We live in a day and age where technology has advanced into the creation of Google Glass and self-driving cars. Yet, people still see the need to point out insignificant details not pertaining to the topic at hand and interpret it as "racist" or "sexist." Now I know that you can never please everyone, but it’s to the point where you have to be so careful to make sure you don’t “offend” anyone. I put “offend” in quotes because I sometimes question whether something truly offended somebody or they act offended so that they don’t look ignorant.
An example of this would be donating to a domestic violence organization, but someone finding some sort of offense because they see you as being ignorant for not thinking about the dying children in rural India.
What about Black Lives Matter? Some people turn the question around and ask why only black lives matter and not all lives. They fail to realize that the reason All Lives Matter isn’t a legitimate movement is because at one point in history, all lives didn’t matter. Clearly not much has changed considering the same ignorant behavior people exhibited back in the day are still present in some people in today’s world. The movement’s purpose is not to single out black individuals for them to receive special treatment, but rather a movement that has to unfortunately exist to deem black lives as valuable as any other life.
It may not seem so clear, but in the two scenarios I mentioned above, the person that believed you favor one organization over another--and therefore finds offense to it--is considered a butthurt individual. The person who felt that a certain movement shouldn’t exist due to the fact that it only pertains to a certain group of people is ignorant. The difference between butthurt and ignorant is that the former believes someone else is being ignorant over something petty, and the latter believes people are being butthurt over something that actually matters. I’m not talking about someone being ignorant due to a lack of knowledge per se, but more along the lines of the type of ignorance some people, who refuse to think about an issue any other way than their own, contain.
Although being butthurt and being ignorant are two different behaviors, they are similar. The thoughts they force upon people cause even more of a controversy, turning the attention away from the actual issue. I am personally for legalizing medicinal marijuana and gay marriage (and the latter is legal now so I’m not sure why this is still such a controversy), but those are just my own thoughts. I believe that everyone is entitled to their own opinions and thoughts so long as they don’t force anyone to take their side. I also believe that anyone who sides with anything that brings another species, and especially a certain group of people down (e.g., Donald Trump), is straight up ignorant. What’s surprising to me, however, is that there are many individuals that are ignorant, but even more that believe that someone is being ignorant, and therefore getting butthurt.
Ignorance is something that can never go away because what people think are right and wrong, in terms of social issues, is subjective. What ignorant individuals fail to see, however, is that there is no right or wrong answer. Similarly, what butthurt individuals fail to realize is that they are only making themselves look more ignorant than they already are based on their comments.
People need to stop being constantly butthurt. Aside from the fact that it is extremely irritating, it subliminally reinforces these backward thoughts that remind people about issues that are still apparently up for debate--despite already having it legalized, attained justice, etc. Instead, being butthurt just brings out other issues that are irrelevant to the topic currently discussed. It becomes a competition on which issue is more important than the other.
We are advancing physically, but butthurt people are the ones that keep us from moving forward mentally. There has unfortunately always been ignorance present in our world, and will probably always be present, but the least we can do is choose which topics are worth fighting for, for ourselves.
There shouldn’t have to be all these body positivity movements because we are clearly all beautiful. I feel like they shouldn’t exist because they don’t really celebrate all bodies anymore, but rather a specific type, whether it be curvy or pear-shaped, over others. The reason they exist is because society clearly favors slimmer body shapes over the others and it seems like the most logical solution to the problem, right?
But how about instead of making “Mermaid Tail” the new thigh-gap, we can just not give society the power to choose what is more beautiful. There is nothing wrong with the words skinny and fat. Butthurt people give all sorts of meanings to those words but in reality, they are just that: words. What if being fat had more acclaim than being skinny? Skinny people would feel bad about not being fat and they would start their own skinny-accepting movements.
It’s honestly all a matter of perception, and yours should be the first priority. You shouldn’t have to let other people define who you are and listen to society’s definitions of those words. That only weakens ourselves and our perception of others. So would you rather make your own opinions by yourselves or instead feel “offended” by what someone else has said?
