General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Is this blog post intolerant of the transgendered? [View all]AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)For example, I can't recall how many times I've been (falsely) labelled a denier, or a "minimizer", etc., for actually looking at the science and drawing reasonable conclusions that just happen to rather strongly disagree with folks like Guy McPherson, David Wasdell, etc., in the sense that yes, climate change is a serious problem, but no, humanity is not at risk for extinction, civilization is not inevitably doomed, and no, the IPCC isn't really underplaying climate change all that much, if at all(and have actually been very much on target with the large majority of their predictions).
And just like you're "uneducated" or "not an ally", etc. if you don't believe that minorities can't harbor racist attitudes, in the eyes of a certain few, you are a "denier" or a "minimizer" according to doomers if you don't believe that humanity is in imminent danger of permanent decline or sudden death. The former is actually not quite as much of a problem on DU as it is in other places I frequent; but the latter problem is actually somewhat more prevalent on DU than most other places(ThinkProgress possibly being an exception).
Honestly, purity fights seem to be a problem with the activist left in general, not just DU; although the primary specific problem varies from site to site, the fighting in and of itself seems to be a universal problem, even if it's only a few doing a majority of the mudslinging. Which is unfortunate, IMO.