yeah, no, and fuck you

[seperis]

Really.

On behalf of those of us who were and are single women on welfare with children in the South and at some point in our lives lived in a--I need to check the wording--"rural south USA in a welfare slum trailer"--and who do not think our population should be fodder for your smug little war on the word shack:

Fuck. You.

Are you fucking serious?

Are you comparing lower income women's lives--and since you used the word 'welfare', we all know you're talking about women, who make up the majority of welfare clients; women, whose choices and lives are limited by poverty and the difficulties raising children alone, without spousal support; poor urban women, a population that is statistically more likely to be battered by their male partner--to a fucking challenge using the word shack?

I suppose indywind felt it was 'problematic' to use the term 'trailer trash'; should I be grateful? Thank you. Your buddies in that thread who were so excited to read it--and that super clever "Now them's fightin' words!!!" jab--also have my abject gratitude that parts of my life--and my family, friends, and clients from when I was a caseworker who decided benefits for those renters of "rural south USA in a welfare slum trailer"--are being held up in humourous example of how southern poverty is totally like using the word shack. I feel as if social justice is on my side.

So, my night is shit. How's everyone else doing?

Comments

[recessional]

No. I was pointing out that writing cheerful happy porn about white people which uses the background of something that involves significant suffering of the disadvantaged and those targeted by racism is, in and of itself, racist and classist and I would like people to stop doing it.

I DON'T WANT people to write that fic. I also don't want people to write happy white guy porn using settings I grew up in which are subject to the disasters, huge amounts of racism, huge amounts of poverty and social neglect, and contains friends and relatives of mine.

I'm very sorry (genuinely) if the way I framed things did not get across, and that's my flaw. But what you're taking from this is NOT what I meant.

[seperis]

Your clever, clever intent does not matter. How is this hard to understand? To show off your social progressivism, a disgusting stereotype was dragged out and aired to show how smart and liberal you are; what it showed was a dramatic misunderstanding of poverty, and a stereotype bordering on fetish for what seems to be some idea of what Southern poverty--Southern rural poverty--Southern rural poverty in a slum, Southern rural poverty in a slum involving a trailer. Involving a population majority women and often majority Black and Hispanic.

If you aren't getting how utterly revolting this was, that it was equally disgusting in context, then I have nothing more to add. Your intent was just as disgusting.

[recessional]

Actually, all I was trying to say was that "conditions in post-Katrina Louisiana were bad and serious and unjust, and it would be shitty to write happy porn fic in that area." I used it because the Attawapiskat people were also moved after a natural disaster, and because that population is also majority women, and majority First Nations - not white. And that this is the association I have with "shacks" in Canada, and with the areas in which these fics are set.

You're right. On the level that I was using it above, I don't see how the comparison is completely revolting. I was saying that it is uncool to use either for porn. I was saying it is uncool to fetishize either or use it for a backdrop for your light-hearted fiction. That is all I've been saying.

I am genuinely sorry that I have upset you this much, and that in my own anger my entry here was what it was.

[seperis]

Please be progressive somewhere else, and leave my family, friends, and former clients out of it. I think we've had enough people being on our side and confirming disgusting stereotypes for really important reasons for one day. We have the entire US conservative movement doing it; we don't need help with that, thanks.