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(WEEKLY) "The Cruelty Is The Point." (lemmy.ca)

submitted 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Reminder: This post is from the Community Actual Discussion. You’re encouraged to use voting for elevating constructive, or lowering unproductive, posts and comments here. When disagreeing, replies detailing your views are appreciated. For other rules, please see this pinned thread. Thanks!

This weekly thread will focus on the phrase "The Cruelty Is The Point", which may take some explanation.

Frequently on Lemmy (and elsewhere), I see the phrase in comment threads. In my experience, it has been referencing any policy that is contrary to a Liberal or Leftist belief that the thread discusses. I have found the phrase when discussing trans issues, housing, taxes, healthcare, abortion, and many more.

This does not mean it doesn't exist elsewhere, it is simply where I see it since I spend much of my social media time on Lemmy. If your experience differs, please let us know!

Some Starters (and don’t feel you have to speak on all or any of them if you don’t care to):

Do you believe this? If so, why?
Is it true / false in some or all scenarios?
Is it with certain groups or regarding certain things?
Do you feel that speech like this is conducive to fixing societal issues?
Is what is considered "kind" always the best course of action?

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

I know it does, and that's a massive pet peeve of mine (if you couldn't tell from other threads). To be clear pre mini-rant, this isn't aimed at you, it's just something that bothers me and I wanted to get it out.

I think clarity and unity of terms use is one of the major issues that need to be addressed, especially now. It's also one of the reasons I often will add the definition of a term being used in our weekly threads, because I don't like people claiming to be correct because their "personal definition" obscures the truth. We have words. They are effective, powerful, and can be wielded to great effect. Changing what they mean in order to shock with a worse term is a horrible thing to do and is a dumbing-down that serves to undermine the original definition. It makes communication worse.

I despise forced political movement of words and don't like turning words into the personal equivalent of morality.