People don't realize that if you want to be the most inclusive, sometimes your focus needs to be brutally narrow. Stick to yarn and patterns and be scrupulous about telling political discussions to go elsewhere.

This.

Political activism is important. Stand up for what you believe in. But political activism does not mix with an inclusive, warm, welcoming hobby community. If you feel so strongly about your political beliefs that you can't let them rest even in your knitting club, then for the sake of the knitting club you're going to either have to turn it into a political knitting club or watch it fall apart. Maybe that's a sacrifice in pursuit of a greater cause.

What’s frustrating as well is that if they would have stuck to knitting, they probably would have done more to advance their various moral causes than explicitly calling things out. The community of knitting builds trust and friendship which is much more effective at changing people’s minds than shouting at them.

> Political activism is important. Stand up for what you believe in. But political activism does not mix with an inclusive, warm, welcoming hobby community. If you feel so strongly about your political beliefs that you can't let them rest even in your knitting club, then for the sake of the knitting club you're going to either have to turn it into a political knitting club or watch it fall apart.

I disagree. Just about anything else is more important and productive than political activism. Almost all political activism (in America at least) is either pointless group therapy (e.g. Women's March), astroturfing (e.g. the "election fortifiers") or actually destructive and thus evil (choose your own "mostly peaceful protestors").

Activists have a tendency to indulge a totalizing vision of their activism. Many of the most hard-core activists would see a request to tone down their activism as akin to being asked to remove their limbs. Activism has become the core identity of some of these people.

And if activists' goals are actually achieved, activists usually have trouble letting go of their crusades, and so invent new ones or just become pure grifters. I can see no other explanation for why the most progressive institutions in America, universities for instance, are among those most frequently labeled as bigoted, racist, white supremacist or otherwise "problematic."

Yes, highly contrarian take, but if we ended all political activism tomorrow, we'd be better off.

Political activism, that is, working to influence politicians and the public mindset, is the only way society and politics change. You are saying that political change is usually unimportant, and so the homeless, the poor, and minority concerns can be cast aside.

Dropping words like "evil" for any destructive activity is itself absurdly absolutist.

I mean, I do believe that politics should be extracted from parts of society so we can go back to some kind of harmony, much like we don't eat food or exercise or meditate 24/7. Politics and political consideration, however important, are exhausting and we can't go on thinking about it all day every day.

I can't say I agree fully with you, but there's definitely something about today's activists that seem odd. MLK protested in suits and ties to convince the american public blacks were respectable citizens who deserved equal protection under the law. When BLM rioted, activists went on TV to tell the lay public that "riots are the language of the unheard" and that white America basically deserved it. Whether that's true or not... It seems to me that the core aspect of political activism in a democracy is *convincing other people*. I see very little focus on this aspect and far more focus on accusing others of wrong think.

Funny you contrast MLK with... MLK. He said that quote, although he said it meaning that riots, however bad, are indeed a sign that a group feels unheard, and it's worth paying attention.

I agree with your conclusion that politics is about convincing others. That takes more patience than many people seem to have, who are eager to tell the "non-woke" how wrong and bad they are if they don't immediately accept the new gospel.

I appreciate the comment. I made an admittedly bold claim, though I do tend to believe it. Activism with skin in the game (e.g. the Tiananmen Square student protests, Vaclav Havel's dissident writings and jailing, Nelson Mandela's imprisonment, the Umbrella Movement, Mohamed Bouazizi'a self-immolation) can be extremely effective and can change the world, often for the better.

America's political activists today seem to have zero skin in the game. It mostly seems like a status and power game more than an attempt to fix something. After all, if the problem was fixed, what would these activists organizations do day-to-day? Why would anyone donate to them?

How can you say they have zero skin in the game after watching video after video after video of Black people being murdered. After an elected president brags about sexual assault. After Asian hate crimes are occurring all over the country. After LGBT+ people are assaulted and or murdered. Political activists in America have reached a generational level. Minorities in America have been mistreated and repressed for hundreds of years and they need and deserve it to be fixed. Not to mention that a whole generation of TV personalities and politicians have spent AT LEAST the last 20years demonizing anyone who protests for Civil rights or climate change. To say this is an extremely privileged POV is a massive understatement IMO.

The irony about your comment is that you're kind of proving my point about activists. Being an activist for "minorities" (I thought I heard that was exclusionary language now?) has become a core identity for you, and anyone who questions any of the social justice Gish gallop such as this merely has a "privileged POV."

Yawn.

Right..... The only thing I've been an activist about is climate change. I do my best to support the communities that you ignore as SJW's but prefer to let them have their own voice. The funny thing is you don't just kinda prove my point, you 100% without question prove mine. You don't don't care about their suffering so anyone that protests that is clearly just doing it for attention. The reality is that you are so selfish that you can't see others suffering and honestly that's disgusting.

I share your cynicism about what political activism usually is, but I find it hard to share your conclusion that we'd be better of without it.

> Almost all political activism (in America at least) is either pointless group therapy (e.g. Women's March), astroturfing (e.g. the "election fortifiers") or actually destructive and thus evil (choose your own "mostly peaceful protestors").

>I can see no other explanation for why the most progressive institutions in America, universities for instance, are among those most frequently labeled as bigoted, racist, white supremacist or otherwise "problematic."

It's weird how you're pretending to make a statement about political activism in general, while only casting aspersions on progressive and leftist activism, using popular right-wing pejoratives ("mostly peaceful protestors") and even "election fortifiers" which is I believe a QAnon meme.

>Yes, highly contrarian take, but if we ended all political activism tomorrow, we'd be better off.

It isn't at all. Pretending to be apolitical while shitting on the left is so common it's practically banal around here.

> It's weird how you're pretending to make a statement about political activism in general, while only casting aspersions on progressive and leftist activism,[...]

> using popular right-wing pejoratives ("mostly peaceful protestors")[...]

The 06 January Capitol protestors were mostly peaceful, too. I chose an open-ended phrase open ended for a reason, notwithstanding the fact that many committed leftists I speak to seem unaware that riot police and tear gas were used against Capitol protestors just like the urban rioters last summer.[1]

Besides, the right is entirely disorganized and has essentially no activism to speak of. When the Buffalo guy was arrested, there was no bail fund to go get him out. He's rotting in a jail cell to this day.

It's a plain fact, regardless of position on the political spectrum, that the Right today is basically a joke.

> [...]and even "election fortifiers" which is I believe a QAnon meme.

Your belief is incorrect. I kindly ask you to retract your defamatory statement.

"Fortifying" was used in a Time Magazine article entitled "The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election"[2]:

> That’s why the participants want the secret history of the 2020 election told, even though it sounds like a paranoid fever dream–a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information. They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.

> It isn't at all. Pretending to be apolitical while shitting on the left is so common it's practically banal around here.

I'm not sure where I pretended to be apolitical. I'm merely non-ideological, and thus reject political activism (of the contemporary American type).

And the idea that HN is some right-wing troll farm is laughably funny. If only you could see the downvotes.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trump-supporters-storm-...

[2] https://time.com/5936036/secret-2020-election-campaign/

It’s hard to do when a very vocal and intimidating group of activists insist everything is political. “Silence is violence”, after all.

One of the commands the various Critical Therories have is to find ‘X’ in everything and expose it. Don’t ask if ‘X’ happened but rather find how ‘X’ happened. ‘X’ can mean racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, etc. And often these terms, like racism, have been redefined to mean something different than what most people think.

So, you can’t just have a nice hobby community according to these therories. You absolutely must unmask the “problematics” in them or else you are perpetuating systemic racism or the patriarchy, or whatever. Any denial that ‘X’ was somehow present is further proof it did happen. Denial is further evidence of guilt. If you don’t join in on the pile-on then you will be cast out and accused of ‘X’ as well and at best have to find new friends and at worst having your livelihood destroyed. So there’s a lot of incentive to “do better”.

You're being downvoted, but this is true.

The disagreement is over whether it's a good thing (break a few eggs, make a better-society-overall omelette) or a bad thing (anyone can get canceled at any time, everyone divided).

The problematics usually unmask themselves. Ravelry is, I think, struggling with the question of how to deal with their more irascible members.

To avoid the subject is to, implicitly, side with the status quo. "Everything is political", even the choice to avoid politics.

And other people don't want their club to be political as such, but they feel personally threatened by people with certain political views. They feel uncomfortable with even the suggestion that someone in their club might hold such views.

This is true regardless of one's personal political affiliation.

I know at least a few people who think (not without justification) that American political conservatives generally want them and everyone like them dead and/or in some state of second-class citizenship.

On the flipside, I know a handful of conservatives who believe fervently that left-leaning political policy is going to destroy their and their families' livelihoods, leaving their children without the future that they've worked hard to build.

I don't see how anyone could be comfortable in a knitting club alongside someone who they see as a literal existential threat.

It's not specifically a knitting club problem, is it?

The corollary is that it's not realistic to expect hobby knitters to solve a set of radioactively toxic political problems. Not even locally.

Indeed and well-said.

This is exactly why they _should_ be in a knitting club together. To deflate these tribalistic views which are mostly fuelled by isolation from each other.

Only in your belief system. Not mine and others.

To be honest, you sound like a flat earther. Reality isn't a belief system.

Would your hypothetical knitting club allow all patterns? That's a political position. If not, would it allow a pattern with the word "VEGAN" baked into it? Yes or no, that's a political position too.

There's no flow through that paragraph that doesn't end in making a political choice. You can't avoid politics, you can only pretend to.

Consider that this might be a privileged perspective.

Not everyone has the luxury of being able to carry out their lives regardless of what happens in politics.

In my experience, the people saying "the ability to not pay attention to politics is privilege" are typically privileged rich white women, not oppressed minorities - those people don't like talking about politics in knitting club. Just a sample size of one.

And in my experience, it's trans people, DACA recipients, people with dark skin, and people who identify as queer.

Let's make my sample size 2, then. How privileged are you?

Very. I can choose to ignore politics for the rest of my days and I probably won't notice any difference in my day-to-day life.

Political involvement is dominated by the privileged

Likewise, not everyone has the privilege of dragging politics into every facet of their lives. Many people like me were bullied by groups when they were younger. And these supposed "anti-hate" mobs look an awful lot like those bullies.

I very much agree with this in principle, but I think there are limits to it too. If a user who uses they/them joins your community and talks about yarn and patterns, referring to the user will always be political unless you ignore them or don't use pronouns around them, which is also political. And then whether or not the user is allowed to participate might be political- some users might be highly uncomfortable with a they/them pronoun user even participating and want a community "without those politics".

Why does that user have to reveal any pronouns on the web? The default state of web based communication is ungendered. I have no idea what your pronouns are. If I was referring to you in a comment thread I would have to use "they/them" (or maybe "KittenInABox"). That's not a political stance, that's just English.

If the policy then has to be that everyone has to be they/them or no one can have pronouns/correct anyone else about pronouns, then that itself is a political stance. Some things are just unavoidable.

That feels like an artificial problem though. On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog.

It's relatively easy to pass as any gender, age, race or whatever you want to. Yes, it will be more difficult if you call your account Transwomxn or request that people use xe/xir to refer to you, but if you're SarahKnitting, everybody will just assume you're Sarah and into knitting and will use she. At that point, it might be the right call by the community to not accomodate those that want to focus their membership on their political identity so they can provide a friendly community about knitting for the SarahKnittings of the internet.

Right, what you're saying is that xe/xir is a political identity and therefore certain trans people aren't welcome. But that decision is of itself political.