Ash
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Hey sorry @Trish. I was being flippant. I meant okay rather sarcastically compared to how bad it can get.
It troubles me that charities and media and medics alike mention Yuppie flu as if it’s the worst that was on offer. Also that it is referred to so often as a measure of progress. ‘We don’t say that now’ as proxy for ‘we are more compassionate’ or ‘less prejudiced’ because unfortunately that is simply not the case. It is said less often because 80s media terminology has naturally passed out of common usage.
I’ve actually lost count of number of people who’ve said to me “Oh yeah they call that Yuppie Flu, don’t they?” Always while wearing the biggest smirk imaginable. I can’t say I enjoyed the experience. But it was so predictable that it didn’t have the shocking or ambiguous quality of some comments. I prefer people to be directly hostile than sly or shy about it. Easier to avoid and I felt it was a sign of lower grade bullying a little easier to step around than most.
The hard stuff coming much more personally tailored and or from those with more power to directly destroy my life chances. Such people wouldn’t refer to me as a professional, even through spite or sarcasm
I don’t enjoy getting bullied on account of any negative stereotype. Still this one as intensionally nasty as is, wasn’t so sharp a cut. It’s just too ridiculous too dated too basic. I feel it is a derogatory term that gets too much attention at the expense of some of truly heartbreaking soul destroying stuff that’s been said about us by healthcare professionals.
But maybe if this attention is warranted, that is because it’s the go to insult for a certain generation in particular, but then it’s also been handed down through the decades and if someone wants to be hurtful but isn’t up on the latest lingo they can always reach for this one as a fall back. So on that level perhaps it has wrought the most harm, by numbers alone. It certainly seems a cycle where it will die off then some “sympathetic” media broadcast or article will remind everyone what less sympathetic media used to called us, in the bad old days.
I don’t think it really exists because a YUP 80’s media terminology fragment is not really how people think of any of us. Not if we weren’t selling stocks and shares in the 80’s and then flaking out after too much coke. The only reason people say it is because they have heard it referred to as way that people with ME are spoken about that we don’t like or find upsetting. It is the malintention that is the only use for it, not the actual content. Whereas I feel some of the psycho medicalised assaults are not really addressed. And are much more harmful.
I have heard it argued that the Yuppie one shoulders a degree of responsibility for a lack of research and support because it caught public imagination. I don’t know. Though I think shit would have been flung at the wall until something stuck and it wouldn’t have taken too much effort to bring us down.
I suppose my fear is we finally move on from YF only to be consumed by the rather more niche in joke that is FND.
It troubles me that charities and media and medics alike mention Yuppie flu as if it’s the worst that was on offer. Also that it is referred to so often as a measure of progress. ‘We don’t say that now’ as proxy for ‘we are more compassionate’ or ‘less prejudiced’ because unfortunately that is simply not the case. It is said less often because 80s media terminology has naturally passed out of common usage.
I’ve actually lost count of number of people who’ve said to me “Oh yeah they call that Yuppie Flu, don’t they?” Always while wearing the biggest smirk imaginable. I can’t say I enjoyed the experience. But it was so predictable that it didn’t have the shocking or ambiguous quality of some comments. I prefer people to be directly hostile than sly or shy about it. Easier to avoid and I felt it was a sign of lower grade bullying a little easier to step around than most.
The hard stuff coming much more personally tailored and or from those with more power to directly destroy my life chances. Such people wouldn’t refer to me as a professional, even through spite or sarcasm
I don’t enjoy getting bullied on account of any negative stereotype. Still this one as intensionally nasty as is, wasn’t so sharp a cut. It’s just too ridiculous too dated too basic. I feel it is a derogatory term that gets too much attention at the expense of some of truly heartbreaking soul destroying stuff that’s been said about us by healthcare professionals.
But maybe if this attention is warranted, that is because it’s the go to insult for a certain generation in particular, but then it’s also been handed down through the decades and if someone wants to be hurtful but isn’t up on the latest lingo they can always reach for this one as a fall back. So on that level perhaps it has wrought the most harm, by numbers alone. It certainly seems a cycle where it will die off then some “sympathetic” media broadcast or article will remind everyone what less sympathetic media used to called us, in the bad old days.
I don’t think it really exists because a YUP 80’s media terminology fragment is not really how people think of any of us. Not if we weren’t selling stocks and shares in the 80’s and then flaking out after too much coke. The only reason people say it is because they have heard it referred to as way that people with ME are spoken about that we don’t like or find upsetting. It is the malintention that is the only use for it, not the actual content. Whereas I feel some of the psycho medicalised assaults are not really addressed. And are much more harmful.
I have heard it argued that the Yuppie one shoulders a degree of responsibility for a lack of research and support because it caught public imagination. I don’t know. Though I think shit would have been flung at the wall until something stuck and it wouldn’t have taken too much effort to bring us down.
I suppose my fear is we finally move on from YF only to be consumed by the rather more niche in joke that is FND.
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