this post was submitted on 21 Dec 2025
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I was speaking about my experience as a STEM person. Why cannot one speak about one experience in STEM without someone coming out and feeling offended by that "but what about other majors". I am a black person and when I speak how white shitty white people are with me, white people are like "but what about shitty black people? They commit more crimes. Why don't you speak about other ethnicities as well?". Same when you speak about Palestine "but what about other wars? Why you only condemn the Israelis?". This is fucking ridiculous and it pisses me off. There are a lot of shitty petite bourgeosie people in STEM. There is a lot of elitism and assholes on it, and that has been my experience. I have no idea about the other majors and I don't think that the fallacy of relative privation ever matters.
I'm think one possible source of misunderstanding is the term STEM itself is broad and somewhat ambiguous. What falls under that umbrella, and how shitty they are may very well vary by country/culture.
I'm willing to entertain the idea that maybe the S fields are ultimately no worse than many of the fields outside of STEM. But Tech/Engineering people are the absolute worst.
It kind of sucks that people in relatively harmless sciences get lumped in with tech/engineering. I think the vast majority of the time people complain about STEM, they mean the T/E.
To extend your analogy (badly?): It's like if one response to complaining about white people was "what about eastern Europeans?"
I guess the definition of "white" could vary somewhat and some groups who fall under that umbrella aren't the ones you mean. Maybe Poles or certain Russian minority ethniticies aren't considered white in the UK (idk, just based on fashy Brits online). But it's still just (probably) someone getting defensive, and regardless sidetracking the issue.
I guess what I mean to say is you're right, we all pretty much know what we mean by "STEM" or "white people" so it feels dishonest when the response is quibbling. But at the same time, if I were being charitable, I guess it's possible for some misunderstanding because they are terms with blurry edges.