It appears some leftists literally believe people are born with certain beliefs and political ideology and that those beliefs are static. 1/
On the surface, it just seems like a bad take, but underneath, is the belief that people don't change and learn. This implies that they themselves feel they are unable to change. Like were these people born leftists or are they just being disingenuous or deceiving themselves? 2/
The psychological and emotional work necessary to address one's own bigotry is overlooked. In my younger years I used many racial/homophobic slurs & treated woman poorly. It was though internal work and listening to those harmed, I was able see how fucked up I was and change. 3/
I grew up in a majority white rural town where alot of fucked up beliefs were normalized. Noone escapes the societal conditioning that comes from living a deeply racist society. If you are white and havnt had to break down everything you thought you knew, in a way that...4/
...makes you question who you are on a deep level, you might want to take a break to look inward. If you havn't done that, you are likely perpetrating the same things you claim to oppose. I don't just mean perfomatively saying "all white people are racist"..5/
...without actually knowing what that means. Not having a deeper understanding of this concept is what fuels white saviorism and tokenism, which is still racism in disguise. And now for the white dude hot take.. 6/
this doesn't just apply to white folks (although they are the primary perpetrators), but also misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, antisemitism perpetrated by all. There should be no leftist space that ignores these things because of the race of the perpetrator. 7/
We can have a discussion on who should be responsible to call it out/in, but it should always be called out/in. I think of when I had to intervene to prevent a misogynist from attacking a latinx femme after he had threatened to shoot a minor and called people fa**ots. 8/
He proudly yelled "Ill beat any bitches ass". Guess who had an issue with him?....noone... especially the white people around....silence... After I simply put my body in between him and her, people literally said "you have no right as a white man." That disturbes me...9/
To top it off he was a self proclaimed leader of Portland Protest Bureau, now Black unity PDX. People like that rise to the "top" because their harm is ignored. I can give many other examples of similar, but you get the point...10/
This leads to cancel culture, where we tend to discard people because they have done or said something fucked up. Sometimes people are just dangerous and shouldn't be allowed in certain spaces, but this doesn't necessarily help the individual change or prevent further harm...11/
..that's why restorative justice and accountability are so important. Canceling people is neither. We fight for a better world, and to do so we need to be better people. To be better people we often need help. 12/
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