@artemis oh of course it's fucking doctorow, of course that's why i keep hearing this stupid argument about not being nice enough to "leftists" who embrace fascist-friendly values

@cy you're talking about your definition of *purity*. What do you think is the *purity culture* Doctorow was referencing?

In my reading, he was directing an accusation at the targets and victims of religious purity culture for our arguments against the use of technology that feels like an extension of it, has threatened autonomy and relationships in similar ways, and continues to undermine natural ecosystems, which the religious purists do using different methods. In other words, it felt to me like a spin, or appropriation, of the word.

*Purity culture* is so often used for religious purity culture, an established thing that involves mainstream media and other social institutions, but he was using the term the way Christian nationalists talk about people who resist Christianity being in everything.

@artemis @foolishowl

@cy it might help to read his AI line editor post, or part of it, to know what Artemis is referring to.

@artemis @foolishowl

So, in my circles, the phrase "purity culture" refers to the harmful & abusive attitudes & behavior around sex & sexuality in religious communities (especially within evangelicalism).

I'm seeing discussion of Cory Doctorow's use of the term "purity culture" to mean something like people who are (supposedly) so obsessed with being perfectly ethical that they harass others and...I dunno...halt progress. I guess he's not the only one who uses it that way, but it's news to me.

So, in my circles, the phrase "purity culture" refers to the harmful & abusive attitudes & behavior around sex & sexuality in religious communities (especially within evangelicalism).

I'm seeing discussion of Cory Doctorow's use of the term "purity culture" to mean something like people who are (supposedly) so obsessed with being perfectly ethical that they harass others and...I dunno...halt progress. I guess he's not the only one who uses it that way, but it's news to me.

Purity culture created a lot of the worst aspects of my religious trauma. MY WHOLE LIFE was purity culture. Everything I did, every interaction I had before my mid 20s was shaped by it.

Would it be so bad to just let us survivors of religious trauma use a combination of words which really didn't get used much at all for anything before we coined it & started using it? Nobody was using it for much, we started using it & now apparently it's a popular term for something almost completely separate.

@artemis There could be understood lexical priority that was in turn made legible through it's associations with particular spaces. I'm all for voluntary rules about language use, especially if they are simple and obvious enough that they can be quickly explained and adopted, and that simply seeing people use them is instructive for the average person in most cases. I'm getting tired of prescriptivism about language among people of conscience. Having essential language taken away from you is bad. But also, sometimes the person "taking it away" is someone who has needed access to language they have never had, or that they themselves have previously had taken away. What happens if tomorrow, the language you want not taken away has been taken away, and the people who have taken it away memory hole that you ever had a claim to it, and they turn around and speak your own words to you about not wanting their language taken away?

It's really frustrating having a term people like me use to describe the trauma that shaped us picked up & used in some vague & non-specific way for no particular reason.

If you Google the term, you'll see references to the meaning I am using. People can come up with another term for their annoyance at people who have opinions about what they should or shouldn't do.

Don't steal terms from trauma survivors. We're using those.

@artemis And it's worse than this, because there can be convergent evolution in language, either simultaneously or in epistemically isolated groups, such that nobody is stealing anything, they are all just behaving and speaking rationally. Linguistic prescriptivism imposes costs on people, it's a good idea to look for alternatives.

@artemis There could be understood lexical priority that was in turn made legible through it's associations with particular spaces. I'm all for voluntary rules about language use, especially if they are simple and obvious enough that they can be quickly explained and adopted, and that simply seeing people use them is instructive for the average person in most cases. I'm getting tired of prescriptivism about language among people of conscience. Having essential language taken away from you is bad. But also, sometimes the person "taking it away" is someone who has needed access to language they have never had, or that they themselves have previously had taken away. What happens if tomorrow, the language you want not taken away has been taken away, and the people who have taken it away memory hole that you ever had a claim to it, and they turn around and speak your own words to you about not wanting their language taken away?

@Alephwyr @artemis
i think i agree with what you're saying

but, also, the phrase that describes what Cory is talking about it "purity politics" (one could use others).

it could be that something else is also described with "purity culture" but there's another term that directly refers to what he means (even though the situation isn't really about purity politics)

@johnbrowntypeface @artemis There are a dozen different stupid aspects of the invectives against purity politics:

1. Every past system is a result of compromises and shortcuts
2. Compromises and shortcuts snowball
3. By the time the situation is dire, it is downstream of innumerable compromises and shortcuts, and the solution proposed is then a final doubling down, pulling the last stable block from the Jenga tower of false pragmatism
4. The type of person who makes this error is generally not very perceptive
4a. Inferentially, the type of person who makes this error is then usually not proximate to any real matter constitutive of the problem
4a1. Not being proximate has both epistemic and practical consequences which are robust even outside of the specific error

@johnbrowntypeface @artemis There are a dozen different stupid aspects of the invectives against purity politics:

1. Every past system is a result of compromises and shortcuts
2. Compromises and shortcuts snowball
3. By the time the situation is dire, it is downstream of innumerable compromises and shortcuts, and the solution proposed is then a final doubling down, pulling the last stable block from the Jenga tower of false pragmatism
4. The type of person who makes this error is generally not very perceptive
4a. Inferentially, the type of person who makes this error is then usually not proximate to any real matter constitutive of the problem
4a1. Not being proximate has both epistemic and practical consequences which are robust even outside of the specific error

@johnbrowntypeface @artemis
4b. This constitutes calling out "fire" after the building has already taken irreparable damage and most saveable people are dead or can no longer be saved
4c. In the event something can be done, this type of person is not competent or capable of doing it.
5. This type of organization is therefore illusory, it provides false reassurance, diverts resources, and prevents sound action.
6. This type of organization permanently diverts attention from both the development of theories of sound long term planning and the sound epistemics and praxis of immediacy and triage, which are overwhelmingly messy, low status, and illegible.

@Alephwyr @artemis
i think calling something purity politics is usually just a defense mechanism, but there are times when it seems to fit

in this case with Cory he seems to be running into folks who are calling him out for having inconsistent political principles (similar to when he stopped masking).

whatever one's politics, once they deviate to a certain degree from what's stated there will be pushback

@johnbrowntypeface @artemis Yeah I dunno, I still broadly like Doctorow, I think attacking Doctorow is a bad use of energy. It is also maybe silly to publicly push back on these things? Just let people blow smoke. If the high context particulars of your social station require some sort of answer you need to get better at laconicism and wit so that it can be efficient and have the judo-like properties of disincentivizing aggressive rhetoric.

@Alephwyr @artemis

different strokes, i guess

Doctorow has a lot of money and influence among 'radicals'/progressives so talking about the importance of masking (then stopping randomly) or being against Big Tech and then supporting world-ending AI has a much bigger footprint than if you or i did so

will calling him out change things? not for him, especially since he reacts defensively instead of thinking on the more respectful counters

but 'the audience' might get something outta it

@johnbrowntypeface @artemis I admit having not paid sufficient attention. I am also anti big tech and pro world-ending AI, though I would prefer the technicality of the world ending without anyone dying.

Also, "stopped talking about masking" is much more absurd than what it sounded like. That's an expression of entitlement to labor towards a man who has already provided labor. That's a case of punishing sympathy and good faith because you think the sympathetic person can be pushed on and the unsympathetic person cannot, which is perverse. Even if it slows things down or requires going without sometimes you should not do that, liberatory politics should be treated as a climb and not a race, and you should be more interested in keeping three limbs on the rock face whenever possible than going fast.