> I see the Social Justice left as being in a phase like "young atheists"[2] or young gay people go through when they first embrace their identity: loud and proud and insistent that others recognize their validity.
Back when I was in college (late 90's) I remember coming across a forum post where someone else was talking about this.
The gist of it was that they knew a gay women who came out when she was in college, and after she did everything became about sexuality. According to the poster, this woman was pretty annoying to a lot of people. "How do you know person X is gay? Don't worry, they'll tell you about it".
But then he talked about how he was friends with this woman over a lifetime and eventually you could know her for years and never realize she was gay. It stopped being the most important part of her identity and just became 1 thing in a 100. She would talk about it with her closest friends but it just wasn't something she needed everyone to know.
The explanation this person gave is that when you're new to something like that, you sort of wrap yourself up in it as an identity. But then over time, as it becomes familiar, you find that there are other aspects of your identity as well, and maybe your sexuality/religion/whathaveyou isn't the most important thing to communicate to other people.
Since then, I've seen this borne out twice in my life.
The first:
While in college I befriended a guy online who eventually told me he was gay. I never personally cared so for me it was whatever. But fast forward a few months and at one point I eventually blew up on him (over chat, we were strictly online friends) because I just got so tired of him equating everything to being gay. It would be completely innocuous things that somehow indicated someone was gay or disliked gays. He went offline after that and never came back and I sometimes wonder if he liked me. For me it was just an online friend, but I do sometimes think about it. I can't remember how we met, but I think it was while I was running a kingdom in the online game of Utopia (I'm pretty sure it's still around in some form).
The second:
I have a very good friend whom I've known for over 25 years. I'm closer to this guy than my own brothers. He grew up christian and at some point in college decided he was an atheist. And he turned into the stereotypical 'angry atheist'. I used to talk to him about it and ask him why he felt the need to be an asshole to someone just because they were a theist. Over the years he's calmed down a LOT and treats theists with a lot more respect than he used to. You'd probably never know he was atheist unless you asked him specifically.
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Anyway, I was just surprised to see this sentiment. It's one that I've kept with me for years and I very rarely ever see anyone else acknowledge it.
I am unable to source the proper quote presently, but something along the lines of:
Nature knows no greater zeal than that of the recently-converted.
The original context was religious, but I can document its applicability to sexual orientations, genres of music, operating systems, text editors, programming languages, and Ayn Rand.
Back when I was in college (late 90's) I remember coming across a forum post where someone else was talking about this.
The gist of it was that they knew a gay women who came out when she was in college, and after she did everything became about sexuality. According to the poster, this woman was pretty annoying to a lot of people. "How do you know person X is gay? Don't worry, they'll tell you about it".
But then he talked about how he was friends with this woman over a lifetime and eventually you could know her for years and never realize she was gay. It stopped being the most important part of her identity and just became 1 thing in a 100. She would talk about it with her closest friends but it just wasn't something she needed everyone to know.
The explanation this person gave is that when you're new to something like that, you sort of wrap yourself up in it as an identity. But then over time, as it becomes familiar, you find that there are other aspects of your identity as well, and maybe your sexuality/religion/whathaveyou isn't the most important thing to communicate to other people.
Since then, I've seen this borne out twice in my life.
The first:
While in college I befriended a guy online who eventually told me he was gay. I never personally cared so for me it was whatever. But fast forward a few months and at one point I eventually blew up on him (over chat, we were strictly online friends) because I just got so tired of him equating everything to being gay. It would be completely innocuous things that somehow indicated someone was gay or disliked gays. He went offline after that and never came back and I sometimes wonder if he liked me. For me it was just an online friend, but I do sometimes think about it. I can't remember how we met, but I think it was while I was running a kingdom in the online game of Utopia (I'm pretty sure it's still around in some form).
The second:
I have a very good friend whom I've known for over 25 years. I'm closer to this guy than my own brothers. He grew up christian and at some point in college decided he was an atheist. And he turned into the stereotypical 'angry atheist'. I used to talk to him about it and ask him why he felt the need to be an asshole to someone just because they were a theist. Over the years he's calmed down a LOT and treats theists with a lot more respect than he used to. You'd probably never know he was atheist unless you asked him specifically.
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Anyway, I was just surprised to see this sentiment. It's one that I've kept with me for years and I very rarely ever see anyone else acknowledge it.