The general harm is that paying attention to unimportant question X means you have less time to pay attention to possibly more important question Y. Was this unclear from the text? For example:
In another comment here, Alejandro1 linked to this Robin Hanson post about policy questions that are orthogonal to vs. that map closely onto traditional liberal vs. conservative divides. The former are underprivileged and the latter are overprivileged, and the harm is that people are likely missing opportunities to implement useful policies because of this. (Perhaps Robin has prediction markets in mind as an example?)
Non-white feminists have a beef with white feminists part of which I think concerns white feminists having overprivileged certain kinds of questions, e.g. questions based on gender alone when non-white feminists think that gender, race, and class need to be understood together. The harm here is that the concerns of white feminism dominate feminist discussion and so don’t leave room for the concerns of non-white feminism.
Similarly, and as an expansion of the gay marriage example, (I think) many LGBT activists think that gay marriage is less pressing than issues like bullying and job security. The harm here is, as above, that concerns about gay marriage dominate discussion of gay rights and so don’t leave room for possibly more important concerns.
To take another tack on the gay marriage example, asking the question also implies that it’s the sort of thing one is allowed to decide on. I welcome a national debate on “Should we give Thom Blake a million dollars” but am less enthusiastic about debating “Should we throw rocks at Thom”.
As a minor historical note, the focus on gay marriage rather than other aspects of gay rights started out as a minority position, not a privileged one. Or so I gather from reading Andrew Sullivan, who seems to have been pushing for the emphasis on marriage rights at a time when that was still controversial among LGBT activists.
ETA: I find the downvote bizarre. I assume it’s for PITMK reasons, but I’m not presenting a normative stance one way or the other.
The general harm is that paying attention to unimportant question X means you have less time to pay attention to possibly more important question Y. Was this unclear from the text? For example:
In another comment here, Alejandro1 linked to this Robin Hanson post about policy questions that are orthogonal to vs. that map closely onto traditional liberal vs. conservative divides. The former are underprivileged and the latter are overprivileged, and the harm is that people are likely missing opportunities to implement useful policies because of this. (Perhaps Robin has prediction markets in mind as an example?)
Non-white feminists have a beef with white feminists part of which I think concerns white feminists having overprivileged certain kinds of questions, e.g. questions based on gender alone when non-white feminists think that gender, race, and class need to be understood together. The harm here is that the concerns of white feminism dominate feminist discussion and so don’t leave room for the concerns of non-white feminism.
Similarly, and as an expansion of the gay marriage example, (I think) many LGBT activists think that gay marriage is less pressing than issues like bullying and job security. The harm here is, as above, that concerns about gay marriage dominate discussion of gay rights and so don’t leave room for possibly more important concerns.
To take another tack on the gay marriage example, asking the question also implies that it’s the sort of thing one is allowed to decide on. I welcome a national debate on “Should we give Thom Blake a million dollars” but am less enthusiastic about debating “Should we throw rocks at Thom”.
As a minor historical note, the focus on gay marriage rather than other aspects of gay rights started out as a minority position, not a privileged one. Or so I gather from reading Andrew Sullivan, who seems to have been pushing for the emphasis on marriage rights at a time when that was still controversial among LGBT activists.
ETA: I find the downvote bizarre. I assume it’s for PITMK reasons, but I’m not presenting a normative stance one way or the other.