Every now and again, some genius will come here and say the equivalent to: “this sounds like ‘white lives matter!’” (Or ‘straight pride’, if that’s even a thing?) I don’t understand this comparison. And never have. These people are so tangled up in the intersectional point scoring of identity politics, that they’ve become dangerously disconnected from reality, and basic common decency. So let’s go back to square one. And I can’t believe I even have to say this – but you cannot swap out the experiences of white American women, with Black Americans, as if they are somehow comparable. Women =/= Black, not now, or ever. Time and time again, I’ve seen the historical suppression of women, compared to the literal enslavement and massacre of Black people. And whilst both are bad, one is clearly a lot worse. Similarly, I’ve seen others compare women to gay communities, another group who’s subjugation is not comparable either. I’ve even seen ‘being a woman’ placed side by side with ‘being disabled’, in laws, political policies and advocacy. But being a woman is not being disabled either. Conversely, I see the opposite experiences of being ‘a man’ compared to those of ‘being white’, an idea served up with an equally large slice of stupidity. I know – white people are, more or less, universally advantaged in western societies. But this is not true for men and boys – who are less educated and less healthy, live shorter and sicker lives, and are at greater risk of virtually everything, including violent crime, addiction, homelessness and suicide. So no, ‘men’ =/= ‘white people’ either. This poorly made equivalence is at the heart of so much silliness I have directed at my account, and I’m over it. So no. This is not ‘white lives matter’, or ‘straight pride’. This is, in fact, an important area of discussion, that is neglected and in desperate need of mature discourse and action. What do you think? ~ Images by – Black Kiwi Hug, Ray Zhou, Julian Myles, and Gradienta from Unsplash. [1] Racial Sentencing Gap, Starr [2] Gender Sentencing Gap, Starr

2023-01-31