I've been trying to formulate a reply to this for a while that goes beyond, 'hey, I definitely agree with this!' or echolalic repetition of what has already been said.
I've noticed the 'hateability' as well, although I haven't used the same wording for it. The idea that someone's identity is so 'weird' and 'freaky' that it must have several people ganging up and laughing at it or going out of their way to harass others about the fact that they dare have an identity that doesn't fit into the traditional Western norms. Psychiatric language is clumsily applied to it, even if it doesn't always fit (and it's most galling with trans people—as I've said multiple times, even the psychiatric community doesn't condemn transgender people, even nonbinaries, to the extent that these hateful people do). And there just...seems to be a lack of willingness for these people to reconsider how identity works, and whether a monistic, black-and-white view is even always appropriate for most people. They just sit there with their preconceived notions, and are unwilling to think about the impact that these notions have on people who may be outside of them. You're Wrong, with a capital W. How dare you experience more than one mind within a body; that's crazy talk. How can you identify with wolves or other nonhuman animals? You're clearly insane. How can you want to transition? You're clearly convinced that you're something other than what you actually are. And 'what you actually are' is always an assigned sex, or something else that someone is told to be growing up, not something they come to realise after they've developed enough to be able to analyse their identity, and come up with a mature conceptualisation of who they are, and how they should move through the world. 'What you really are' is always arbitrary, a conceptualisation of you that is created before you really have much of a say in the matter, and that is probably one of the most disturbing things about 'hateability' and the 'you must have a one-to-one correspondence with certain physical characteristics OR YOU ARE CRAZY AND NEED TO BE CURED!' mentality.
I feel uncomfortable with the clumsy use of social-justice language applied to groups like otherkin, as well. Not that otherkin aren't being attacked by the people who do consider their identities 'hateable', but that as all of you have said, the metaphors are stretched thin. They work well when talking about racial, gender or sexual-orientation oppression, but with subjective identities like otherkin or fictivity within plural systems, it really doesn't work in the same way. I feel that these people are trying to find some framework to discuss their difficulties being accepted within various communities, and because the culture of Tumblr social justice/identity acceptance tends towards privilege checklists and clear Privileged/Oppressed Hierarchies, they use this language and philosophy to describe their own experiences, even if it isn't as effective as taking another tack. Social influences have a lot to do with it, as does the lack of discussion about subjective identity and its nature within most parts of Western culture. In fact, one of our primary criticism of the 'plurality CANNOT EXIST WTF BBQ' school of thought is that the straight one-to-one correspondence between body and mind is a Western cultural trope, rather than an immutable reality that has existed throughout all time. I know that this applies to gender identity as well—the 'only two genders that always correspond with genitalia and chromosomes and can never be altered or fluctuate' is an idea that is related to a particular set of cultural stereotypes, and doesn't apply to all cultures that people have ever belonged to.
I don't think that hierarchical, dualistic thinking applies well to 'hateable' identities, either. My primary issue is with strict, black-and-white 'sceptical' (I put it in quotation marks, because I feel that this sort of 'scepticism' is often just as dogmatic as religious fundamentalism, except that it has an 'academic' or 'scientific' veneer over it) thinking, and how it's used to criticise identities that are based in something else other than genotype or phenotype. The problem with this sort of thinking is that it views cognition as a black box, or as something that's subordinate to genetic configurations and the phenotypes that those genes switch on in people, rather than identity formation as a psychological or philosophical construct, or how people can logically view themselves as being separate or different from their bodies without necessarily being 'deluded'.
They're missing the nuance. Identities have to be simple and black-and-white for them to be real.
This is such a dangerous philosophy, and there are some days and nights when I think about it and I get frustrated enough that I can't think straight, which is usually a reminder for me to get the fuck off Tumblr or avoid forums/media that aren't designated safe spaces.
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Date: 2012-02-13 10:30 am (UTC)I've noticed the 'hateability' as well, although I haven't used the same wording for it. The idea that someone's identity is so 'weird' and 'freaky' that it must have several people ganging up and laughing at it or going out of their way to harass others about the fact that they dare have an identity that doesn't fit into the traditional Western norms. Psychiatric language is clumsily applied to it, even if it doesn't always fit (and it's most galling with trans people—as I've said multiple times, even the psychiatric community doesn't condemn transgender people, even nonbinaries, to the extent that these hateful people do). And there just...seems to be a lack of willingness for these people to reconsider how identity works, and whether a monistic, black-and-white view is even always appropriate for most people. They just sit there with their preconceived notions, and are unwilling to think about the impact that these notions have on people who may be outside of them. You're Wrong, with a capital W. How dare you experience more than one mind within a body; that's crazy talk. How can you identify with wolves or other nonhuman animals? You're clearly insane. How can you want to transition? You're clearly convinced that you're something other than what you actually are. And 'what you actually are' is always an assigned sex, or something else that someone is told to be growing up, not something they come to realise after they've developed enough to be able to analyse their identity, and come up with a mature conceptualisation of who they are, and how they should move through the world. 'What you really are' is always arbitrary, a conceptualisation of you that is created before you really have much of a say in the matter, and that is probably one of the most disturbing things about 'hateability' and the 'you must have a one-to-one correspondence with certain physical characteristics OR YOU ARE CRAZY AND NEED TO BE CURED!' mentality.
I feel uncomfortable with the clumsy use of social-justice language applied to groups like otherkin, as well. Not that otherkin aren't being attacked by the people who do consider their identities 'hateable', but that as all of you have said, the metaphors are stretched thin. They work well when talking about racial, gender or sexual-orientation oppression, but with subjective identities like otherkin or fictivity within plural systems, it really doesn't work in the same way. I feel that these people are trying to find some framework to discuss their difficulties being accepted within various communities, and because the culture of Tumblr social justice/identity acceptance tends towards privilege checklists and clear Privileged/Oppressed Hierarchies, they use this language and philosophy to describe their own experiences, even if it isn't as effective as taking another tack. Social influences have a lot to do with it, as does the lack of discussion about subjective identity and its nature within most parts of Western culture. In fact, one of our primary criticism of the 'plurality CANNOT EXIST WTF BBQ' school of thought is that the straight one-to-one correspondence between body and mind is a Western cultural trope, rather than an immutable reality that has existed throughout all time. I know that this applies to gender identity as well—the 'only two genders that always correspond with genitalia and chromosomes and can never be altered or fluctuate' is an idea that is related to a particular set of cultural stereotypes, and doesn't apply to all cultures that people have ever belonged to.
I don't think that hierarchical, dualistic thinking applies well to 'hateable' identities, either. My primary issue is with strict, black-and-white 'sceptical' (I put it in quotation marks, because I feel that this sort of 'scepticism' is often just as dogmatic as religious fundamentalism, except that it has an 'academic' or 'scientific' veneer over it) thinking, and how it's used to criticise identities that are based in something else other than genotype or phenotype. The problem with this sort of thinking is that it views cognition as a black box, or as something that's subordinate to genetic configurations and the phenotypes that those genes switch on in people, rather than identity formation as a psychological or philosophical construct, or how people can logically view themselves as being separate or different from their bodies without necessarily being 'deluded'.
They're missing the nuance. Identities have to be simple and black-and-white for them to be real.
This is such a dangerous philosophy, and there are some days and nights when I think about it and I get frustrated enough that I can't think straight, which is usually a reminder for me to get the fuck off Tumblr or avoid forums/media that aren't designated safe spaces.