A clarification for the privileged

[noracharles]

An emotion is not an opinion. We can not agree or disagree with an emotion, but we can sympathize (feel the same) or empathize (understand or care about the person's emotions).

An experience is not an opinion. We can not agree or disagree with it, but we can believe or disbelieve, or understand the experience being relayed.

An opinion is an opinion, and we can agree or disagree with it, or argue for or against it.

Someone who has a mental health issue and reacts in an unusual way emotionally may have emotions we can't sympathize with. But that doesn't mean we have to disbelieve their experiences, or disagree with their opinions.

Irrational is a not a synonym for wrong, or "thing I disbelieve" or "thing I disagree with."

Sane is not a synonym for right, or "thing I believe" or "thing I agree with."

And a pertinent example:

"Because of my social anxiety, I don't like having my fic archived on public archives, including the AO3" is not the same as "I have political or philosophical objections to the AO3".

When you use mental health to judge who are right and who are wrong in a disagreement, you are not just arguing for your opinion, you are also contributing to the oppression of all people with mental health issues (including those who agree with you about the matter at hand).

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Um, I'm 99.99% sure you have empathy and sympathy mixed up, and getting definitions mixed up gives an unpleasant irony to the whole post.

[noracharles]

I've been trying to understand what you mean by irony, because that word would not seem to apply to my post in the sense that I use it. Do you mean to say that it is ironic for me to give dictionary definitions, because I'm doing it wrong?

If that is the case: I am defining some concepts, in order to nuance how we perceive the mental processes of others, and assigning the concepts names, so we can talk about them. I could have assigned any names whatsoever, and in the context of talking about this post they would make sense. What people choose to call the same concepts in their daily speech is not very relevant.

That said, I didn't invent names for the concepts, I used the words I normally use, the way I normally use them. Some people use the words as synonyms, and some, I suppose including you, make the same distinction I do, but apply the words the other way around.