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Comment by DannyB2 | Hacker News Reader

Basically one kid (eg, the "bully") says to another kid (eg, the "victim") that the victim's mere existence is deeply offensive to the bully. Hope that helps.

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Still missing context. Are schoolyard bullies actually doing this to other kids? Or are you talking about something else? Can you speak plainly and not use analogies?

I think he/she is referring to white males.

I did not make the original post. I was attempting to clarify it. I was not using an analogy at all.

I literally meant: A bully said to victim that victim's very existence is offensive to bully.

IMO, that summarizes how I interpreted the original top level post.

You've really never experienced being told that unless you are a minority (ideally an oppressed one) or a victim, or at the very least, you have some non-typical sexual identity, you are worthless?

You have not noticed people making up sexual identities that they don't really have? Or inventing (or inflating) victim stories about themself?

The sexual minorities have far higher suicide rates, so I don't think that would explain the numbers we're seeing here. https://www.thetrevorproject.org/resources/preventing-suicid...

I've basically never seen the former. I do see 100X as much ranting against it though. It's hard to feel oppressed when you fit into all the majority categories.

As for people "making up" aspects of their identity ... so? Who fucking cares? It doesn't affect me at all, let alone make me more prone to committing suicide!!!

> so?

You missed the point. Correct, who cares. But why are they driven to do it? It's because otherwise they are not valued. (If you have another theory let's hear it.)

> I've basically never seen the former. I do see 100X as much ranting against it though.

You don't spend enough time on college campuses, and you especially don't spend enough time listening to liberal student yell and scream if someone conservative dares to talk.

Or maybe you spend just the right amount of time LOL. Ignoring those kind of liberals probably helps one's sanity.

25% of transgender students were physically attacked for being transgender. One in six left school because of mistreatment and one in twelve were kicked out of the house. Jumping from those facts to the conclusion that they are just doing it to feel "valued" is bizarre. You might just as well say they're in it for the money, since they are three times more likely to be unemployed and twice as likely to be in poverty. https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS...

Lots more detail at http://www.ustranssurvey.org/reports if you're actually interested.

The bully / victim could be filled in with different values.

The Bully says to gay kid, your very existence offends me.

The White Bully says to non-white kid, your very existence offends me.

The Sports Hero says to the Computer Nerd, your very existence offends me.

Make other substitutions for bully / victim as you see fit. But it's not an analogy. It really happens.

He's talking about underprivileged people expressing frustration and anger towards the privileged.

So, in this analogy, white people are the victims, and minorities are the bullies?

I guess if you strip all historical context out of the racial issues, ignore current inequalities, and just focus on what people on Tumblr are saying, I guess you could come to that conclusion, but you have to intentionally avoid a lot of stuff to reach that

I don't think it's possible to deny it at this point; you'd have to be blind not to see the hatred directed towards white people. This behavior is both encouraged and protected by the culture & institutions running the western world at the moment. The opposite is cracked down upon swiftly.

Yeah, every now and then someone makes a harmless joke online about white men. It must be really hard to deal with that kind of pressure.

I feel like this comment is coming from some parallel bizarro world. We have an openly racist president and majority party and yet somehow it's the whites who are suffering?

Those two things are not mutually exclusive. This is especially the case when you consider that, for example, government is currently controlled by conservatives but popular culture is controlled by progressives. Similar situations exist for the deep south versus the coast, churches versus software companies, gun culture versus hip hop culture, etc. Therefore, depending on their circumstances both a minority progressive and a white conservative can be suffering.

Both sides complain about this. Its hard to say what the original poster is really saying.

I've got a liberal gay friend who was ostracized by his family after a failure to complete gay-conversion therapy for example. He managed to live fine once he ran away from home, got married in Canada to his now husband, and seems to be happily married for the past few years.

On the other hand, there are right-wing friends who also claim that they're being bullied online. I don't think I've heard of any horror stories that compare to the trauma of gay conversion therapy however. Still, there's a level of trolling that can be psychologically damaging, so I can understand that issue.

To be clear: I'm against bullying of any kind. But often times, its important to know the viewpoint of the complainer. I'm not sure if there's anything we can do about casual internet trolling, not without breaking the 1st Amendment anyway. But there's definitely something we can do about gay conversion therapy for example.

I would personally be for increasing penalties on "obvious" internet troll moves: Swatting, online harassment, revenge porn, etc. etc. There's relatively little legal recourse against these acts of trolling right now. And sure, its technically chipping away at 1st Amendment / free speech issues, but I do think that cleaning up the internet a bit and reducing bullying online will probably help someone.

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