It's a special topics course I teach in my department: "The Rhetoric of Hate Speech." It's mostly a cultural history that goes into the origins of various stereotypes, the evolution of certain organized hate groups, the impact of the pseudoscientific racism of the 19th century, misogyny throughout world history, legal…

You're precious. Really. Enjoy whatever it is you get out of posting on a forum you despise.

Oh, come off it. I'm a white, cis-identified het male, and I've had no problems on here, people have been receptive to my posts, etc. I've seen plenty of other people loaded with privilege who are respected commentators and community members.

Spec, I lurk around on Neo-Nazi forums like Stormfront for a living, you don't need to tell me that this wasn't equivalent to what you would see on there (I usually have to go to sites like Cute Overload just to wash the bile out of my brain after a couple of hours with the dregs of humanity).

The First Amendment is about the government not being able to interfere with the freedom of speech. If somebody tells somebody else that they don't like what they said and would they please stop/apologize/etc., that is in no way getting in the way of their right to say what they like. Indeed, the offended party is…

But the only thing we have to judge people's intentions on are by what they say. And despite what everybody wishes at some point or another, there's rarely such a thing as "obvious" intent.

Funny thing: it's entirely possible to say something racist without ever having remotely intended it to be that way. Saying something racist does not automatically make the person saying it a racist. I have little doubt about your intentions. You're embarrassed and feeling defensive, and I feel for that. But the…

As long as you're still doing the equivalent of rolling your eyes while "apologizing," I don't think you're getting the key point.

I go through this discussion every semester with my hate speech class. "But if THEY call themselves niggas/fags/dykes/mutts/etc., why the hell can't I?" Because context matters. Who it is who's saying the words matters. If it's somebody who the word is normally targeted against, that means, "Hey, I'm owning this so…

It's such a damn waste, too, because there are many, many things that vegans, hippies, environmentalists, etc. are absolutely correct about (I'm an unreformed carnivore myself, but I won't try to claim I'm doing so because it's healthy). But stuff like this is what sticks around in people's minds, in no small part…

If you're going to pull the "but the virus could mutate and affect humans" card, understand that the viral genes used (not even full-blown viruses, mind you, viral genes) are from plant viruses. The chances of crossover to humans are infinitely smaller than crossover from birds or pigs, which is where the vast bulk of…

Good point. Furthermore, do you know how plants are grown? They take a seed and they put it in dirt. DIRT. Do you know what they then spread over it? POOP. They grow our food in DIRT AND POOP. YUM!

This is particularly hilarious because there's a Harry Potter parody to the old Badger/Mushroom/Snake song.

Yeah, it didn't really seem like a viable long-term thing, but I didn't pry about whether she intended to keep this going indefinitely or if she was waiting for the "right moment" or whatever.

Back when I was in college I went on a date with a 23-year-old woman who quite literally fetishized her own virginity. And by that, I mean that she was sexually excited about being a virgin. She loved fooling around, kissing, groping, and was more than happy to let me go down on her (though I was supposed to stop the…

As a man who read a lot of that stuff even though the authors seemed to loathe me at first glance, I can say that I really do think a lot of second wave radical feminists really were mischaracterized (yes, even Dworkin), but that a lot of it was their own fault - not in the ideas as much as the delivery. But delivery…

This whole "third wave feminism is when the man hating began" meme is big on a lot of the anon boards these days. It has me extremely puzzled as well. If anything, the general lesson I learned in my women's studies courses was that part of the third wave was a response to the perceived "man-hating" of the second wave…

I had an ex who would get pretty vivid nightmares. Every once in awhile I'd be the lead villain in said nightmares, and she wouldn't even be able to look me in the eye for much of the following day. To her credit, she fully acknowledged that I hadn't done anything at all in real life and was really sorry, but she just…