portraitoftheoddity:

I feel like a lot of tumblr culture, especially the particularly ineffective brand of Tumblr Social Justice™, has somewhere along the line lost track of the difference between something having the potential to be bad, and being innately bad. 

For instance, a white author writing a character of another race absolutely has the heightened potential for problematic portrayal, since that author lacks lived experience as a member of marginalized racial/ethnic group to draw on, and has a heightened chance to misrepresent that group. However, if they do their research, talk with individuals from that racial/ethnic group, consult with sensitivity readers, etc., they may still tell a very honest, sympathetic, good story with good representation. It is not innately bad, simply because of the author’s race; though I’ve seen arguments on tumblr insisting this is the case. 

Another example is relationship dynamics; couples who have an age gap or a power imbalance (such as one individual being lower on a professional chain of command from the other) might have an increased potential for an abusive dynamic to form. The couple with the age gap has to be more conscious of differences in lived experience, and the couple with a power differential in the professional side of their relationship needs to overcome more hurdles to equalize things in the context of their personal dynamic. But neither of these things is impossible. These dynamics are not innately abusive; they might make abuse easier, or more common, but they don’t guarantee it. Just as avoiding these dynamics doesn’t guarantee a lack of abusive behavior.

Some situations/dynamics/endeavors have a heightened potential for things to go wrong. And we should be conscious of that potential and keep an eye out for problems – not to destroy the thing, but to encourage course correction (an edit to a manuscript; couples’ therapy; etc.). Many of these things, however, tumblr culture has labelled as innately bad, rejecting any possibility of the thing being done well and thus shutting down that encouraged course correction in favor of flat-out condemnation, without nuance, thought, or consideration. And by drawing clear lines of what is ‘innately bad’ and ‘innately good’ we also avoid giving due criticism of problematic things that have been assigned as ‘innately good.’ 

This hellsite is allergic to nuance, but damn, do I wish we could all be better at it and recognize that few things are as black & white and simple as we’d like them to be. Shit is messy. Everything is problematic. But not everything that can be bad is, and not everything that’s less likely to be bad is perfect.