you know that program where they tried to train crows to pick up litter for a treat that backfired because they started attacking people to grab half eaten food wrappers out of their hand. i feel like 2012 tumblr did the same thing, but instead of litter it was covert bigotry and instead of crows it was a whole generation of leftists who now have moral OCD where their critical thinking should be
they became sort of like dangerous crows, you could say. i bet some of them were boys
okay i walked into that one
So....if food wrappers on the ground represent bigotry, what is it when it's in their hands and they're shoveling it into their mouths? The crows have the right idea. Attack the bigotry at its source that way we don't have to clean up the mess it left behind.
In this metaphor, the wrapper in someone's hand might not actually become litter (although it may indeed be plastic). The person might be planning to dispose of it properly. To the crows, it doesn't matter.
The wrapper - the thing mistaken for bigotry - might instead be a mixed-race person accused of appropriation while participating in their family's traditions, or a white person participating in a part of a culture that is willingly shared with them. It might be an elder queer person using outdated terms, or general over-policing of which type of queer person is allowed to use which word. The crows - performative activists - don't look for nuance. They just want to earn their treat: a chance to feel like they're making a difference and to prove to their peers that they're "one of the good ones" by pointing out something that looks like bigotry.
