The privilege of speaking openly

[yeloson]

One of the sticks waved around recently was, "We post using our -real names- and that means we're more special than you!". Not everyone has that privilege, especially when you're speaking out against an entrenched oppression. There's always someone willing to bring consequences to you for that.

The right to speak freely, without threats being made, without people inviting physical and personal harassment and harm upon you? The ability to say what you will without fear of being assassinated?

And the fact is, these folks don't need to threaten you personally, they simply need to open the door, put up a sign, and throw the info to people who -are- crazy enough.

It's always about who -isn't- protected in this society.

Comments

[furikku.livejournal.com]

Cripes, they're going with that now?! Isn't it a widely accepted thing that putting your real name on the internet is generally a really stupid idea?!

Folks need to quit being stupid.

[yeloson.livejournal.com]

A while back some folks were waving around that their opinions held more weight because they put their real names online, mind you, the people they were dismissing weren't Anonymous, but rather folks working in anti-racism and anti-sexism who've held the same screennames for years.

And this dude is running around digging up people's personal info and dumping it online.

[kynn.livejournal.com]

It is also interesting that as a white, male(-appearing) person, I am pretty immune to this stuff in general -- I have that privilege you talk about, in that by and large people don't do this kind of stuff to white people most of the time.

It's worth noting that even in this case, he still had to "otherize" me with the gender issue -- he couldn't attack me with white privilege, so he had to pull out cisgender privilege first before posting my [sic] address and phone number.

I want to back up what you are saying about this by adding that blogging openly about race and racists for me is not an act of courage, just an exercise of privileges afforded to me. I don't want anyone to think I am doing anything other than being a typical white person in this regard, and I fully support POCs and others who do anti-racism work under alternate names.

[yeloson.livejournal.com]

Right. It's why we can have folks like Tim Wise blog openly, but not necessarily women of color do so.

I've spoken before with folks about the fact that a great deal of ish goes down because it's about who's protected and who isn't. A lot of people stand by and go, "Oh that's too bad" while they don't do anything to step in and stop bad behavior, which is exactly how it keeps going on.

The fact that this guy thinks he's being prosecuted (never mind he keeps his job, never mind he suffers no personal set backs, never mind he isn't ousted from his social circles) says everything about perceived vs. real persecution.

Ditto with the race imbroglio and drama. As Tempest says, "This is what real abuse looks like."