u/Brief_Paramedic2501

A thought I’ve been workshopping are similarities between marginalizing people’s (I.e., bigots, racists, etc) perspectives of the people who they marginalize vs the patient-therapist relationship. 

Marginalizing people think they are arbiters of objective truth, and if you don’t see their truth about you as an objective fact, there’s something wrong with you. 

An example re marginalizing people: fatphobes tend to feel personally offended when they see a fat person who loves themselves because the fat person isn't supposed to accept their “deficit”, they’re supposed to see themselves as “defective” as the fatphobe sees them. “How dare they not understand how inadequate and (especially if they’re a woman) unattractive they are? They should be hiding their body, not flaunting it.” 

An example re the patient-therapist relationship: the therapist discounts the patients thoughts and experiences and essentially pushes the patient to adopt a perception of themselves that is equivalent to the therapist’s perspective of them. “It’s important that I get them to understand the truth of their problems, which I, as a person who has known them for a few weeks, can dictate. They must see things the way I see them in order for the ‘treatment’ to stick. And if they disagree with my perspective, that’s even more proof of their illness.” (Disclaimer: I don’t think this would apply to people in denial of things like addiction, harm they’ve done, or psychological symptoms like delusions or hallucinations)

In the end the outcome is the same: either agree or be wrong. Misogynists demand that women recognize the “reality” of their inadequacies and place in society, and any woman that doesn’t recognize that and act in accordance to the misogynist’s expectation is faulty and needs correction. Racists demand that Black people recognize the “reality” of their inferiority, and any Black person that doesn’t recognize this and defies the racist’s expectation is an existential threat or “uppity” and needs correction. I’m sure there are other examples for other marginalizations, but I’m only using examples that apply to me personally. 

The essential thought can end up being: “This person who I view as less than human thinks of themselves as a complete and worthy human being, and needs correction”.

One way I know if marginalization is occurring is how they respond to new evidence. There is no amount of evidence that can change their mind unless it comes from people not within the group they’re marginalizing. Even then, theres a limit, that one thing would be the exception, but they’ll still keep the other rules.

My husband and I plan on having work done in our home, and we have a contractor who puts on a mask then takes it off when we walk away then rushes to put it back on when he sees us. We asked him to wear a mask in our home and only does it when we’re around. We haven’t agreed to any work yet, still planning, but he’s been here twice, did this both times, and today two other guys were with him and did the same thing. I haven't decided if I want to talk to them or just tell them we’ll look for someone else to do the work, but I’m wondering, if I had a conversation, how could I approach it? And do you have a way to filter out contractors like this?

I’ll preface this by saying: I don’t live in Texas, so I’m speaking from a limited perspective. If you are a vegan from Texas, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

When Republicans accused him of being vegan, I’m disappointed that he decided to lean into talking about how much meat he eats. It’s like Republicans accused him of being compassionate, and his response is “nu-uh, I’m not compassionate at all!”. I wish he would’ve said something like “I’m not vegan, but I think living compassionately is noble, and I respect that”, and leaned into the importance of living with compassion for your neighbor as his religion promotes.

I’m not sure how catering towards Republicans who probably already don’t like him by proudly proclaiming he eats meat and alienating vegetarians vegans who likely already would vote for him, helps him politically.

EDIT: Folks from Texas in comments have taught me I’m in a bubble and some people make consuming meat not only their diet, they make it their personality, their culture, the way they sustain themselves financially and therefore their politics. Those people make up the majority of Texas voters and winning by any means necessary against a fascist government that’s placing families in concentration camps requires these concessions.