On positionality, online behavior, and assholes

This will be a short post because I only want to talk briefly about two related things:

1. As I rework the introduction to my dissertation, I'm once again forced to face the inevitability of positionality. I'm not a native speaker and I wasn't born in this country, but it is my home and I fully support the right of every individual to try to call it the same. Furthermore, my bilingual/multicultural background is only part of the reason I stand with blacks, browns, members of the LGBTQ community, freaks, immigrants, weirdos, and anyone else for whom Otherness is a perennial state. All the other reasons have to do with being a halfway smart person and a decent human being. People who are made to feel like they don't "fit in" are only in that situation because someone else has decided that what they do/are/stand for is "the way" and anyone who's different should be harassed and discriminated against. Fuck those people. In the words of Ruben Blades: "El planeta no le pertenece a un grupo; fue creado para que todos lo andemos." If a guy making love to a guy pisses you off or a Mexican woman with her kids crossing the border in search of a better future is something you strongly oppose, then you and I have a problem and, since I don't need any more problems and have no time to try to make you change your ways, you and your bigotry are out of my life.

2. A few people have commented on my patience lately, saying that they've never seen me engage in online arguments. Please, don't confuse my silence with indifference. I stand with the folks named above and loathe bigotry, but I decided that my time is better spent working, reading, talking to those whose company/mind/presence I enjoy, and writing than trying to change the life views of someone who wholeheartedly agrees with everything Trump says. Unfortunately, most of my Facebook friends are no longer doing their homework, and relying on them as indicators of compatibility has been an awful thing to do lately. Seriously, I "unfriended" and asshole the other day who had only shared anti-Obama/anti-immigration/racist/global-warming-is-a-lie bullshit since the day I accepted his request. The worst part? I accepted because we had 128 friends in common. Sure, I could take my discourse analysis skills and eviscerate him using facts and sense, but that would be a waste of time. Instead, I trolled him and then vanished, like a ninja with a sandwich and a movie waiting at home. I don't think the web is the place to fight bigots. If we ever meet, then that's a different story, but my free time is something I want to fill with humor, love, books, music, movies, and whatever else good people want to share with me, not thinking how bad I'd like to pop someone in the mouth repeatedly.

Stay cool, lovely creatures. Much love.