A lot of people seem to implicitly think that racism, misogyny, and homophobia are fairly rare things in our society. The corollary to this is that racist beliefs are only held by racists, and racists are the sort of extreme aberrations from mainstream society who burn crosses on people’s lawns. So when you say that what person X said is offensive, they think “No way! Person X wouldn’t burn a cross.” I think this is where “it wasn’t intended to be offensive, so it must not be offensive” comes from.

This worldview presents a double whammy, because even if you can convince them something is technically problematic, it’s not related to any systematic problems in our society, so it’s still no big deal.

“
—

A comment by Autumn Harvest on No Cookies For Me: Blatant Sexism *Isn’t* Benign, Thank You…

I’ve experienced some of this from friends recently—not that what they say can’t be offensive, but they don’t understand that sexist, racist, heterocentrist, ciscentrist, ableist, etc. beliefs are actually widely held, by people who may or may not be otherwise fairly decent human beings (although how decent one can be while supporting the continued disenfranchisement of an already oppressed class is debatable.)
Posted 1 year ago
577 notes
Tagged: racism, sexism, heterosexism, kyriarchy, .
  1. the-nomadic-writer reblogged this from distractedbyshinyobjects
  2. fuckingfuckingchickentown reblogged this from eggplantastic
  3. heartuntamed reblogged this from loveyourchaos
  4. faysbook reblogged this from genderfuckandsecrets
  5. inkscars reblogged this from genderfuckandsecrets
  6. writteninwingdings reblogged this from vulgarvulgar
  7. lesshumansmorecats reblogged this from seriouslyamerica
  8. paperbackworld reblogged this from shannonwest
  9. postsatire reblogged this from onyourownsidethistime
  10. wellesleyunderground reblogged this from veruca-assault
  11. justother reblogged this from myasphyxiatedmind
  12. myasphyxiatedmind reblogged this from veruca-assault
  13. veruca-assault reblogged this from fuckyeahwomenprotesting2
  14. mlle-annetoinette reblogged this from fleurdelanuit
  15. barefoot-dancing reblogged this from brashblacknonbeliever
  16. brashblacknonbeliever reblogged this from fleurdelanuit
  17. fleurdelanuit reblogged this from seriouslyamerica
  18. plainjanefaye reblogged this from seriouslyamerica
  19. raspberryflavored reblogged this from seriouslyamerica
  20. seriouslyamerica reblogged this from fuckyeahwomenprotesting2
  21. tastyanagram reblogged this from babyslime
  22. babyslime reblogged this from qweerdo
  23. scarecrowdreams reblogged this from loveyourchaos
  24. sarah-today reblogged this from mymangotree
  25. cheryltz reblogged this from karnythia
  26. bonbons reblogged this from articlesofcleansingbreath
  27. theworstliariknow reblogged this from aweeshanikole