woke.

[Keith Houchen]

8 minutes ago, Tommy! said:

That does than annoy me a bit when people try and relate with something ultimately banal "ohh I'm the same, I get so nervous when I'm presenting" because that a perfectly rational response

I wonder if some of that is a clumsy, well meaning attempt an empathy and understanding to try and make you feel better. As you say, it’s the difference between feeling depressed and being depressed, or feeling anxious and being anxious. 

[Devon Malcolm]

5 hours ago, Michael_3165 said:

What is the matter w these bullying fucktards?

As an "expert in psychiatry", do you find the use of this term to be at all appropriate?

[BomberPat]

36 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

Yeah, my Dad's not a bad person but will bang on about "wokeness" etc 

My Dad used the word "woke" a while back, and I honestly don't even know where he got it from. He's broadly centre-left, very pro-EU, pro-immigration, pro-unions, hates the Tories, voted Corbyn, often complains about how right-wing a lot of our extended family are, and doesn't read any right-wing newspapers. So I don't know where he picked up the word, and what, when using it negatively, he would even think it means, as most people who throw it around would use it to describe most of what he believes.

I'm sure he has some dodgy views, and tend to shy away from any discussion around gender politics or anything like that with him because it's not worth the hassle, but again, he had his Bowie phase, his punk phase and so on, when he was younger, and that's always a good benchmark to be able to set and pull back to. Around gender stuff, it's always been more of an exasperated sense of "well, I just don't get it" from him than outright opposition, and I always want to tell him that not getting it is fine, nobody's asking him to understand it.

19 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

Unlike gender identity this is not a new thing as I have found out to my frustration. Whilst doing the whole genealogy thing on my mum's side of the family it was initially baffling that I couldn't find anyone. My mum's mum had 10 siblings (Farming folk, no electric) and I could only find 1 to start with. I eventually found out that the other 9 all used names that were not there original first names, but were names they chose themselves and everyone just went with it. None of the names were even middle names. 

I'm not sure I have more of a point than me finding out my great aunt June was really called Margery was frustrating and funny in equal measure, but if I did have one it would be that if farming folk from the Lincolnshire fens born between 1908 and 1935 can get used to calling people by the name they want to be called then anyone can. 

Very similar in my case - big farming family (Mum's Mum had 14 kids), and going back more than one generation was a nightmare because of the amount of names people went by. My Dad always called his parents by their first names, so I always knew my Grandad on that side of the family as Harry. It was only when he died that I found out his name was George!

Completely agreed, though - when you take gender out of the equation, nobody struggles with calling somebody by a different name, whether that's their middle name, a nickname, a shortened version, or something else entirely; I worked with a bloke called Christopher who hated to be called Chris, and everybody was able to manage that. It's only once gender identity is brought in that people start acting like it's an imposition, or too difficult, to call somebody by the correct name and to just generally be polite to them. I admit that I sometimes slip up on "they" pronouns, but generally just correct myself quickly and move on, and that's all there is to it.

In terms of names, I think there must be a very powerful, transformative effect in choosing your own name. After all, why should you be lumbered with a name that two people gave you before you had a personality, and when they'd only just first met you?

15 minutes ago, Tommy! said:

It's always been my understanding that we all like ultimately like to be part of a group in some way, although sizes may differ, be that religion, class, football team support or hundreds of other things. As a base level we get safety and recognition of self worth from being within a group and part of a wider pack, which in my limited experience is somewhat related to the above. People ultimate, consciously or subconsciously, need something to identify as and with in all works of life, and as you say that leads to an exercise in playing around with labels and seeing what fits, especially as a young adult where that is a fundamental part of personal growth into the world. I don't know if you agree or not, but you seem far more knowledgeable than me so I'd be keen to be shot down about that TBH.

I think this is all absolutely right. Personally, looking back at being an extremely cringe teenager that had just got out of a shit school and gone to a college where I suddenly had more scope to figure out who I was, and trying on every kind of identity that came along and appealed to me, I do think that perhaps I'd felt less inclined to do that if I already felt more affinity towards something like a football team as a badge of identity or mark of inclusion in a group. It's an act of finding your "tribe", your people, as much as it is of finding yourself. And, not to get too deep into personal history and treating this like therapy, I think a lot of my more damaging and toxic social experiences of that time were born of a naive sense that because someone else belongs to a similar group, they must be a good person, or must share something innate with you, rather than just wearing similar clothes, consuming similar media, or hanging out some of the same places.

 

Quote

Off topic slightly but one of the things I had to be taught when I've gone for help was the difference between a reasonable emotional response and an unreasonable one, because i just couldn't mange them effectively without understanding the difference. That does than annoy me a bit when people try and relate with something ultimately banal "ohh I'm the same, I get so nervous when I'm presenting" because that a perfectly rational response and isn't sitting in the dark in the early hours convinced you'd better kill yourself before something unpleasant happens to you for no disenable reason.

Same when people talk about OCD meaning they don't live in a shit heap which is perfectly normal, as apposed to you know actually a condition.

Yeah, stuff like "oh, I'm a little OCD" when what they mean is that they like things neat and tidy isn't helpful to a genuine understanding of the condition and how to best shape society in such a way as to make life easier for people with that condition. I don't know how much people do that for Autism (and I know we're now a little too deep into an Autism thread crossover episode) in terms of jokingly describing their own behaviour that way, but I definitely hear it used to describe other people's behaviour as "a bit Autistic" or "on the spectrum", which is again just muddying the waters of what these terms actually mean. 

It's frustrating in the example you give, when it's somebody who thinks they're being helpful, but it's really just the same as listening to someone with depression and saying, "yeah, we all get sad mate". 

EDIT: so yeah what Houchen said.

Edited May 3, 2023 by BomberPat

[SuperBacon]

43 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

Unlike gender identity this is not a new thing as I have found out to my frustration.

I think this is a bit of both. Their birth name is the same as a very well known Disney princess (not chosen for that reason though, we're not weird Disney adults 😆) and I think it's more a kick back against that than anything else.

Like I said, it's what we and all her friends have always used anyway, it's just a bit more official with school and the like.

The irony being to my original point is so does my Dad, as he can't even pronounce the bloody name!!! 

Edit: @Lion_of_the_Midlands @BomberPatFurther to your posts just remembered that my entire life I called my Dad's Dad Grandad Jim, and it wasn't until I attended his funeral and saw the order of service that I found out his name was Maurice!

Edited May 3, 2023 by SuperBacon

[Keith Houchen]

Whenever I hear the topic of preferred names, I’m reminded of my youth. I go by a shortened version of my given name but my parents hated it and insisted my name was the one they’d given me. It would’ve carried weight had both they and all of my siblings not all went by shortened versions of their own names. 
 

AJ from The Backstreet Boys made a post the other day. He said how his young daughter came home from school and announced that there were too many other girls called Eva in her school, so she now wants to be called Elliott as there aren’t any other girls with that name. So they’re calling her Elliott at home. Nice wholesome post. 
 

Of course, it was met with wing nuts declaring “OMG how supportive of you helping your child with his transition” or “OMG this is child abuse she is a girl”, so he had to state how she just wanted a unique name that no other girl had and wanted to be different, that’s all. 

[SuperBacon]

10 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

Whenever I hear the topic of preferred names, I’m reminded of my youth. I go by a shortened version of my given name but my parents hated it and insisted my name was the one they’d given me. It would’ve carried weight had both they and all of my siblings not all went by shortened versions of their own names. 

As you know, I have a very similar first name as you (OK, Full disclosure its Beith) and one shortening of it I don't mind, and one shortening of it I absolutely hate.

Of course my nearest and dearest all use the one I hate, even my ex. Its annoying as fuck. No salient point, just a mini rant.

[gmoney]

2 hours ago, BomberPat said:

I think about that kind of thing a lot, and it's really no different to the mindset that allows a die-hard racist to have a black mate and have the cognitive dissonance to think "well, that's different, that's just Jim", mentally putting him in a different category to the abstract concept of "black people" that he'd otherwise slag off.

Yeah, this sort of thing is extremely common, if you think about people who clearly hate women who are in heterosexual relationships, fond of their mothers and sisters etc. I've met people in interracial relationships that I'd charitably say had misguided views on race.

Edited May 3, 2023 by gmoney

[BomberPat]

that's quite often my counter-argument to this stuff!

"He's got a black mate, he can't be racist!"
"Well he's married to a woman, and he's still a misogynist". 

[Carbomb]

22 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

that's quite often my counter-argument to this stuff!

"He's got a black mate, he can't be racist!"
"Well he's married to a woman, and he's still a misogynist". 

Possibly too absurd to be a counter-argument, but I always liked "I couldn't possibly be a serial killer - some of my best friends are alive".

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

1 hour ago, Carbomb said:

Possibly too absurd to be a counter-argument, but I always liked "I couldn't possibly be a serial killer - some of my best friends are alive".

After that raisin pun I'm surprised you have any friends. 😁

[Keith Houchen]

4 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

After that raisin pun I'm surprised you have any friends. 😁

Currantly he doesn’t. 

[Carbomb]

7 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

After that raisin pun I'm surprised you have any friends. 😁

Maybe, but I do alright for dates

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

35 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

Currantly he doesn’t. 

 

32 minutes ago, Carbomb said:

Maybe, but I do alright for dates

Bring back downvotes 

[Keith Houchen]

Go woke, go broke indeed. 

 

[Carbomb]

8 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

 

Bring back downvotes 

That's just sour grapes