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I genuinely do not understand the moral outrage that people express at some of my lines of questioning. It's a bit novel each time, and to some extent I'm drawn to figuring out which kinds of question that trigger the outrage. But it seems so inconsistent!

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Aella

@Aella_Girl

Sep 30, 2021

Some qs I predict people would get upset about, but they don't at all. Others seem extremely innocuous or basic questions I assume everyone asks and then I get slapped upside the head with surprise anger. I've learned ppl are touchy about trans, pedos, bestiality, and autists.

Aella

@Aella_Girl

and like, it is intuitive to me that those questions are more charged, but not intuitive to me that they're anger inducing. I've sort of assumed the charged areas are the most interesting places to ask qs and some part of me doesn't get why everyone else doesn't feel the same

2:54 PM · Sep 30, 2021

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Aella

@Aella_Girl

Sep 30, 2021

I don't think I've ever come across a single question I think shouldn't be asked, or made me upset. this concept is foreign to me.

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But I mean if we wanna do the childhood explanation thing maybe it's cause I was raised a fundamentalist Christian who believed evolution was a lie and gays were sinful, and questioning every single one of my deepest moral intuitions was essential for getting out of there.

Aella

@Aella_Girl

Sep 30, 2021

But still, those questions didn't make me angry, I was still drawn to the charged questions about whether women should be allowed to vote or whatever then, and I'm drawn to the charged questions of this culture now. And - whyyy do they make ppl so upset?

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srry I mucked up this tweet thread cause I tried to delete to fix a typo good luck wading

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my guess is that a lot of people have a very absolutist view of morality and political issues. this means that people that disagree with them are the enemy, and that questioning those beliefs, whether you disagree with them or not, is kinda challenging those beliefs, which is bad

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Bad-faith “just asking questions” messaging has become a common trope in far-right media as of late. There’s now a societal presumption of subtext whenever you are “just asking questions” about culture war topics.

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I think people just don't believe you're actually sincerely asking a question. Most statements can probably be packaged to resemble a question, so if you believe there are statements that cause anger, it doesn't seem like a big leap to statements-hiding-as-questions causing anger

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Ok, hypothesis: People get angry if you question the boundaries or implications of categories, whenever they rely upon that category's social legitimacy. People will get angriest when they fear that the category's legitimacy is tenuous.