a system comes from within not from the outside tearing through and injecting their ideology forcible

I've seen social change happen both ways. c.c

OH! This is a long legitimate thing and well the issue with this internet term SJW is that the term is meant for people who pull the double standard.

You can't say A is bad then use A when its to your advantage.

So in the argument about sexism those calling out sexism are showing extreme cases of sexism. This isn't the 20- 70's rendition of social change this is some half heart ego trip to get one way or another without changing the core issues in the middle.

Rights for me but not for you mentality.

What's an example of someone calling out sexism being an extreme case of sexism? Because I suspect a lot of the frustration comes from there. That sense of unfairness and hypocrisy. I felt it too! But being mad about it is unproductive? Like I don't want to be sexist at all, so if someone has the courage to tell me something I'm doing is sexist, I tend to assume I'm being sexist! It's worth examining one's behaviour over, at least.

I don't feel like the volume of people who fit the SJW mould warrant the widespread hate they've been receiving. The problem isn't that the definition is loosey-goosey, it's that the consequences of being labled a SJW are so awful. When I talk about my life experiences, people are generally sympathetic. When my trans friends speak about their life experiences, it's DRAMA and they get Twitter stalked and generally become a target of mockery. The stakes aren't symmetrical, so the consequences of being called a SJW mean that you're fair game to be doxxed and hacked and spied on and humiliated (like what happened to Zoe Quinn recently). Not a SJW? You're fine. The decision of who is and isn't a SJW is in the hands of the harasser! Do you see the problem there?

I haven't had much contact with the term, but this is the internet, so I'll go ahead and voice my thoughts.

I think some parallels can be made to the term feminist. By dictionary definition (if a bit loosely) a feminist is someone who stands up for the equal rights and equal treatment of women, the idea that people are of equal value regardless of gender, and that women are the masters of their own destiny. It's a little simplistic, but it's also a bit of a broad term (and you already know all that). Men can (and should) be feminists, because feminism is beneficial to men, too. By breaking down gender stereotypes, men are also liberated as well. In light of the recognition that gender is not binary but a spectrum, I think the concept of feminism may be becoming out of date, but it's a good jumping off point.

Of course there are degrees of feminism, and variants of it. There are more extreme versions of it (not to be confused with saying someone is an extremIST), and there are viewpoints that claim to be feminism, which I would argue have become something else: these are the "all men are vile, violent, misogynistic pigs, and women are all better and more intelligent and should be running everything and in the dominant role in all cases" views, and this is what the actual vile, violent, misogynistic pigs like to hold up as an example of what feminism is. It polarizes the debate, resulting in pushing some folks toward more intense views, and making others with more mild, "in the middle" views to back off of the whole thing and "have no strong opinion" because that's safer and easier.

So I think that SJWs are a subset of social justice activists. SJWs are more intense, more passionite, more in-your-face at times. Some may have extreme views, some may even be extremists, and the rest are simply, in my estimation, empathetic or directly targets of some form of injustice, who have said "this is too much for too long, and things are not changing because not enough people even recognize the problem." The blogs, essays, videos, and so forth of SJWs can get annoying or frustrating even for less intense people on their side, but I don't consider that a call to dial things back. For me, sometimes the annoyance or frustration is due to the fact that I feel that I already "get it," or that a SJW has made too big of a generalization against an oppressor group that I am admittedly part of. That sparks off an internal debate about why I feel that way, and sometimes I realize it was because I didn't want to face past wrongdoing on my part; at other times I feel confident that I have been lumped in with a group for something I have not done. What I don't do is start an argument with the person to tell them why I'm not like the others.

So where was I going with this? Wherever the SJW badge came from, whether it was one pinned on with pride, or one slapped on like a warning label but co-opted all the same (perhaps like the pink triangle), it can mean different things to different people. To a feminist and like-minded individuals, feminist is a positive. On Fox News, feminist is a pejorative, and they want it to be taken as such by society at large. There is a broad area in the middle with a broad range of opinion. SJW works the same way. Among SJWs, I would imagine they will gladly identify as such, and passionate but less vocal activists will consider SJWs to be a good thing. Homophobes, racists, and misogynists will unequivocally use it as a pejorative and want you to do the same--which is not to say that if you feel uncomfortable with SJWs that you are one of those groups. In the middle, there is a broad range of views, and a broad range of opinion on what a SJW is, and what that term is going to mean.

I think it's also worth saying, and maybe I'll be called an extremist for this, that a bit of intolerance from someone who is in the oppressed position, is more acceptable and understandable because they've been oppressed. A lot of these topics can become emotionally charged very easily, and it's easy for a poorly phrased criticism about something in an article or video to be taken as an oppressive attack, regardless of the intent.

Yeah I think it's easy to forget, in a lot of the cases where social justice is at issue, that it represents an argument between a marginalized group and an entrenched majority and the stakes are therefore asymmetrical by nature!

I kindof understood the idea after I started working with some social justice stuff, but it was a long time for me to really figure out why and be able to articulate it. I had to do a lot of comparisons of issues relating to different pieces of identity I have to start figuring it out, comparing across identities where I'm part of a marginalized group, and those where I am part of a dominant group.

SJW is a term a person will use to refer to someone who basically ruins their 'way' (be it comedy, lifestyle, natural programmed speech) by informing them that it's hurtful to someone. In many cases, a person would rather argue that it's unfair to try and get them to not say/do things that are part of their 'way' while disregarding or downplaying the fact that it's hurtful.

In short, SJW is a reactionary term created by people who cannot handle being corrected.

^^^

Pretty much this. Any meaning the term once had is now completely gone. Like calling someone a 'commie' or 'fascist' in US politics.

This. It used to refer to feminists and genderqueer people that were counterproductive in their efforts for equality with how hateful they acted, now it seems to largely be used to refer to anyone that makes an asshole feel uncomfortable about acting like an asshole.

The general impression I have got is that people who might be called SJWs by some do not, by and large, argue for social justice: they argue over video games and pop culture trifles.

Also I think that they'd tend to argue in bad faith and trying to use concepts such as 'privilege' as a stick to beat people with.

Certainly I think the term SJW is also used to dismiss what someone is saying without examining rationally what they have said. People who could be called SJWs use terms like "dudebro", "garbage person" &c. to dismiss people, I think.

Also also, I think a lot of it is tied to US politics and culture and especially how polarized it is and the love of confrontation and dividing people up into 2 groups to match the two party system (two parties both for the rich though).

The civil rights movement has been brewing since the mid 50s. Third wave feminism has been calling white males on their privilege since the 70s. The LGBT rights movement have been fighting since Stonewall. "Social justice" is not a new concept.

So lets briefly be honest with ourselves.

The reason most people are currently angry about "social justice" right now is because 1. its on tumblr a lot, it annoys them, and they can't figure out how to use a plugin to block keywords like "die" "cis" or "scum" or 2. they are a gamer and they are being faced with change. Group #1 can use Google to find a good Tumblr filter, they are collectively a big boy, so I will discuss group #2.

Gamers are insanely conservative creatures. The Them vs Us wars over comparatively pointless issues like Sega vs Nintendo, Sony vs Microsoft, or Melee vs Brawl are waged at the figurative drop of a hat. Gamers hate change, unless its change that already fits into their preconceived purchasing patterns. They are used to being pandered to, and their entire hobby could be distilled down to $60 power and control fantasies.

Gamers are finding themselves on the "wrong end" of history for the first time and they are hilariously unprepared for it. Many don't know what they're fighting for, or why they're fighting for it, outside of the threat of something changing. They are willing to violently protect their chosen consumer identity, simply because somebody said "video games" at some point. Many of them literally fear that Anita Sarkeesian will personally ruin their video games forever.

Honestly, this fight is not about the rank and file gamer. In ten years none of these people will remember what happened in 2014, just as nobody remembers Jack Thompson as anything but a stale joke. Their outrage is at best a stepping stone to discussing the matter with higher powers like developers, writers, and publishers, and even that is a stepping stone to a broader goal.

So those are my thoughts on that.

Just have to say:

#GamerGate LOLOLOLOLOL

It's kind of the same way calling someone a furry might be an insult. People take the worst of the community and use that to represent the whole. There's some really rotten eggs in the social justice movement who have some pretty far out ideas, and they're REALLY LOUD, so people take them to be the leaders and not the outliers. Kinda like us 'furverts' ruining the 'fandom', people don't like the oddballs and it colours the whole movement.

That's one reason anyways.

Then there's folks like some of my close friends, who might use SJW as a slur partially because of what I said above, but largely because we don't like the idea of someone taking offence on a third party's behalf, which is a big part of the social justice movement. We're a bunch of humanists who think of social justice warriors as the lunatic fringe at best, and actively hurting the causes they claim to support at worst.

Reason three, anybody calling themselves a warrior in any context besides roleplay is making a mockery of themselves. It's a silly term. Even if you see social justice as a war and yourself fighting that war as literally a warrior, it's a silly term. You could call yourself a social justice advocate or a social justice activist or something like that, and less people would make fun of the term. But probably some people still would for the reasons I gave above.


As for the real question you asked, why is it so bad to argue for social justice, well it's not really. It's just an easy target for trolls. The stereotype for the social justice warrior is a young person with high ideals, who hasn't learned the value of temperance yet. So they flip out and the trolls enjoy themselves. So, continue to argue for social justice if you want. There's nothing wrong with it, and you're an older and wiser person (I think) than the stereotype, so you won't feed the trolls.

After reading the other replies to your post, I feel I should clarify that my friends and I probably wouldn't call someone a Social Justice Warrior that didn't self-identify as such. I said we might use it as a slur, but only in reference to someone who calls themselves that already. We wouldn't use it as an innate slur, like some people do.

Well for pretty much all those reasons I would never publicly identify myself as a furry because of the stigma attached to that label by loud an obnoxious fuckheads from both inside and outside of the group, I would likewise not publically identify myself using the term 'feminist' because nowadays its needs a big fat fuckin' asterisk attached to it to clarify that I support it in terms of socially treating people the same regardless of sex, gender, race, etc.

That's a shame. I still call myself a furry despite the stigma. And I guess it's kind of a silly term too. ^.^;;

People don't actually call themselves Social Justice Warriors except as a joke. Most people just say 'I'm an activist' when they're being serious.

I've heard of people using the term, but I just asked my go-to guy for dealing with crazies and he says they don't really call themselves that, so I guess I made a big fool out of myself more than responding to Swatcher's "Let's see who comes out of the woodwork" post. :/

Please don't refer to anyone as 'crazies'. That's hugely offensive and ableist.

I like you Farore and I don't want to be on your bad side, but I think you're being oversensitive and unreasonable here. :/

Calling my comment ableist is particularly awful. I can understand not calling someone 'retarded', that's cruel, but not calling people a common term like 'crazy'? What words do you want me to use to describe the lunatic fringe ideologues that I disgree with? I suppose you don't like me using the term lunatic either. :/

If someone tells me the earth is flat I'll call them crazy, and there should be no relation to ableism at all.

Haha, you've been on my bad side for ages, your particular brand of offensive is not something I can handle.

It is not awful of me to call you out for what you are doing. No, you shouldn't call people crazies or lunatics. Just because you disagree with someone does not make them mentally ill. Neither is being mentally ill a thing to be derogatory about. It's just the same as calling someone 'gay' (or better yet a f*ggot) because you disagree with them. It's offensive. I'm sorry you don't like being called out on being offensive; maybe you shouldn't be offensive, in that case.

That's a shame. I really do like you, and I don't try to be offensive. I'm open to talking about it if you are, but you just said it's not something you can handle. It makes me feel kind of sick that there are people out there who I like who dislike me so much they can't handle me. :/

Anyways I gave it some thought after what you said and I probably am ableist. I deal with people who have physical and mental disabilities all the time and it's a constant trial on my socialist ideology. I'm disabled myself and I constantly fear becoming worse, like a paranoid schizophrenic. Even the way I am now, I sometimes feel like less of a person for being disabled, and I can't help but mirror that on other disabled people, though I try not to.

Still there's one sticking point. You didn't answer my question. What should I call the ideologues I disagree with?

What do you call me?

'People I disagree with'? 'Extremists'? Anything that isn't a slur?

I would call you a bigot, given your behavior and what you've just explained.

Because there is no such thing, in a pluralistic liberal democracy, as "the right not to be offended by someone or something else".

Because there is a difference between threatening behaviour, libel, slander and incitement (against which there absolutely should be legal remedies), and merely being offensive and obnoxious (which cannot be criminalised unless you wish to go down a very deep and dangerous rabbithole). Going around saying, "All fags should be rounded up and shot, starting with Mr XYZ living at XXX Apartment, XTown. Who's with me?!" certainly should be a matter for the authorities; just saying, "I can't stand fags!" certainly should not.

Because the far left, having conspicuously failed to conquer the world, seems to have settled for the next best thing, namely conquering language and culture. That many movies don't pass the Bechdel Test, or that the characters in Mad Men are sexist and smoke a lot of cigarettes, has nothing whatsoever to do with "justice".

"SJW" is code, usually, for "marginalized person talking about things that pertain to their life."
By using the abstract term here, "Social Justice Warrior" posits that, no, justice doesn't pertain to the person's life, they're obviously some teenager who's just doing a bandwagon because it feels cool, and it won't affect them anyway.
Usually the people who call people that are already members of privileged groups who can't understand the idea of being marginalized and wanting to fix it. They see attempts to rectify the system as half-assed and shallow brownie points.

These are the people who went out in droves to see "Avatar" and "Dances with Wolves," [/sub]the kind who internalize the idea of privilege being inherent and obvious. "I, Chad Cracker, absolve myself of white guilt by joining the marginalized group! What's this? You marginalized people who have lived your lives your whole life have spontaneously decided to make me, Chad Cracker, the public face of your movement and undisputed leader, because I, a white person, know what's best for you? Shucks!"
Or [url=http://www.robot-hugs.com/pitch/]this. Basically, these people think that their own superiority is omnipresent ("Oh, I'm the dude, I'm the superpowered protagonist who's better than everyone else and entitled to everything!") and the stories they relate to reflect that odd sense.
I love that phrase. "They want to be an oppressed minority group without ever being oppressed."
This mode of thinking drives the phrase "SJW," the insinuation that everything is made up and it doesn't reflect anything, so shut up, it's annoying.
Near as I can figure out.

This is a really late reply, but I hope that you'll take the time to read my response.

There's nothing wrong with social justice. There's nothing wrong with fighting for it. There's no inherent problem that I think that anyone who does so. That having been said, I think that many of the people who label themselves "social justice warriors" go about in very much the wrong way. I'm a member of a number of the communities that are mostly tied up with SWJ politics, and I see damage that these self dubbed SJWs do. They swing so widely and so hard that they strike people who are trying to approach the communities. These are people who have grown up learning to hate themselves, so when they're approached by someone from within the community that they are seeking to enter for support, and they are met with this incredible vitriol... it can be very bad.

The persecution going on toward minority groups is a really awful thing, but the issue that I have with a lot of the angriest members of social justice movements is that they turn the anger in on the community itself. They do and say hurtful things to members of the group, calling out people they think are unworthy of the community's help, or have said things that the SJW in question disagrees with. They out people who aren't ready to be outed. They can do some very hurtful things to individuals in the name of the "greater good."

Again. Social justice is worth fighting for. The very particular group that has taken up the name "social justice warriors" to describe themselves, though... is something that I look very warily at. I hope that makes sense to you.

I don't think anyone calls themselves a social justice warrior except as kind of a joke, unless something's changed recently that I didn't know about.

The big reason people in your communities are angry, and I'm guessing because this is the case in the communities I'm a part of, is that they've come to these communities for support and understanding and a common interest, but often find themselves being singled out and insulted and harassed. People don't consider them a member of the community and their difference is always highlighted and made light of. In gamer culture, the harassment campaigns mounted against prominent feminists is covered under an excuse of journalistic ethics, also allegedly the "greater good". There's a tendency to conflate criticism with attack, but I dunno, that doesn't seem right to me.

It's hard to change an unfair culture without making some people mad because they like things the way they are.

Oh god, please don't think that I'm defending gamergate. That is a terrible situation where someone who, at most, did something personally (NOT publicly) hurtful to someone else in her private life is having her life ruined by a hateful group of people dead set on eliminating the influence of any gender other than male from a social space.

It's that majority that most associates criticism with attack, simply because they themselves have never even been in a situation where they might be attacked for who they are, and have no appreciation of it.

What you say at the end there is very true. The people fighting hardest to keep the system as it is are a huge current problem. The people was describing don't actually have a problem with the system, only that they are the victims rather than the abusers.