[ETA: It has been pointed out to me that “social justice warrior” is sometimes used as a neutral term for what I call in this post “social justice person.” I am totally okay with this use, although I would advise people who use it that way that other people might understand them as using SJW in a pejorative sense. This post is only complaining about its use as a pejorative.]
I used to use the phrase “social justice warrior” a fair amount. Then I started to notice something.
When my friends complain about people using feminism as an excuse for ableist attacks against mentally ill and developmentally disabled men, they use the phrase “social justice warrior.”
When men’s rights activists complain about gender studies teaching women to hate men, they use the phrase “social justice warrior.”
When anti-social-justice people complain about (to look at the top three posts on wtfsocialjustice as I write this) blogs named BPD(insert character name here), nonsexual BDSM, and fat people who have the temerity to think that they shouldn’t hate themselves, they use the phrase “social justice warrior.”
And when misogynist douchebags complain that people disagree with them about whether women are good at anything besides making babies, cleaning, and finding the car keys, they use the phrase… “social justice warrior.”
This is sort of upsetting because I would really not like to say any words that might conceivably lead people to mistake me for Jim.
The reason that such a wide group of people can use the phrase “social justice warrior” is that it doesn’t actually mean anything besides “social justice person that I don’t like.” You personally might define “social justice warrior” more narrowly, as “bullying social justice person”– but such narrow definitions do not reflect how the word is actually used (indeed, even by the people who have narrow definitions).
There’s a couple of reasons why it’s bad to have words like that. First, there’s an illusion of transparency issue. I, the hypothetical MRA, the creator of wtfsocialjustice, and Jim have very different critiques about social justice. I think social justice is often full of bullies who use fighting oppression as an excuse to perpetuate oppression. The MRA shares my values about not irrationally hating large groups of people, but has a factual disagreement with me about whether gender studies involves this behavior. The creator of wtfsocialjustice has a bizarre hateon for asexuals, trigger warnings, and self-diagnosis. Jim objects to anyone who thinks that women are not pets who can talk.
But the problem is that if you say “social justice warrior”, all four of those groups are going to think you’re talking about the same group of people. (…Well, maybe not Jim.) It can take a surprisingly long time to figure out that someone else’s true rejection of social justice warriors is that social justice warriors think asexuals exist. This is particularly true if someone is just making contextless negative statements about social justice warriors– if someone says “I like real social justice, but not social justice warriors”, do they mean “I believe that social justice people can also be sexist and racist” or do they mean “I think it is hilarious and funny to viciously mock teenagers online who think they’re wolves”? This is really an important distinction!
Second, if you say “so-and-so is a social justice warrior” or “such-and-such is a thing that social justice warriors do”, it makes your argument sound a lot more credible than it really is. Imagine replacing “Jane is a SJW” with “Jane is a social justice person and I don’t like her”. The former sounds like a fact about the world, while the latter sounds like a fact about your preferences– even though they literally have the same meaning!
Third, it creates a category which really doesn’t exist. There are some times when “people I don’t like” is a relevant category– for instance, drawing up invitations for a party. Intra-social-movement politics is really not one of those times.
It’s not necessarily true that everyone I used to call social justice warriors– people who are mean to others, people who claim to be in touch with the Universal Oppressed Person Hivemind, people who are sexist or ableist, people who erase male rape survivors, people who make really silly claims about how language works– are the same group of people. It is perfectly possible that no one who erases male rape survivors makes silly claims about how language works. It might turn out that all the people who do those things are mostly the same group of people, but that’s a claim that needs to be argued for, not smuggled in one’s language.
And if they aren’t necessarily correlated, I’m going to make bad predictions. I will relax my guard around people because they aren’t ableist and are therefore not a social justice warrior, only to discover that they regularly bully others. I’m going to assume that people who believe one thing I disagree with believe other things I disagree with, which makes me more likely to misrepresent their views. I will assume problems in the social justice movement are the result of a few individual actors that we can easily eliminate, rather than widespread bad ideas and incentive structures.
The solution here is really simple: instead of saying “social justice warrior”, say the actual trait you’re critiquing. Social justice people who bully others. Ableist social justice people. Social justice people who hate men. Social justice people who think asexuals exist. Social justice people who believe that women should have autonomy. This practice will lead to much clearer thinking and communication.
Thing of Things 
This is really, really ironic coming on the heels of a post that takes exactly the opposite position on use of the word “racist” even though there’s also quite a bit of ambiguity what people have in mind when they hear that.
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“Racism” has a meaning beyond “person I don’t like” that is reflected in pretty much every use of the word “racist” (prejudice or discrimination against someone of a different race). “Social justice warrior”… does not.
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So does SJW. You listed some of them.
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Ahem. Asymmetric editability is not cool.
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I didn’t see your comment until after I was done editing mine. I know, I know, I should implement an edit button for y’all at some point…
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Not according to social-justice-people-who-indiscriminately-use-words-well-beyond-their-colloquial-scopes.
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I like and admire Ozy but the more I hear or read about the social justice movement the more I think they are crazy. They seem like a bunch of neurotics screeching about how terrible everyone else is and how terrible people are for not understanding their idiosyncratic definitions.
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While the term is often mis-used, I do think that in 95% of cases, it has a consistent definition – an SJ person who uses SJ to attack others for their own psychological benefit (bully, pompous grandstanding, direction all the attention to themselves, self-righteousness, etc.) rather than to actually achieve any SJ ends or oppose oppression.
“Bully” is similarly nebulous, with no 100% ironclad definition (it’s a social term, after all, not the mass of a subatomic particle that we can know to 10 decimal places). Just because, for example, right-wing Xtians claim to be “bullied” when we ask them not to marginalize basically everyone, doesn’t mean the term has no meaning.
It’s like “toad”. There is a correct meaning (member of Bufonidae), but even the imprecise manner in which it’s usually used (“any anuran with dry skin and/or wart-like protrusions”) has a grain of truth (those *are* key features of true toads), making it a useful term even if it’s sometimes used in clearly wrong ways (e.g. calling Pipa pipa a “Suriname toad”).
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I might be wrong here, please someone help me correct my understanding if I am.
Isn’t Social Justice Warrior a label that was initially self-applied? I think it was intended to indicate that the person combined an aggressive approach to feminism, which some 2nd wave feminists evinced , with the intersectionalityof the 3rd wave.
And the critique of that aggressive+intersectional approach is that it tends to lead to an “everything is problematic” mindset, and everything must be argued against stridently. And that tends to lead to a certain sort of bullying behavior.
Once that, fairly reasonable, critique was out there, and SJW becomes something of both a shorthand for the initially self-applied label as well as the critique, then you begin to see those who against feminism and/or broad social justice apply the label fairly indiscriminately.
This seems very much and in-group/out-group dynamic. Apply the appropriate out-group label to someone who is more of an in-group rival and attempt to force the rival into the out-group. Racist whites calling other white people n****** because that white person wasn’t sufficiently racist comes to mind.
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It’s doubly super ironic after the post about the word creep, also.
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This sounds very much like my rationale for not calling myself a feminist (or any other -ist, for that matter, but it’s my disclaiming of “feminist” that draws by far the most ire). It connotes so many things to so many people that pulling out the term is more ideologically than practically useful. I state my beliefs individually in appropriate contexts. That enables, as you said, “clearer thinking and communication”.
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I was just about to say the exact same thing.
The only difference I can see between feminist and SJW in this post is that feminist is a self applied label and SJW is applied by your opponents (though I have seen people proudly using the term – and various puns).
And that doesn’t isn’t relevant to the arguments in this post.
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I sympathize with your problem except I don’t think it has a solution.
This is the “You know who else opposed Stalin? HITLER” problem. If you talk about why communism is bad, some people might confuse you with people who think Obama is a communist… and those people are idiots and trying to ban the word “communism” all together is too much of a concession to the idiots.
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For that matter, how about the word “misogyny?” After all, if you use it, someone might confuse you with Femitheist Divine . . .
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TFD never uses the word ‘misogyny’.
You should check out her serious content…or read any of her pages…
http://www.femitheist.net/p/cp-faq.html
http://www.femitheist.net/p/important-disclaimer-read.html
& things like…
http://www.femitheist.net/2014/07/male-circumcision-mgm-a-matter-of-bodily-autonomy.html
she plays a character in satirical work that is offensive. the rest of the time she is basically egalitarian. read.
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I am best-known for writing contentious and humorless “satire,” but typically, such work only makes up a very insignificant portion of my general content (even though it is what people often focus on the most). I employed this method to evaluate the mentalities of various collectives, to gauge narrative and discourse climates, and for my own personal accumulation of useful research information.
I now no longer present my satirical works without making it clear that they are not serious, as many people have been unable to recognize that fact on their own, despite the over-the-top and theatrical style of said presentations.
“It was a social experiment!”
Now there’s a familiar cry.
Interestingly, the posts on that site start in December 2012, after all of her FSTDT quotes other than the one pertaining to her VICE interview (is that satire as well?). Note that two of those quotes do in fact use the term “misogynistic.”
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I do not expect the suggestion if your conclusion to work, because both sides are too often assuming bad faith, and have built automatic counters. Examples below of answers met “in the wild” to criticism of the first 3 categories of SJ-persons.
“Social justice people who bully others.” → “Tone policing!” or “but it’s a joke” or “it is punching up”.
“Ableist social justice people.” → “You don’t get to define ableism” or “it is punching up”.
“Social justice people who hate men.” →”Why don’t you get it’s a joke?”, with a side of “People who make/laugh at rape jokes should shut up about ironic misandry” (nice have_you_stopped_beating_your_wife bundled in the defense here).
But then, my main problem (and I don’t think I am alone in this, especially in rationalist-adjacent spaces) with (parts of) SJ norms is the casual use of bold lies and slander. And the tolerance that is extended for those persons and their discourse in more moderate SJ-aligned spaces.
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>“People who make/laugh at rape jokes should shut up about ironic misandry” (nice have_you_stopped_beating_your_wife bundled in the defense here).
Me: “I’ve never laughed at rape jokes, ugh, really, they are disgusting!”
SJ person: “#NotAllMen” :smug:
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+ “Do you want a fucking cookie?”
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@Anon: Oh gods, the fucking “want a cookie” bullshit.
Now that I think of it, it’s an example of Kafkatrapping, isn’t it? If you deny being sexist, you’re demanding a cookie, which is sexist.
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“Social justice people who think asexuals exist.” – I suspect you forgot a word here. If not, please do explain what is wrong with that particular belief.
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As I understand it, from the POV of those who do not believe in asexuals, the term SJW can be used to describe those who do believe in asexuals:
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Nothing is wrong. It’s similar to the following phrase: “social justice people who think women should have autonomy.”
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Nobody will ever say these things. They’ll say “social justice people who think women are superior.” They’ll say “social justice people deluded into denying their sex drives.”
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It would still be helpful to have them identify themselves.
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I think that asexuals exist. (My boyfriend Scott is an asexual.) “Social justice people think asexuals exist!” is a critique that people have of social justice (as is “social justice people think that women should have autonomy!”) and I would prefer that people who make that critique say so specifically.
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Ah! Thanks for the clarification, I get it now.
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Is there some overarching principle that makes it ok to re-define the words “racism” and “sexism”, but not ok to re-define the word “SJW” ?
Obviously, saying “no, there’s no such principle, we’re doing this piecemeal” is a perfectly reasonable answer; but figuring out the overall algorithm would be useful, since you could apply it to other words.
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Racism means the dictionary definition of racism: prejudice or discrimination against people based on their racial group. Social justice warrior doesn’t really have a meaning other than “social justice person I don’t like.” I think the former refers to a natural category and the latter does not.
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I think the difficulty is that it’s totally possible to prop up a racist society without actually being prejudiced against a given race. For example, take the whole “Black Lives Matter” thing. There are presumably people who dislike that campaign because they just happen to think that [insert cop] acted totally reasonably. There is a good argument that they are propping up a racist system, and there is a good argument that they are wrong on various grounds, but they aren’t necessarily prejudiced based on race.
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Susebron: I’d be uncomfortable saying any individual who thinks [cop] acted totally reasonably is being racist; I am very comfortable saying that the criminal justice system is racist, but it does actually cause discriminatory outcomes to people based on race.
osberend: Surely the claim that statement is making is the fairly reasonable “prejudice against Muslims is usually rooted in prejudice against people of color and leads to discriminatory behavior against people of color, who are more likely to be read as Muslim.”
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@ozymandias: I am vocally anti-Islamic (and anti-Jewish and anti-Christian, but Islam is generally Religious Enemy #1), and have had numerous people either assert that “Islamophobia” is inherently racist, regardless of motivation, or simply deny that anyone who is “Islamophobic” could possibly not have racist motivations. They have done this even after I’ve specifically cited what about the religion of Islam I find abhorent, and acknowledged that some other opponents of Islam are motivated by racism, and denounced that.
I’ve also encountered the same “arguments” about opposition to Judaism, but less frequently, since it comes up less. Oddly enough, no one seems to assume that my opposition to Christiantiy must be motivated by a hatred of white people . . .
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I was under the impression that “racism” was previously re-defined as, “prejudice plus power” (and is thus impossible to commit against white people). So, it looks like we have at least four competing definitions:
1). The common-use definition: “A despicable act of violence or overt discrimination against a group of people based on their race; something that is almost as bad as slavery”.
2). The dictionary definition: “Prejudice or discrimination against people based on their racial group”
3). The Social Justice definition: “Prejudice plus power”
4). The Ozy Social Justice definition: “Prejudice or discrimination against people based on their racial group, be it conscious or subconscious, deliberate or accidental”.
I’m not sure where to go from here, but clearly, we need some algorithm that will tell us which definition to use.
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Uh, Bugmaster? Ozy’s definition as you’ve listed it is the same thing as the dictionary definition.
My heuristic is this- I assume people are using the Ozy/dictionary definition. Done.
I don’t think (1) exists. I think even the most retrograde conservative understands “racist” to encompass someone who doesn’t explicitly discriminate against black people but who does think of them as inherently criminal or lazy or whatever. I don’t understand how so many people in this thread are claiming otherwise.
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@Bugmaster:
That’s isn’t a common-use definition. Rather, it’s the definition used by conservatives and anti-SJ folks, and virtually no one else. (Although, see Patrick’s comment.)
Anyway, I agree with you that the word “racism” has multiple meanings and connotations. But that’s common in the English language.
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@Patrick:
As far as I understand, “discrimination” is usually meant to be deliberate, though I could be wrong. Ozy’s meaning of the word “racism” includes things like “looking at a black person and feeling vaguely uneasy”, which as an example of subconscious discrimination.
@Ampersand:
> Rather, it’s the definition used by conservatives and anti-SJ folk
What do you mean by “conservatives” ?
My point was that most people (even those outside of SJ circles) have very strong negative emotional connotations linked to the word “racism”, which the dictionary definition does not adequately convey (except perhaps for definition #3, “hatred or intolerance of another race or other races”).
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…why is that not an example of “prejudice,” a term contained in both (2) and (4)?
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Enter “define:racism” into Google:
“… the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races.”
Important parts bolded by me.
This has always been the dictionary definition, as far as I know. Any deviation to the left or right is a result of a conscious effort to re-define the term to suit one’s political biases.
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@ozymandias: But “racism,” as used by (many, if not all) social justice folk, doesn’t simply mean that, unless you adopt highly unusual definitions of “discrimination” or “based on.” Otherwise the slogan “Islamophobia is racism” would be recognized for the idiocy that it is, to give just one example.
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@ozymandias It’s kind of strange that ‘race’ is socially constructed but ‘racism’ has an objectively correct definition.
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Toggle, I feel like racism’s definition is well aware of the fact that ‘race’ will mean different stuff to different people and allows for that insofar as it only describes behavior based on assumptions (of what race is). As such, it takes the unstable framework of whatever-race-means-to-you as a given and builds upon that foundation, describing a distinct and objectively measurable behavior.
Which as I say it, reminds me of hate-crimes and the fact that you can’t really say if that crime actually was due to racism.
So I guess I agree with what I think you’re inferring.
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I don’t know about Ozy, but I’ve seen social justice people refer to themselves as ‘social justice warriors’. Most of them seem to rather like it (see jokes about social justice wizards and social justice rogues). So mostly I think it’s just a less cumbersome way to say ‘member of the social justice movement.’ People who have a problem with *social justice* will use the term in a negative way, but people who dislike a particular social justice warrior but agree with social justice cultural trends will tend to use it in a positive sense if they use it at all.
So more often, “SJW” is used to refer to members of a fairly distinct culture of activism. Specifically the one that is currently mostly online and owes a lot of its discourse to academic poststructuralists like Derrida and Judith Butler. It isn’t just a version of ‘progressive activist’, because there are noted feminists and reformers that most people would never refer to as social justice warriors- Amanda Marcotte is a SJW, but Susan B Anthony was not; even Gloria Steinem is something of an edge case. Martin Luther King Jr. probably wasn’t a social justice warrior; Malcolm X definitely wasn’t.
I often see people use ‘social justice warriors’ language as a way to target a specific set of philosophical attitudes. In particular, a strong concern with language use and the ways that language reinforces taboo, as well as a tendency to use rapidly organized group action to enforce those language preferences. They tend to believe that the social construction of reality is the dominant force leading to existing inequalities, and are correspondingly less interested in legal change than in changing social attitudes. A ‘social justice warrior’ will also be specifically concerned with the hierarchy of privilege. And so the distinction of ‘social justice’ and its warriors is useful as a way to distinguish that culture from, say, the assertion that women are people who should have rights.
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I’d be willing to ID as an SJW, but perhaps with the same irony I might identify as a “militant atheist”. I’d do it because my position is strong enough that I don’t mind shocking people. Also as an insult it’s kind of laughable.
However, I can see more moderate people being upset with the label.
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I have seen this usage to. Unfortunately I think people who do this believe that people who use the word SJW are always doing this because they irrationally oppose all social justice causes. And have never taken into consideration that some people within the social justice community might actually deserve criticism. Or even worse have adopted a “ends justify means” mentality and think anything that social justice activist do for the cause is justified.
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I kinda like “Social Justice Techno Mage.” You can call me that if you like.
Which, near as I can tell, “SJW” emerged as a pejorative and then was gleefully reclaimed by social justice folks, cuz who wouldn’t want to be a warrior for social justice?
Which, perhaps this qualifies as the most ineffective pejorative ever.
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Well, I can’t be sure how our timelines match up, but my first experience with “Social Justice Warrior” was over a decade ago, from a liberal Anglican church I used to attend. They were big on, well, social justice: feeding the poor/homeless (i.e. free soup after Sunday service, attending service not mandatory), campaigning for female and gay priests in the clergy, etc… The pejorative usage of the word seems to have arisen from internet assholes who’ve sullied it by being particularly terrible while claiming to promote social justice.
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If I understand, you are essentially arguing that Social Justice Warrior is a Fully General Counterargument. Any time anyone is criticized in a fashion that is tangentially related to social justice, they can dismiss their critic as an SJW.
The thing is, I don’t think SJW is a term you use to dismiss ideas, I think it’s a term you use to criticize people’s behavior. If someone dismisses a social justice idea because its proponent is a known SJW, they are not doing things right.
To use a really obvious analogy, dismissing a SJ idea because an SJW argues for it is like dismissing a critique of Stalin’s atrocities because a McCarthyist argues for it.
It’s a fairly close analogy I think. Humans have an urge to witch-hunt, to seek out powerless people and blame the problems of our society on them, all while claiming they are powerful oppressors. In the old days we could get away with claiming that the powerless were using their supernatural powers to oppress us. Nowadays we tend to exaggerate the power of real oppressors, or attack people who are in the same social groups as a real oppressor, but lack any power. In the Fifties McCarthyist claimed the relatively powerless American communists were oppressors, while in the modern day SJWs bully weak and powerless people who are demographically similar to powerful oppressors.
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My personal perspective, as a non-SJ Blue Triber who uses the term: “SJW” is just a pejorative synonym for “SJ person.” Saying “SJW” instead of “social justice person” has the same function as saying “commie” instead of “Communist”—it’s shorter, and it conveys a negative attitude.
There is, of course, some remaining ambiguity that results from the fact that some people have a weird notion of what “SJ person” means (which may extend as far as “anyone who thinks that women are not pets who can talk” in extreme cases), but the same is true of “Communist.”
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This seems accurate.
Personally, for a non-pejorative term, I’d prefer “Social Justice Advocate,” because advocacy is something people do. “Social Justice Person” makes it sound too much like holding a particular set of opinions is inherent to particular people.
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You say that SJW is not a natural kind. This is an empirical (ish) claim and thus can be verified or falsified by empirical facts.
Hypothesis: there is a subset of people in SJ who are zealous in self serving ways who often use bullying tactics.
I shall have to think of more properties of SJWs.
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This is interesting and helpful.
I never had alarm bells at phrases like “social justice warrior” to say “social justice person and by the way I don’t like them.” It seemed like a natural and useful way to talk.
But unfortunately I also never had alarm bells when I saw a post referring to “social justice warriors” in general, talking about them as a group. You’ve made me realize that I should have had alarm bells ringing saying “YOU DON’T ACTUALLY KNOW WHICH GROUP OF PEOPLE THIS POST IS TALKING ABOUT BECAUSE YOU DON’T KNOW WHICH SOCIAL JUSTICE PEOPLE THEY DON’T LIKE.”
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Would you be for the term if a group of people all started using it the same way and wrote a thing clearly defining it?
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From how I see it a SJW is someone who uses social justice activism as an excuse to be an asshole. Not everyone who is an asshole is an SJW. Not everyone who is an Social Justice Activist is an SJW. But whenever someone combines these two traits together and uses the Social Justice Activist part as an excuse for the asshole part you have an SJW.
I have seen self proclaimed Social Justice Activist do the following things:
1. Claim to be an “anti-racist” then openly express anti-Semitic viewpoints that you would expect to here at a Nazi rally.
2. Defend Imperial Japan because they are “POC”.
3. Claim that Japanese war crimes against Chinese and Koreans aren’t racist because “their all the same race”.
3. Defend a woman who raped an eight year old boy “because he seduced her”.
4. Commit identity theft.
5. Use their blog to harass random people on the internet. And if their popular. Send their fans to harass people for them.
6. Use their popularity as a sj blogger to manipulate people into a abusive relationship
7. Spread slander and lies about people who disagree with them.
9. Convince someone to commit suicide and then get upset
10. Defend people who engage in some or all of this behavior.
Although all these behaviors are very different they all share a common thread of someone using social justice language, causes, identity, ideology as an excuse to justify evil beliefs and behavior.
SJW is not a perfect term since its often misused by bigots who are against social justice of any kind. But I would much rather have a collective term for people who abuse social justice activism. Than pretend that isn’t the case.
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“9. Convince someone to commit suicide and then get upset when they got in trouble for it”
Sorry I didn’t complete 9. And yes that actually happened.
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I’ve seen horrible thongs like that. And I don’t want those things conflated with the belief asexuals exist or that being mean to fat people is not helpful.
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I was once called a SJW for criticizing (really more like going “WHY…?” than an actual written out criticism) people for complaining that demographics in a game’s characters don’t match up exactly with real demographics (In all fairness I likely was using a somewhat mocking tone, though they were also beforehand. Its also possible I am not remembering all details properly). So the term is definitely “misused”.
(Context: pre-release dev stream of Civ Beyond Earth on Twitch. Kozlov, one of the game’s 8 playable characters, had not been fully revealed yet, though he had been called a he. A quote from him was read in game in a female voice, which made people think he was a she, which would give the game 5 female and three male PCs (really, the quotes were all read in that generic voice rather than by the leader voice actors, which was disappointing))
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This was in chat, not meatspace.
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Warrior for Christ carries the same sort of connotations in the red tribe (albeit in the opposite direction), and bugs me very similarly.
I think that means it’s the ‘warrior’ part of it in something very nonmilitary. It’s basically signalling, saying ‘I believe I’m at war and are willing to act as aggressively as I need to in an existential crisis for soul of humanity” It makes them feel strong (with all the bad parts that entails), and their opponents concerned (again, with all the bad parts that entails)
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If Jim thinks women are pets who can talk then Jim thinks women are birds! In a shocking turn of events, I now like Jim (unlike Jesus, whom I continue to dislike.)
I did propose Social Justice Javert a while ago but that only fits one very specific type of sj bully, plus there’s a risk that it would just get expanded like sjw has expanded.
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queenshalamit, it’s good you backed down, because insulting M. l’Inspectuer is fighting words as far as I’m concerned.
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*l’Inspecteur
(I don’t normally post clarifying comments for typos, but I’ll make an exception for Javert.)
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[content warning: suicide mention]
To be clear, I am a Javert fan. Javert is #relatable and interesting and important. There *are* Social Justice Javerts, people who, in Victor Hugo’s (translated) words are driven by “sentiments, simple and good in themselves, but [they] made them almost evil by [their] exaggeration of them.”Hopefully SJ Javerts can be shown the error of their ways in a way which does not result in their jumping from the Seine. But I think a lot of SJ bullies re NOT Javerts. Javert was willing to resign when he thought he was wrong about the mayor. Javert’s dedication was not to himself, but to The Rules. And here are SJ bullies who bully people because The Rules Of Being Socially Just Are Most Important. But there are also SJ bullies who have found that SJ is the most convenient way for them to amass power and only care about The Rules Of Being Socially Just as a means to enforce that.
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(Preemptive note: I didn’t really track this closely, so I got all this second and third hand and almost certainly missed some stuff.)
The original definition of SJW that I became aware of was roughly “someone interested in social justice who uses social justice as an excuse to attack others, either baselessly or out of all proportion,” BUT with the attached understanding that this definition and use originated from people who thought all social justice comments, critiques, and thoughts were baseless aggression, no matter how politely phrased or understated (along the same lines as the people that complain about “calling me a homophobe for wanting to ban gay marriage is oppressing my religion!”). So, a SJW was someone who viciously attacked people who hadn’t done anything wrong using social justice as an excuse, where “viciously attacked” extends to “criticized in any way” and possibly “wasn’t apologetic enough about existing in the presence of,” and “not doing anything wrong” covered everyone who hadn’t committed mass murder while screaming slurs and demanding genocide.
From there, I think some people who were/are actually interested in social justice picked up the term, essentially along the lines of “okay, those examples are absurd, but there are people who really do use social justice to viciously attack people who’ve only done minor things wrong and only unintentionally. That does need to be critiqued, and hey, here’s a ready-made phrase for it.”
And, at about the same time, other people started calling themselves SJWs, usually to denote a more provocative or defiant approach to social justice, or just that they felt attacked for their interest in social justice. Or liked the image of getting to stab oppression with a badass sword.
I think that that rapid shift in meaning, combined with the original meaning being so misleading, is why it’s such an unclear term now. But as said I didn’t track this closely, so I’ve almost certainly missed some steps and might have gotten the ones I do have out of order. Maybe someone who did watch it more closely can fill them in? (Not that it’s likely to make people start using the term with anything like a consistent meaning, but hey, internet linguistics is fun.)
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I was always used to the term “social justice” meaning a euphemism for “poverty” or “economic inequality issues”. Some time between the mid-2000’s and the end of the decade, it switched to mean a particular offshoot of liberalism, generally concentrated among young, well-educated, and hip, with a zealous focus on identity politics issues above all else. I generally refer to this subculture as “SJ”. I don’t call it “social justice” because I don’t think they deserve that term; I believe in social justice, and many of their beliefs run contrary to actual social justice.
SJW in particular mocks a certain type of mindset and behavior, in the same vein as the terms “keyboard warrior”, “keyboard jockey”, “Monday morning quarterback”, “Internet tough guy”, “backseat driver”, etc. are all similar mocking. One thing I’ve noticed is that SJ-types themselves often mock the SJW mindset, criticizing the SJW as someone who is essentially correct on most matters, but does it in an abrasive, self-aggrandizing manner that drives people away. I heard a true blue SJW mocking Tumblr for the tenor of discussions hosted there, for instance, before I knew (a) what Tumblr was and (b) that this thing called Tumblr had any particular political leanings stereotypically ascribed to it.
The problem is that they are not essentially correct. This sounds to me like a political party blaming its losses on its messaging, not its platform. There is much to criticize about certain SJW behaviors, though to a large extent these behaviors are common to all advocates of causes. Something about the SJ platform, seems to disproportionately attract negative personalities. In a simplified nutshell, I’d say that the SJ platform is more authoritarian than the standard liberal platform, and that’s what attracts the negative personalities.
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Definitely agree with the bit about how “SJW” is essentially just a brand of “keyboard warrior” aka a belligerent and obtuse bellend using their online connection to supposedly try to “educate” everyone but in reality vent their frustrations over the net.
I can see what you mean about the problems of “SJ” politics in general, but I think its how it resonates with online users in general. In the same way that far-right politics usually attracts bitter, aggressive 18-30 year olds, “SJ” seems quite suited to the sort of well-meaning but obnoxious and overreactive 15-25 year olds of today’s Internet. It’s probably that whole “e-activist” thing again (how many times have you heard the phrase “signal boost”?), where you think you can change the world by clicking a link. It seems to be an American thing too, no doubt spawned from America’s messed-up racial/ethnic history and climate.
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What if I want to refer to a specific cluster in thingspace? The group that’s characterized by “PoC can’t be racist”, “#NotAllMen”/”You don’t get a cookie for not being sexist/racist”, opposition to globalization (especially because they’re against cultural homogenization), those who are more likely to criticize Islamophobia than Islamic culture, “You’re racist if you think James Bond should be played by a white actor”, who see issues in terms of groups rather than individuals, who are economically left-wing but usually not socialist, and who are often more loyal to the SJ movement than to SJ ideas (e.g. the Zoe Quinn issue). “SJW” points at that cluster, and while you’re right that some people use that term more broadly, I still know of no better term that gets at what I’m talking about.
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This is my issue too. From the OP:
“The solution here is really simple: instead of saying “social justice warrior”, say the actual trait you’re critiquing. Social justice people who bully others. Ableist social justice people. Social justice people who hate men. Social justice people who think asexuals exist. Social justice people who believe that women should have autonomy. This practice will lead to much clearer thinking and communication.”
This is essentially saying that we have to say “blue, fuzzy, egg-shaped thing that glows in the dark and contains vanadium” rather than “blegg” every single time. I’m fine with coming up with a new term, but we do need to have one IMO.
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The problem as I see it is that you then start calling blue, fuzzy, egg shaped things that glow in the dark but DONT contain vanadium b legs, and blue, fuzzy, egg shaped things that contain vanadium but don’t glow in the dark vanadium, but you assume that they both glow in the dark and contain vanadium and then you misrepresent them because you’re modelling them wrong and end up talking past each other since they are doing the same thing to you.
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If some people use “blegg” to mean “blue, fuzzy, egg-shaped thing”, and some people use “blegg” to mean “thing that glows in the dark and contains vanadium”, and some people use it to mean “anything that is egg-shaped”, and some people use it to mean “red, smooth, non-glow-in-the-dark, egg-shaped thing”, then it would probably be less confusing for everyone if you spelled it out.
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I’m not convinced “social justice” is any more or less meaningful than “Social Justice Warrior” at this point.
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In fairness, there are definitions for SJW more narrow than “SJ person I don’t like,” including being extreme; bullying; vying for personal status; being a hypocrite; overreacting; acting as a mob; being culturally marxist;[1] being a keyboard warrior or slacktavist; etc.
Basically, its just a hodge-podge already common insults in political discussion. Since these insults are so common, I frequently consider them (and their substitutes e.g. SJW) basically meaningless, and little more than a stand in for “I disagree with this person and also they are a poopy-head.”
1) I am shocked to learn that this phrase actually has a coherent meaning to it.
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People are going to mean different things by SJW and racist, and that’s OK, but it’s something you should be aware of. (Everybody google Scott’s fish/feesh post!)
Ozy, I get your frustration. On the other hand, I like SJW. It’s compact and expressive. “Social justice” is a loaded concept that’s tied into the progressive way of seeing the world, and “warrior” implies a particularly combative approach to social justice. Calling the people who want to prevent right wing or liberarian speakers from appearing on college campus “college speech reform advocates” is pretty anodyne, but calling them “social justice warriors” captures a bunch of things.
On the other hand, as with calling people racist or accusing them of objectification, it’s confrontational. If you call someone an SJW, you’re probably not going to have a productive dialogue with that person,* because you’re going to fall into a debate over whether your understanding of that phrase matches the other persons, and whether it’s appropriate.
* And yes, there’s a good joke to be had about whether it’s possible to have a productive discussion with a SJW, but I actually think there are plenty of those discussions in Ozy’s comment threads – they just require that you Assume Good Faith, as the wikignomes say.
Now that I’ve written all that and clarified my thoughts somewhat, I guess my point is: (1) IMHO, SJW is a good piece of language, expressive and compact, but (2) it’s going to kill most conversations that involve a SJW, so use thoughtfully.
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The funny thing is, I remember a time when “social justice” seemed to have different connotations then it does now. So, when I hear people (unironically, as far as I can tell) self identify as “social justice warriors”, my first response is “who the fuck are you, Nelson Mandela?”.
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