I've been thinking a lot about these two concepts. I feel like there are no two words that are more alienating in modern discourse.
Calling someone "over-sensitive" or "too sensitive" is like a death sentence in some spaces online, but similarly in interpersonal conversation there is probably nothing you can do to rile someone up like calling them oversensitive. What the word tries to allude to is the gulf between someone's reaction and someone's intent, but both of those are in the brain and speakers and listeners have no way of really knowing what's in someone's brain. There needs to be a word like sensitive without the alienating connotations, which usually suggest being out of control, are often feminized, and serve as a way of invalidating how someone is feeling. Analogous words include triggered, etc.
Privilege has a similar effect, mostly due to long simmering class tensions around the world. No one wants to believe that they're privileged because it suggests they didn't earn something or that someone else's sacrifices and disadvantages make them somehow nobler than someone who didn't have those disadvantages. There are many places where simply using the world privilege will lead to a total shutdown in the conversation. But the word is accurate, at least, as it nods to real material disparities that exist in the world and at least to the consequences of a few symbolic ones. Analogous words include entitled etc.
My question is what words could replace these highly charged words in discourse? Is there even a need for them? What do these words make you feel when you hear them about someone else? What do they make you feel when one or the other is applied to you?
FULL DISCLOSURE: Normally I don't do any research on this forum because I don't crap where I eat, but I may end up writing about this topic at some point.
Calling someone "over-sensitive" or "too sensitive" is like a death sentence in some spaces online, but similarly in interpersonal conversation there is probably nothing you can do to rile someone up like calling them oversensitive. What the word tries to allude to is the gulf between someone's reaction and someone's intent, but both of those are in the brain and speakers and listeners have no way of really knowing what's in someone's brain. There needs to be a word like sensitive without the alienating connotations, which usually suggest being out of control, are often feminized, and serve as a way of invalidating how someone is feeling. Analogous words include triggered, etc.
Privilege has a similar effect, mostly due to long simmering class tensions around the world. No one wants to believe that they're privileged because it suggests they didn't earn something or that someone else's sacrifices and disadvantages make them somehow nobler than someone who didn't have those disadvantages. There are many places where simply using the world privilege will lead to a total shutdown in the conversation. But the word is accurate, at least, as it nods to real material disparities that exist in the world and at least to the consequences of a few symbolic ones. Analogous words include entitled etc.
My question is what words could replace these highly charged words in discourse? Is there even a need for them? What do these words make you feel when you hear them about someone else? What do they make you feel when one or the other is applied to you?
FULL DISCLOSURE: Normally I don't do any research on this forum because I don't crap where I eat, but I may end up writing about this topic at some point.