Like a lot of people I have a tendency when thinking about systemic bigotry and abuse to look to who materially benefits from the subjugation of its targets. And it is a useful corrective to remember that historically (and in many parts of the world today!) left-handed people—a minority it is trivially easy and straightforwardly socially useful to accommodate in daily life—have been subjected to abusive “handedness conversion therapy” as children, inflicting permanent neurological damage, for no discernible reason beyond that they use their upper limbs and digits weird
Yeah, this is a really good illustration of a thing
Because I think centrists/adjacent have their own version of what you’re talking about, which is to say there’s an assumption that as a species/society we Aren’t That Stupid and so on some level there must be a Good Reason why things are the way they are. It can’t be the case that we’re just torturing people and excluding them from society for no good reason and, with some investment in diversity of provision and changing of mindset, we could literally just stop doing that and nothing would collapse.
But sometimes it really is that simple. Sometimes we are just being horrible for no good reason, and things would get better for everyone if we just stopped.
