To believe someone else *cannot* understand your experience is dangerous. Not only does it put you at fundamental odds with them, but it also prevents you from ever allowing yourself to feel vulnerable with them.
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This is why I distrust groups that claim only they have the authority to understand their experience. It discounts general human's ability for imagination and empathy and is self-isolating and self-reinforcing.
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The example I have authority to speak on is women. I very often see women talking about how men cannot represent them, can't understand their experience, and discount a man as a representative just because of his gender. While I agree similar experiences is correlated with-
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Or just that cross group empathy is a different thing than actual experience.
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I think people are willingly confusing different levels of understanding. Like obviously I can’t understand your experience isomorphically, same as I can’t understand what it is like to be a bat. But you can understand a given thought process or experience I’ve had -
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it is a necessary counterbalance to men talking how women cannot represent them, can't understand their experience, and discount a woman as a representative just because of her gender
until the above stops the opposite that you stated is necessary
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So I have a lot to say about this, as someone who is a minority and a misfit who has always felt compelled to find ways to relate to other people, partially just to survive, and partially from a desire to know others. You are right to feel uncomfortable IMO.
That said,
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But those same women will turn right around and assume they completely understand the male experience.
