destroy the idea that intermediate goals aren’t important. maybe you can’t play the entire piano piece yet, but you can play the right hand and that’s good. maybe you haven’t figured out your major yet, but your minor or your field and that’s progress. maybe you can’t hold a full conversation in your target language yet, but you can ask for directions and that’s fine. setting high goals is good, but don’t diminish the small goals you achieve on your way there. they are just as important.
I feel like the best way to respond to someone you’re friends with making gross, racist, sexist etc. jokes isn’t to argue with them or call them out directly, but just to kind of wince at them like they just did something incredibly inappropriate and awkward and try to change the subject. Like, almost in an exaggerated way, like you’re just really disgusted and want to forget they said it. Arguing with them lets them 1) shoehorn you as a “SJW” and shut themselves off to you 2) defend their opinion or feel like they did and 3) lets you end up categorized as the person who did the inappropriate thing by making a “big deal” out of it. But acting like you would with any extremely gross and inappropriate thing makes it harder for them to mentally defend themselves and thus to avoid feeling weird and ashamed. It prevents them from getting in any way satisfied by your reaction or validated in their views. It makes them the person that broke a rule. And anyway, it is really gross and inappropriate to joke like that. It has to be a taboo, not just a viewpoint or a style of humor that some people don’t like. If you argue, it frames the issue as an opinion. If you just show disgust and displeasure and treat the offensive material like you would a pile of dog shit on a sidewalk you’re walking down, it’s not arguable. It’s an action, with nothing intellectual about it, and there’s nothing for them to defend against.
Anyone have any thoughts? Has anybody tried this?
This is straight up how I deal with the subtle racist and homophobic behaviours a lot of people exhibit, as well as the use of slurs. Wince. Make a face. Look away. Get really quiet. Change the subject. Personal favourite is just just to say “dude” quietly and loaded w disgust.
And you wanna know what?? It fucking works. I’ve observed a decrease in these behaviours in the people I react this way to. OP is totally right, don’t give them the chance to turn it into a ‘discussion’, just skip directly to shame.
Make them realize they’re not edgy or shocking, they’re boring and embarrassing.
The purest form of love, I think, is having someone who wants to learn about you, from you and with you.
“There was another life that I might have had, but I am having this one.”
- Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go
