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a bit of sad background: I grew up in a racist family. Crazy racist, appallingly racist, any disappointing adjective you can add to racist, that was my extended family. I was an adult before I heard brazil nuts called brazil nuts. I've heard terms that to this day, I'm not sure which group was being slammed. My family also invented horrible terms, because I guess, there weren't enough racist slurs to go around.
I struggle with that upbringing when I try to discuss racism or homophobia or being a decent human being. Because, while I know over-the-top racism, I'm pretty tone-deaf about the less-obvious ones. Moe had to clue me in on "oriental describes things, not people" Shamefully, I should have known that, and I've never used that word that way since, and I'm not trying to dodge any "oh Opera" I deserve, I'm just trying to explain that my thinking was "I'm trying to use a "good" word instead term X, Y, or Z."
I'm not proud of that moment Moe had to correct me, but it did solidify my position on slurs. They aren't about the speaker; they're about who they're aimed at, who's hearing them. My intent really doesn't matter if it has the capacity to hurt someone. A proper reaction isn't "I didn't mean it that way"; it's "I'm sorry."
The "wifey" secret and one of the series of replies at Wrestlesecrets triggered that in me. "Wifey" bugs me for a lot of reasons: way to perpetuate heteronormality you transgressive slashers you, way to devalue friendship (especially between women) by suggesting marriage should be the ultimate goal of relationships (and its high point), and mostly because (and this is where I'm worried I'm making a super fail)I feel like it totally shits on people who can't get married.
Fandom likes to wallow in wangsty-ness about two people, deeply in love, who can't marry. Love disrespected is awful, yes. But the true crime in the gay marriage problem is the socio-economic impact. The easiest way to marginalize a group is to stymie them economically. To make the issue totally about relationships mocks the economic kicks to the teeth people take. It mocks real struggles and real deprivation-- deprivation that doesn't have to exist. It's not about love or "finishing each other's sentences"; it's about the fact that some people get tax cuts and no-hassle health insurance for being straight and some people pay more tax and possibly go without health insurance because they love someone of the same sex.
So, to me, calling each other "wifey" on the internet seems like a shitty co-option of a term other people braved physical danger and social trauma and economic deprivation in order to say in the privacy of their own homes.
I struggle with that upbringing when I try to discuss racism or homophobia or being a decent human being. Because, while I know over-the-top racism, I'm pretty tone-deaf about the less-obvious ones. Moe had to clue me in on "oriental describes things, not people" Shamefully, I should have known that, and I've never used that word that way since, and I'm not trying to dodge any "oh Opera" I deserve, I'm just trying to explain that my thinking was "I'm trying to use a "good" word instead term X, Y, or Z."
I'm not proud of that moment Moe had to correct me, but it did solidify my position on slurs. They aren't about the speaker; they're about who they're aimed at, who's hearing them. My intent really doesn't matter if it has the capacity to hurt someone. A proper reaction isn't "I didn't mean it that way"; it's "I'm sorry."
The "wifey" secret and one of the series of replies at Wrestlesecrets triggered that in me. "Wifey" bugs me for a lot of reasons: way to perpetuate heteronormality you transgressive slashers you, way to devalue friendship (especially between women) by suggesting marriage should be the ultimate goal of relationships (and its high point), and mostly because (and this is where I'm worried I'm making a super fail)I feel like it totally shits on people who can't get married.
Fandom likes to wallow in wangsty-ness about two people, deeply in love, who can't marry. Love disrespected is awful, yes. But the true crime in the gay marriage problem is the socio-economic impact. The easiest way to marginalize a group is to stymie them economically. To make the issue totally about relationships mocks the economic kicks to the teeth people take. It mocks real struggles and real deprivation-- deprivation that doesn't have to exist. It's not about love or "finishing each other's sentences"; it's about the fact that some people get tax cuts and no-hassle health insurance for being straight and some people pay more tax and possibly go without health insurance because they love someone of the same sex.
So, to me, calling each other "wifey" on the internet seems like a shitty co-option of a term other people braved physical danger and social trauma and economic deprivation in order to say in the privacy of their own homes.
