So, in my circles, the phrase "purity culture" refers to the harmful & abusive attitudes & behavior around sex & sexuality in religious communities (especially within evangelicalism).
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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 It happened to “fake news”, it can happen to you
but that’s fine, fight back with “Sexual Purity Culture”, then drop the “sexual” like a shortened honorific after a discussion begins. -
I don't try to be a language purist who insists words & phrases can only ever be used in certain ways, but...sometimes we have come up with useful terms for things we really need to be able to discuss & think through & it's just not *helpful* to have them hijacked for non-specific purposes where *any number of other words* could be used instead.
@artemis yep it’s not helpful
but that’s because it’s part of Distraction + Delusion + Despair
Stay on point, stay engaged with your audience
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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 *nods vigorously*
Taking your label is not a different war; it’s the same war.
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I don't try to be a language purist who insists words & phrases can only ever be used in certain ways, but...sometimes we have come up with useful terms for things we really need to be able to discuss & think through & it's just not *helpful* to have them hijacked for non-specific purposes where *any number of other words* could be used instead.
@artemis surely we had agreed “virtue signalling”/“virtue policing” was the term for what he’s describing? We’ve been using it that way for years, whether or not one agrees with particular accusations.
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@artemis I've seen "purity culture" used a lot within the ostensible left to denounce critics and criticism. It was a big part of the "dirtbag left" who were a major influence on DSA around 2014-2015 (some of whom went outright fascist).
I think it did start as a deliberate comparison of critics of internalized sexism, racism, etc., to Purtians and evangelical Christians.
It was used to bury a lot of important critiques on both sides of that comparison.
Purity is bad regardless of who does it. It's bad because it enables sexual oppression, and literal oppression, and persecution of minorities, and homogenization of diversity. The same diversity keeping us from all simultaneously dying of the same virus. It's bad when people rely on purity to halt progress, because it goes beyond stopping people from doing bad things. It's bad when people rely on purity to further progress (you only get to argue with me if you are a Rationalist). Purity just... sucks. We want good things, not purity, and purity culture distorts reality until people are throwing away good things because they are labeled "disposable."
So please do talk about fascism, and the role Christianity (and also Mormonism) plays in forcing it on modern society. Please talk about the assholes claiming some Christ fellow said they get to murder trannies for not being pure enough. Please expose all the abuses of church authority that seem to disproportionately happen to young boys, covered up to make things look more pure.
Purity's more than that though. Telling us not to talk about software purists is like telling us we can't talk about the military, because that's something the Holocaust survivors need exclusively to communicate what the Nazis did. It's like telling us we can't talk about monocultures, because that's something reserved to the Irish since they had the potato famine. Don't be a purity purist, is what I'm saying. You can still talk about assholes using purity to trick religious nuts into voting for The Devil Himself.
CC: @artemis@dice.camp -
Purity is bad regardless of who does it. It's bad because it enables sexual oppression, and literal oppression, and persecution of minorities, and homogenization of diversity. The same diversity keeping us from all simultaneously dying of the same virus. It's bad when people rely on purity to halt progress, because it goes beyond stopping people from doing bad things. It's bad when people rely on purity to further progress (you only get to argue with me if you are a Rationalist). Purity just... sucks. We want good things, not purity, and purity culture distorts reality until people are throwing away good things because they are labeled "disposable."
So please do talk about fascism, and the role Christianity (and also Mormonism) plays in forcing it on modern society. Please talk about the assholes claiming some Christ fellow said they get to murder trannies for not being pure enough. Please expose all the abuses of church authority that seem to disproportionately happen to young boys, covered up to make things look more pure.
Purity's more than that though. Telling us not to talk about software purists is like telling us we can't talk about the military, because that's something the Holocaust survivors need exclusively to communicate what the Nazis did. It's like telling us we can't talk about monocultures, because that's something reserved to the Irish since they had the potato famine. Don't be a purity purist, is what I'm saying. You can still talk about assholes using purity to trick religious nuts into voting for The Devil Himself.
CC: @artemis@dice.camp@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.
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@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
@matildalove I saw him arguing here on Mastodon that his post doesn't read as (little-l) libertarian. It's, um, not as convincing as he was going for, I'm sure.
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@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.
Eh, I don't usually read that guy's blog so couldn't tell you. I just think that none of us are immune and a culture of purity is something you have to guard against, even if the other side is driven by the same madness. Not saying technology is good or anything.
CC: @artemis@dice.camp @foolishowl@social.coop -
Eh, I don't usually read that guy's blog so couldn't tell you. I just think that none of us are immune and a culture of purity is something you have to guard against, even if the other side is driven by the same madness. Not saying technology is good or anything.
CC: @artemis@dice.camp @foolishowl@social.coop@cy it might help to read his AI line editor post, or part of it, to know what Artemis is referring to.
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@cy it might help to read his AI line editor post, or part of it, to know what Artemis is referring to.
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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.
@artemis it's a very cynical, abuse culture way to use that word. i think either you or someone else mentioned that it's a way to shame people for having any fucking principles and sticking to them. that's what i've been accused of before.
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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.
@artemis
The way he misused it has a strong association with the MAGA movement. They mean it in a pejorative sense akin to 'virtue signaling'. It's jarring when it comes from a well-known liberal.I don't know if Doctorow is still active on the website formerly known as Twitter, but if he is, it's truly a brain-cooking, pickling vat of MAGA, manosphere, white nationalist depravity...
Maybe he picked it up there. No one is immune to bullshit. They just have to stew in it long enough.There is also a haughtiness about it. Like he knows he is doing something that merits being shamed, so he is shaming the would-be scolds before they emerge, if ever they do. I'll extend him grace unless and until he doubles down or whistles another MAGA sounding tune.
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Purity is bad regardless of who does it. It's bad because it enables sexual oppression, and literal oppression, and persecution of minorities, and homogenization of diversity. The same diversity keeping us from all simultaneously dying of the same virus. It's bad when people rely on purity to halt progress, because it goes beyond stopping people from doing bad things. It's bad when people rely on purity to further progress (you only get to argue with me if you are a Rationalist). Purity just... sucks. We want good things, not purity, and purity culture distorts reality until people are throwing away good things because they are labeled "disposable."
So please do talk about fascism, and the role Christianity (and also Mormonism) plays in forcing it on modern society. Please talk about the assholes claiming some Christ fellow said they get to murder trannies for not being pure enough. Please expose all the abuses of church authority that seem to disproportionately happen to young boys, covered up to make things look more pure.
Purity's more than that though. Telling us not to talk about software purists is like telling us we can't talk about the military, because that's something the Holocaust survivors need exclusively to communicate what the Nazis did. It's like telling us we can't talk about monocultures, because that's something reserved to the Irish since they had the potato famine. Don't be a purity purist, is what I'm saying. You can still talk about assholes using purity to trick religious nuts into voting for The Devil Himself.
CC: @artemis@dice.camp@cy @artemis @foolishowl expressions like "moralism" and "moral absolutism" are right there, and exactly fit what Doctorow was criticizing. There was no need to reach out and take a term survivors of a very specific abuse are using, farther confusing the issue.
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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?
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@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?
@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.
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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 would activism purity test (or something similar) as a substitute be acceptable?
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@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 Also, I don't actually like the use Doctorow is applying it to, so I don't mind yelling at him in general. But the argument then is that this is a case where it is a bad word choice even before the contested use cases for the words come into play.
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@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 sayingbut, 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)
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@Alephwyr @artemis
i think i agree with what you're sayingbut, 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.
