Poll: Usage of the term "Social Justice Warrior"

[metatron]

Ok, in the newest self-congratulation thread for people who list their gender identity as Helen Lovejoy a rather old dispute about the usage of the term Social Justice Warrior (SJW for short) has resurfaced once again:

LOL it's used as an insult against anyone who is perceived to be an enemy of the right wing.

If you forget that half the people using it are left-winger themselves.
Oh, right, I forgot you just redefined anyone disagreeing as "fascists". Silly me.

Yeah, I'm sure that when some blowbag is called derisively "Internet Forum Warrior", it's because the person using the term absolutely hate the Internet and forums in general.

So i thought we may take a little survey of CFC-OT regulars.
Beware: Votes are public. (Or not - apparently this doesn't work.)
Also: I added more poll options for conservatives, in case - as i suspect - you people don't give a damn.

My aim here - obviously - is not to "win" the poll - i don't think that will happen - but rather to establish the fact that people in category #1 (and #3) are in fact a significant minority among both the left and users of the term as a pejorative - rather than being the odd fluke among a monolithical group of punchable Nazis.
Obviously i'm voting option #1.

 

[Zkribbler]

SJW is a term of the far right. It's a pejorative used to insult people who care about social justice.
The far right doesn't give a twittly-twot about social justice. They believe in social and economic Darwinism, where "the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must."

 

[Arwon]

It's a stupid term that doesn't mean anything

 

[inthesomeday]

Where's the dog whistle option?

 

[Hygro]

I appreciated it at first because it was honing in on people whose social justice fight is an assertion of identity and meme-spreading and not actually tied to a commitment to social justice. The term I had come up with was "social justicist". A year later there was coined "sjw" but it's been over applied and not as an internal critique and is therefore not a term to validate.

 

[Archon_Wing]

It appears to be the new Communist, for fans of Mccarthy.

Basically, it seems used by people that are afraid to lose an argument, so gotta find a label to autowin.

I mean even the term it self is kinda stupid, and quite the insult to people that actually fight for equality and stuff. Unless one thinks that's a bad thing, then it makes a whole lot of sense.

That being said, I wasn't really sure where to put me on the left-right spectrum, but I liked "Don't Punch me Bro" the most.

 

[Dachs]

not even the best Warriors in California

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

I prefer rogue class myself

 

[Gori the Grey]

I don't believe I've ever used the term without (at least implicit) scare quotes: "so-called SJWs."

So I guess "not at all." And I guess I'd call myself left leaning. But maybe on another day, centrist.

I once wanted to write a sonnet about SJWs and MRAs on CFC. But I never did write it. The last line of it was just going to be a string of letters. I was amused by the fact that each side had a three letter pejorative term for the other. (That was back in the stretch when there was a lot of talk about MRAs here on CFCOT.) When I think both sides are a little silly, that's when I feel like a centrist.

(Maybe on second thought, it should be a Spenserian allegory rather than a sonnet.)

A gentle knight was pricking 'cross the 'net,
(But "pricking" in the gender-neutral sense) . . .

 

[Lexicus]

I don't believe I've ever used the term without (at least implicit) scare quotes: "so-called SJWs."

Me, so I didn't vote in the poll

 

[Ajidica]

Can Social Justice Warriors dual class into a Social Justice Warrior Mage, or is it multi-class only?

In all seriousness, it is a term I only ever here from the crankier corners of politics to describe naïve if well meaning (who are badly expressing half-remembered gender and race theory) tumbleristas. At worst, they are the anti-Milo, getting off on antagonizing people on the right. At best, they have an energy and drive the American left sorely needs.

 

[metatron]

Me, so I didn't vote in the poll

As Gory correctly diagnosed, that would be the purpose of me in an errant* fit of fairness having added the "or not at all" to all three "no" options (so as to do justice to the claim originally made by, well, you guys).
Anyway, even without the additional input you have given here i would have strongly anticipated you picking option #2.

*Errant because the SJW's mindset typically renders them incapable of appreciating such a thing.

 

[inthesomeday]

But there's a very big difference between the two options included in that umbrella. The point has always been that we don't use it at all, and that it was made up as a boogieman by the right.

 

[metatron]

But there's a very big difference between the two options included in that umbrella. The point has always been that we don't use it at all, and that it was made up as a boogieman by the right.

I feel that this is largely immaterial to the claims that have been made and don't think a poll with 27 options would have been worthwhile.
Correspondingly i am perfectly willing to grant, on good faith, that a majority of the people who have or will vote option #2 are more or completely in the "not at all" category, since this i take it is the datum you see in danger of being underappreciated.

Edit:
Let me be more clear: If there are persons on the left or in the center who for whatever reason (naivete, outright attempt at appropriation) use the term as a positve, possibly even as describing themselves, i complete grant you that that does not invalidate the original claim, since as i understand the crucial portion of the claim was about the usage as a negative.
So you may count virtually everybody in category #2 or #4 (or #6 even) as "not at all" vis a vis said claim if you feel that is required. I accept that.
However i will not accept any contention that the poll is unfair because you or some third party has prohibitive issues of some sort with wrapping their mind around the super-technical term "or".

 

[luiz]

For me it's a term for people who get outraged - and then promote a modern day witch hunt - over ridiculous and irrelevant things. People who count non-white characters on freaking video games. People who got outraged over this comment Steve Martin made after Carrie Fisher died:

When I was a young man, Carrie Fisher was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. She turned out to be witty and bright as well

"exposing and shaming" him as an evil sexiste to the point that he felt compelled to publicly recant, like the inquisition did to heretics.
People who police what celebrities say in search of the smallest "offensive" clue, people who terrorize college campuses by policing what can be said, demanding the removal of statues or changing of names.

The term obviously means something, this groups is obviously real and obviously loud. And obviously toxic.

 

[Perfection]

Using the term SJW is one of the quickest ways to lose my respect.

 

[Kyriakos]

I personally find the term "SJW" funny. Like any term (surprise) it can be used with many different things in mind, and varying degree of malice or humour. I use it to troll, mostly Also to not bother with a periphrasis, cause ultimately it is all lost.

Btw, good for SJW google that it identifies "periphrasis" as a term, at last.

 

[Akka]

"warrior" is often used on the Internet as derisive, to outline the comical contraste of some guy who picture himself as a tough, hardened fighter while he's just a random guy typing on a keyboard in his home. It also brings to mind the mocking parallel between the pugnacity of a combattant fighting for his life, with the stubborness typically displayed by the recipient on "forum wars".

"Social justice warrior" is just an adaptation of this. It catches the contrast between the self-styled grandstanding for great causes and the actual pettiness and small-mindedness of people who tend to just regurgitate the same echo chamber discourse. And the shade of mullish droning that comes with the term really fits well with how the persons described tend to be obsessive about the issues they focus on.

 

[Ryika]

It's funny, because the term wasn't coined by the opposition, it was used unironically by social justice advocates who were often very aggressive with their "fight" for what they called "equality" when really they were just trying to instate a very radical form of identity politics, and so it naturally developed into a pejorative term.

One of the first communities that started to change its meaning was the youtube Atheist community (which is and was heavily left-wing for obvious reasons), back when Atheism+ was a thing. When people started to request preferential treatment for minorities, and asked for conferences and online discussion forums to be turned into safe spaces where stating opinions that are not endorsed by the collective would get you deplatformed. We all know how that worked out, right? ...well, no, looking at the answers in this thread, apparently people don't know how it worked out, so let me summarize: It crashed and burned as people required ever-more ideological purity, the community ate itself.

That's how it became a pejorative for people who claim to fight for social justice but actually are just in it for their own self-aggrandizement, to make themselves look like people who are better than everybody else, people who continued to fight that fight even in a community that was made solely out of people who heavily favored social justice over everything else, and still managed to find ways to constantly get at each other's throat when they created ever-more ridiculous reasons to call each other out.

That's the original use of the "social justice warrior", the term has lost a lot of its meaning today, but in case you ever wondered, now you know.

So I guess that's it for today's random facts about the history of the internet, I hope you found this useful, see you tomorrow, and have a nice day.

 

[Hrothbern]

In general I agree

so let me summarize: It crashed and burned as people required ever-more ideological purity, the community ate itself.

My experience with the most weird leftish splinters and movements in the 80ies was the same. Too many people lost themselves in it, and many disappeared exhausted, some radicalised into oblivion. I considered that all as "lost for the good cause" , but to some degree unavoidable collateral damage.
But all that, with real people discussions and beer, mostly not that fast and not that much as on platforms.

That purity fight happens also at seemingly harmless platforms about taking care of pets.

People in cars, while driving, behave on average much more agressive to other people in cars, than when they would be both outside their cars.

human nature ? and a kind of anonimity ?