I think a lot of the disagreement about these issues boils down to: if you think you're right, what rights does that give you? Do you get to abrogate social standards? And if you don't, what recourse do you have to draw attention to your cause?



People bring up civil rights era sit-ins, but I'm not sure nonviolent protests and boycotts wash with or correspond to people's angry rhetoric. And whether or not to use that rhetoric was similar controversial then, hence the gamut of civil rights leaders from MLK, SNCC, Malcolm X, and the black power movement.



In comparison, I use the gay rights movement as an example of where that rhetoric has definitely not worked; people didn't start approving of gay marriage because people were getting in their faces and playing identity politics, they approved of it because homosexuals demonstrated to their peers, their neighbors, and their families that they weren't any different than them, except in who they loved.



The thing I agree with most is the "white straight male wrote this, ignore" stuff though. If the recourse is to attack the person rather than the opinion, you're essentially proving him right that identity matters more than substance. Not to mention from a pragmatic standpoint, you will get nowhere by antagonizing a majority of people.



The bit about millennials just strikes me as the usual "this generation is different!" stuff we go through. People don't fundamentally change, in terms of how we operate—while there are certainly going to be differences in values and beliefs between generations, you can't act like we're some different species.

Last edited by Fuchsdh; Today at 05:24 PM .