Rainbow Queen @mayfl0wer-power - Tumblr Blog

sustancy

eliminated

destroymylife

writingcircus

favorite corners.

recaption

sofiapdf

of course you believe in soulmates you’re gay

kloudzzz

I feel attacked…

destroymylife

especially

cisyphus-deactivated20140730

Slurs are not oppressive because they are offensive, they are oppressive because slurs by nature of being slurs draw upon certain power dynamics to remind their target of his/her/their vulnerability in a certain relation to power and as an extension of that, to threaten violence and exploitation of that vulnerability.

kalpansh

THANK YOU

crazy-pages

I feel like a lot of privileged people see slurs as just, like, bad words. (I know this is how I saw them before they got applied to me). They’re words which are impolite or exceedingly rude to use, which are bad because some people don’t like it when you use them. And it just so happens that in the case of slurs, people don’t like them because of their historical context which makes them a ‘special’ kind of bad.

Except that’s not it at all.

When someone uses a slur that can be directed at you it’s terrifying. There’s a moment of “oh god, am I safe?”. To be part of an oppressed group is to know that there are people out there who can and will hurt you. And when someone uses a slur you are suddenly confronted with the very real possibility that they are one of those people. And you have to ask yourself “am I safe?”.

Slurs aren’t bad just because they cause offense, they’re bad because they create terror. If you wouldn’t casually whip out a knife and brandish it at someone, don’t use slurs either. Because being on the receiving end is a very similar experience.