Yoko's Asterisk 🏳️⚧The eight most wonderful words you can say on the internet:
" I don't know enough to have an opinion."
Since many people are responding to me from various instances:
I'm obviously not saying you should be neutral/apathetic on transphobia, climate change, or other hot button topics. I'm not a climate scientist, but I listen to climate scientists and let them shape my views.
But because I'm not a climate scientist, if there was a technical question about the mechanics of climate change, I would defer to the experts.
And to use a different example, I don't follow sports. So I don't have any opinions about sports. I also don't have any opinions about 99 percent of celebrities.
Nobody is harmed by me not exposing my ignorance on those topics.
And when it comes to marginalized/stigmatized communities, I listen to the members of those communities and avail myself of whatever resources they offer. I try to boost/support them however I can.
I don't lecture a member of a marginalized group about their own experience, especially if it's a marginalization I don't share.
My general rule of thumb is that marginalized people know more than I do about the challenges they are facing, and I should support them without drowning them out.
Tammy Garrison, MLIS@charliejane I’m always deeply surprised that people from nonmarginalized groups feel audacious enough to tell marginalized people how they should feel and what their lived life is like. But they’re the same people who explain the expert’s job to them. I shouldn’t be surprised by now.