The Alt-Right Playbook: Didoing

One thing I wish this got into more is that didoing kinda exploits exhaustion. If a bunch of different situations involve a bunch of different forms of people having power over you, you’re liable to run out of resources to say “hey, isn’t this messed up?” So, when they find the most edge-case situation they can where they have power over you, the one where you look most unreasonable, they admit it’s real. You’re exhausted, you look unreasonable, you’re in a precarious position. That means that you’re at just about the worst possible state to realize that they’re advocating for you to be harmed for no real reason.

Isn't this basically gaslighting?

Maybe because I didn't watch music videos, and have heard that song maybe twice, I... really prefer "The Tolerable Level of Permanent Unhappiness." It's obviously not verbable, but saying "people with power are only willing to bend enough that your level of suffering is permanently tolerable and no more" matches how sadistic it is

Rev. angel Kyodo williams gave a talk ages ago where she said that she doesn't like the term "privilege" because she doesn't see it as a privilege (honour, advantage, benefit etc) to be so disconnected from shared humanity that you lack compassion for others. After I heard that talk I sought an alternative to "privilege" and it did not take me long to settle on "social power", because that's what people are REALLY talking about. I think with this video, you not only solidify that for me, but you have also flagged how our continued use of "privilege" when we mean "social power" is yet another way the conversation can be controlled, especially considering how many conversations about the social power someone has just devolve into arguments about what is or isn't a "privilege". Anyway...fab video as ever. :)

Thank you so much for this video, it explains in very simple terms something I've been having minor arguments with people. (As a writer, I strive to provide content warnings for my stories, and I sometimes get messaged by people who disapprove of that.)

I thought this was excellent upon first watch. I’ll watch again as soon as I can and provide feedback.

I think your argument is pretty severely flawed because, well, isn't it just plainly true that some amount of inequity must inevitably be accepted, because the cost of eliminating ALL inequities (no matter how small) (no matter how niche and rare) is infinite? To not admit any margin, any inequity, is like building a bridge and saying that it should never pose any risk ever of harm ever, no matter how small - you can never get the risk to 0, but you can always reduce it with more spending, so the bridge's cost is infinite. Obviously this doesn't apply to the trigger warnings example, because the gap is both meaningfully large and cheaply solved. But you're explicitly saying that accepting any margin is unjust, and are explicitly denying any wiggle in any case. It's an absolute claim, and its content is explicitly about the fact that its an absolute claim. But can something be unjust, if doing otherwise is impossible, even in principle? I think your counterargument is just plainly false. Which sucks, because I totally know the behaviour you're talking about and it sucks and we shouldn't let people get away with it. But this argument is bizzare, or misstated to the point of complete falsity.

Great video, thank you for it.

Ian: Dido-ing. Me: Di-Doing!

I'm not big enough in disability rights to say for sure, but I expect this also applies there. "We can either add wheelchair accommodation to the front entrance of our building, or you can just go around the back through an alley to get to our handicapped entrance."

Only because of the videos premise I immediately assumed the guy on the right was supposed to be Eminem but yeah this one rings. When someone knows that their *inaction* is powerful, that can turn out especially badly