mr_engineer

You should thank your lucky, privileged stars that people are taking your racist opinions seriously.

There are open-minded cis-people who will tell you to your face that they support you. There are also people who will call out transphobia and condemn transphobes just to sound 'cool' to the woke crowd. Now, here's my point - these people cannot create sustainable change for you in the cis-community. The reason for it is this - the real problem you're dealing with in the cis-community isn't the open-minded people. They're on your side, actually. And you should accommodate for them. The real problem is the closed-minded bigots in the cis-community. These are the people who will defend the bro-code to the death. And, as supportive as the groups of people mentioned above are, they also have an ego of a cis-person. And, the closed-minded people, who are religious for the most part, will be able to put enough pressure on their egos to not show up for you when you need them. Which is why the supportive people will turn out to be shallow. And this could reinforce your resentment towards cis-people. Do not make the mistake of trusting a sweet-talking cis-person. Even if they're well-intentioned, they most likely won't be mature enough to be able to show up when you need them. I would prefer that you trust a cis-person who is willing to admit to the ego-issues in the cis-community. Cuz they will show you the obstacles that'll come up when you create change. To question your cis-identity requires serious inner-work. And, that takes incentives. Cuz you're playing with your ego here. It's not trivial stuff. There you go. One big thing that the LGBT-community has to offer to cis-people, is the knowledge that masculinity and femininity do not have to link to gender. I think it would be a much more fruitful endeavor for the LGBT-community to focus on offering this to the cis-community, than to directly fight bigotry. Cis-people who benefit from these teachings, will then get the right tools to break out of the control-structures created by the fundamentalist bigots. It's not sucking up. You don't have to pretend to be cis or deny your trans-identity in doing this. It's just being on good terms with those cis-people who are on good terms with you. HTH!!

It is possible to find principled individuals, for sure. Having said that, this is not the majority of open-minded cis-people. Most open-minded cis-people are decent people and are open-minded to you telling them about trans stuff but when push comes to shove, will they support you?! I'm not sure whether it's realistic. Again, you're saying that they should, and I agree with you. It is the right thing to do. But, will they?! There are consequences for them too. Why should they risk losing being on good terms with their in-group? Why should they crusade for trans-people? Do you have a solution to these problems of theirs? The LGBT-community should think about this. If you do, you're set! If I stand up against the bro-code, the cis-people will be like 'What is your problem? What are you losing because of the bro-code?! Just relax and be on good terms with us, we'll be nice to you.' The average (decent, by the way) cis-person does not have an incentive to stand up against it and every incentive to enable it. Someone has to say 'I have a problem with your bro-code, this is wrong, this is how it actually hurts me' for them to actually take the possibility of changing it seriously. If you want an explanation for the (irrational, as you correctly say, but real) backlash that you're getting on this thread, this is it. This is the reality of open-minded cis-people. And, I think that if you want to get anywhere with this, your first goal must be, to get on good terms with them. Because, as well-intentioned as they are, they need an incentive to take these kinds of risks for you. HTH!!

When you say you don't think it's pretentious or savioristic, I agree with you. Having said that, it's very easy to build that kind of reputation in your own in-group when you go against the collective ego of that group and call out transphobia. Because no victim, no crime. And people don't like to admit to the existence of a victim if someone (like a trans-person who has been a victim of transphobia) doesn't claim to be one. I'll give a very relatable example. Why is it so hard for a man to call out other men's sexism? Women look at that and they're like 'Just hold other men accountable! Step up and 'be a man'.' It's not that easy. You will build the reputation of a 'simp' among men if you try to 'hold them accountable'. But, women don't get this, cuz they don't understand the bro-code or the point of it. I am not trying to discourage your solution in any way, shape or form. It is the right solution, in fact. I'm just showing you the depth of the problem that you're dealing with in cis-dominated spaces. I believe in your ability to come up with something better to raise awareness about LGBT-issues. Because, and I'm sorry to say this, this responsibility falls on the shoulders of the LGBT-community. It is an unfair deal for you. It's not your fault, it's just the way things are. And, before your ego resists what I'm saying, I'd like you to consider this - most transphobes don't wake up one day and say 'Okay. Should I hate trans-people or should I accept them? What ideology serves me and my community the best? Is it transphobia?! Alright. Transphobia it is.' That's not how a transphobe is made. It is unconsciously conditioned into them and they simply go along with it. Which means, that this is a powerful opportunity for activists (you may or may not put yourself in this category) to educate open-minded cis-people about what it means to be 'trans' and what your lives are like and what rights you lack, etc. To someone who really wants to resolve this issue - I'd recommend that you really understand religion and the origins of transphobia. It will help you pick your battles well. And create an impact that actually matters. You will need open-minded cis-people on your side. And, I'm showing you how you can do that. HTH!!

@bejapuskas Here's my 2 cents on this issue - the root-level solution to transphobia is to question the cis identity. People do struggle with this. Most cis men and women struggle to even build a cis identity to begin with! Let alone question it. If you ask me 'Where's the help for trans-people?! That's cis-privilege!', I agree. It is cis-privilege. We don't have our own shit figured out yet. So, it's going to be very difficult for us to help trans-people and all of our help will be riddled with 'benevolent transphobia', so to speak. And, I think that trans-people would benefit a lot more from trans role-models than from cis-people actively doing stuff for them. Yeah, fine, cis-people can help you. But, we barely understand the problems that trans-people go through! It's actually very difficult for us to empathize with trans-people. We do not want to be arrogant enough to assume that we know more. And, please excuse our ignorance as it shows here. This is how educating ideologically stubborn adults works. Edit - I understand you have an issue with cis people looking at this thing from a cis perspective, being unable to set aside their cis-identity while doing so and being given air-time to do so. Here's the thing - on this forum specifically, the emphasis will be placed on using this air-time to questioning the cis-identity and ignorant perspectives. I think explicit transphobia will be moderated. And, the fact that Leo himself is cis and not trans does play into this. The issue is that cis people have literally no experience of being trans. If you just have a problem with being on a forum headed by a cishet white male and those biases showing themselves, which they inevitably will, feel free to start your own community for trans-people!

Here, in India, we have the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT). It's known as the best engineering-university in the country. They have a MCQ entrance-exam that's known as one of the hardest on the planet. Because it's ultra-tricky. And, I'm planning on coaching students to crack this exam. I'm able to take the freedom to experiment with a new model of education-system precisely because the exam is not a subjective test, in which they memorize stuff. They have to deeply understand the concepts and apply them to solve tricky, complex problems. And, there is a massive gap in the coaching-industry and I have found a way to meet this need because I watch Leo's videos and I understand some epistemology. This is where I get to convince the parents. Because, an education-system that believes that 'the map is the territory', fails miserably to help students think and deepen their conceptual understanding! Let's see what happens!

Yes. But, I don't think that having a debate-video about a racist talking-point creates more racists. I think it brings to the surface people's pre-existing racism and addresses it. I don't know much about the topic, to be honest. This was not a discussion about racism to begin with. I just gave an extreme example of a BS claim that people genuinely believe and rationalize to themselves and that those rationalizations should be directly addressed.

Fair enough. Here's how it goes - the debaters like to 'pretend' that they're debating in good faith and the audience, because they have their own intellectual egos, like to 'pretend' that they're watching a debate happening in good faith. We even have different definitions of 'good faith'! And, every individual intellectual caters to their audience's definition of 'good faith'. That's why they have an image of an intellectual and that's why they have an audience. I'm talking about the bigger, fairly respected players here. The Sam Harris types, the Ben Shapiro types, the Jordan Peterson types. Controversial to the woke audience, but respected by their audience. Not trash-talkers who pop off huge today and are nowhere to be seen tomorrow.

Yeah, I mean, that's what today's good manners are, right?! Be PC, don't judge people off the color of their skin, etc. Yeah, fine, you can be a rebellious teen and become racist in that process. Because, say, their high-school friends were racist. But, as they grow older, become more mature and understand their PC parents more, I think they can stop being racist! Racism as a reaction to PC values is definitely a step backwards, not forwards. The real racist people inherit that stuff from their parents. Their parents were racist. As a parent, your morality can make a huge difference. This is a much harder problem to solve. I really don't know the solution to this one.

You do have a point, that people get indoctrinated with content that they don't think about, that they don't actively listen to. The issue of passive listening vs active listening. The root-cause of this issue is the epistemology of our education-system, or our definition of 'knowledge'. We define 'knowledge' as words. The map is the territory. So, if you're drinking in words, you're 'getting educated' or 'getting knowledge'. Passive listening is given undeserved credence. The solution is to change the epistemic-structure of the education-system. Or, create a new education-system where the definition of 'knowledge' is not 'words', but 'awareness'. And, students will be expected to actively listen, or else they will miss out on what they need to pass exams. The bar of listening must be raised and the teaching must be made interesting and applicable to reality. I've worked on this new design of an education-system. I'm in the process of implementing it right now. I will be sure to get back to you once it's up and running, when I'm supporting myself off of it!

So, is it now the government's responsibility to teach children good manners?! Do that in the schools, if you must. All kinds of people exist in the real world. Why not the online world? Parents can feel free to teach their children about right vs wrong. I think the free-market can solve this problem. The ones who are the best-equipped will pop off in the public intellectual space. And, the best-quality content will be from people debating in good faith. They have a very stable and steadily improving place on the internet, even if they're not as popular as the bad-faith debaters. Fair enough.

If they want bullshit, they'll seek it out. Either it'll happen on your watch, or not. The solution, really, is to understand why they're holding onto what they're holding onto, and come up with an intellectual position/information that'll better help them achieve their goals. Public intellectuals fill this need. That's why they have an audience. It's not because they're peddling 'truth'! When Leo says that the point of all media is to be 'factually accurate', I don't fully agree with that. Because people seek out BS even when the truth is readily accessible! And, if you want people to 'be in reality', (which really means, be in your reality), that will never fully happen. Not mentally. But, if you meet the right conscious people, you can have them be in your reality, emotionally! This is a deeper reason for ideological crusades. That people are trying to fill the void for emotional connection with mental agreement, because they identify with their minds.

Every individual is free to make up their mind about the conclusion of the debate. That's the beauty of my solution!

Yes, they should. If it's that false, people will use their better judgement, decide for themselves whether it was debunked or not and take their call. If you're hinting at me, I'm not a pro at this. I'm not peddling anything, honestly. I don't gain a dime convincing you of anything. There are better people than me doing this work.

It's debate-worthy because people believe it and act on it. And, you're not going to change their mind by banning them in one place. They're going to go elsewhere and act in racist ways. And, they have insane rationalizations for believing that. This shit has to be debunked, right?! And, it has to be given air-time for the debunking to be given air-time. I agree that racism is a problem. I disagree with the solution-technique, though.

If that's true, I'm very sorry that happened to you. It is an offensive idea and the offence should be acknowledged. Having said that, it is obvious disinformation and it should be up for debate, just for the purposes of debunking it. It's kind of a chicken-move, to ban someone for stating their false opinion. It emboldens them more. You have to resolve this by debate. The issue with not doing this and banning people left, right and center, is that when the truth is not so clear, power gets abused. What I gave you is a very extreme example, where the truth is very clear. But, when it's up for debate, the platforms should allow that debate to happen. Otherwise, it comes across as a chicken-move, like they have something to hide.

Don't make this personal.

Oh, you'd be surprised.

'Dog' is a slur, isn't it?! So is 'monkey'. But, when you say 'we want to change the name of the monkeypox virus cuz that name is racist', that's being a snowflake. Here's my solution to this - The first thing we have to do is that we have to stop demonizing hate as an emotion. Everyone feels it. The next thing is to be able to look at whether someone who feels hate, is acting out of that hate or not. Whether they're being rational in their action or not. Don't ask me how this will get done. I'm just putting out a solution that I think is better than what exists, and I do think this can be done. I'm not sure about how, yet. That'll depend on other factors.

And these behaviors do come out of hate. So, hate-speech includes but is not limited to these behaviors. But, when you limit the definition of hate-speech to these behaviors and then when you see someone actively engaging in a debate about whether white people are intellectually superior to black people or not, actively working on their racism, that can also be classed as 'hate-speech' by black people listening. Because it can evoke a feeling of 'unfairness' or 'being hated' or 'offence' on the part of black people listening. Because, the racist is coming from a place of being biased against black people. They are prejudiced to begin with. But, they're not being an a-hole about it. And, when something like this is reported, the authority-figures have a choice - do we look at the reality of whether it is hate-speech (offensive, or ban-worthy hate-speech) or not, or do we care about our reputation? Cuz there is a danger of getting smeared if we don't 'do something' about this 'hate-speech', because people are offended! The line between actually behaving fairly and making people happy gets blurred and people err on the side of their best-interests. This is the root-cause of this idea that 'ideas are dangerous'. I think we're really wrong as a collective on what 'hate-speech' means. And, there is a lot of disagreement on this issue, for sure. This was an enlightening discussion. Thanks!

This is where I disagree with you. 'Hate' is an emotion. So, 'hate speech', is supposed to have come out of hate. Now, this implies that the elite/authority-figure is empathetic enough towards the person uttering the hate-speech to be able to see that it is coming out of hate, right?! My claim is, that turns out to not be the case. Do you agree with me on that or not?! I agree with you that in this example, it really is about public decency. But, should political correctness be mandated in social gatherings? Isn't that being a snowflake? This makes it so you can't even disagree with the collective. I mean, I can understand that it's an unwritten rule that you should be nice to each other, and that's what political correctness is about. But, on a huge platform, you know what happens. You know the flame-wars. And these are civil, ideological debates. This is the reality. If your goal is to mandate political correctness, are we really ready for that?!

When you say that 'some ideas are dangerous', the ultimate long-term consequence of that is the formation of an echo-chamber. Of, say, woke ideology. My problem isn't with woke ideology. It's with the echo-chamber. And this is a band-aid on the very real wounds of racism, sexism, homophobia, disagreements on war, on the scientific-method, etc.

The major platforms are banning the application/embodiment of intelligent spiritual ideas. Which requires people to open their mind to other perspectives than the one the platforms are pushing. They are creating echo-chambers. Do you agree with me on that or not? Echo-chambers are anti-spiritual, by definition.

Or, when you have an elite pushing for closed-mindedness, doing the work to access infinite intelligence becomes very hard. And it's disincentivized. Why?! Because people won't do it, so why bother leaving the door open for them?! This is a catch-22. This is my main issue with the promotion of echo-chambers that happens when you ban people.

I'm not debating the existence of the problem. I'm debating the choice of solution-technique. This is a collective issue. But, banning individuals is not the solution to this problem. It may have been, in the past. But, in today's democracies, it's not going to cut it. Especially with the internet, where when you ban one person, everyone else is informed about your decision to ban them. It's no longer something you can do in secret anymore. We need more innovation in conflict-resolution techniques. And, we need to treat a collective issue in a collective way. I.e. we need to address them at the root-level. And yeah, some of these decisions will be questioned by the people who put these authority-figures in power.