this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2025
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chapotraphouse
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Yes. "Subhuman" is primarily used as a label by white supremacists to degrade anyone who is different to them.
Calling me "mate" (a gendered term that applies to men) when my pronouns are right next to my name
And yet you still decided comment.
So are dude, bro, and man in some circles.
As far as I'm concerned if a woman tells you that you've misgendered her using any of the terms in question, the only appropriate response involves an apology.
Even in fucking australia it was a gendered term
But that's not even the core of the issue. If somebody has been misgendered it is so cruel to start debating the merit of whether it's actually okay to use that word for them, especially to them. Apologize or get lost.
I am not american, your assumption that everyone you talk to is american by default is an ironic example of your own limited worldview. Also, you not considering that the words you use can have different meanings to different groups of people also reveals your ignorance.
In the vast majority of contexts, it very much is. You cannot remove the racist undertones of words such as "subhuman", no matter how progressive the context you use them in is.
Yeah because some "people" are ableist scum and want to dehumanize disabled/ND people in profound ways because they see them as "economically unproductive" etc. Which is, in itself, sub-human behaviour.
Yeah it's indicitave of blind arrogance and being a pseud but afaik it has been established that patterns of behaviours falling under "being a psycho" are caused in part by slight differences in brain structure. I'm not saying it's the only determining factor nor that we need eugenics, that's fucked up and takes the heat off the mode of production. If anything people have different needs that require different levels of care and we should advance a more humane society such that these needs are met so they can lead dignified lives.
On your part? Sure, but it seems weird to say that in the middle of quintupling down. Anyway, here's something that might actually be productive to explain:
The framework that you are speaking in is very detrimentally oversimplified. Any difference in people's behavior can be explained as being "a difference in brain structure" depending on what you mean by that phrase, because we have different neural pathways that produce different personalities, memories, etc., but it is extremely unusual for you to be able to look at a single behavior in an uncontrolled environment and identify a specific characteristic of brain structure that caused it (outside of simple learned responses, which this almost certainly isn't), because the vast, vast majority of human behaviors can stem from many different causes that vary case-by-case (as well as having multiple contributing causes in any one case, as you note). Among most people, the apparent reason for the majority of difference in behavior can be explained as a matter of socialization/enculturation and other mundane biographical factors, and this is no exception.
There is no reason to assume this person has any specific personality disorder because we simply don't have information to make that conclusion more likely than that he was socialized to be an asshole, which is not the same thing as having ASPD with psychopathic traits. You don't need that condition in order to act like this, and most people who do things like this do not have that condition.
Yeah because the "concerning attitude" the other user was implying was literally being a nazi, which is fucked up.
Yes I absolutely agree.
You're totally right that would be fucking hilarious if I pretended to be a neuroscientist and identified the specific difference in brain structure that caused it and/or larped as a psychologist and formally medically diagnosed the bastard. But I'm not a podcast guru and I'm not saying that.
As I said above, my main point is that I am using the label "psychopath"/"sociopath" as a shorthand for demonstrating really fucked up, comically evil, damaging behaviour (hoarding wealth, snatching candy from a child) to the extent that it's reasonable to assume the person may possibly have an inherent condition partly caused by biological factors.
I remember reading somewhere that most billionaires and millionaires display sociopathic tendencies or something. Again, this is not a formal, psychological assessment based on a literature review or deep research.
Yes I agree with that for neurotypical people. However, I remember reading somewhere that people who have been formally diagnosed with ASPD have inherent structural differences in their brains. This doesn't imply 'go eugenics' or other dumb shit, it's just that early childhood intervention and support is important.
They invented the term "Subhuman" to apply to the disabled, the "economically unproductive" and other ethnic groups. It is not a misused term when used by racists and ableists. They are using a term coined by people like them to describe the same people it originally described. You can't reappropriate it.
I know what you mean, technically though, isn't it linguistically misused? Because, unlike racial slurs like the N-word and K-word, ableist slurs like the R-word, doesn't the term "sub-human" apply to no group in particular, and literally just mean "below human"? Furthermore, wouldn't it be incorrect and ironic for ethnic-supremacist fascists to then call other ethnic groups/disabled people "sub-human" as a justification for genocide, a crime that represents the ultimate failure to live up to what it means to be "Human"?
However on the other hand, is the term "sub-human" is similar to the term that means "the opposite of re-generate" in that its use is inextricably linked to organized persecution, cruelty, and violence against the west's victims?
If so then the problem was that I assigned some private personal meaning to the word without accounting for its history and common meaning. Sorry about that.
It is a term invented with a distinct purpose of othering and lessening the disabled, the queer, and ethnic minorities (Including Slavs). It was invented by eugenicists to describe a specific category of human, it exists for the purpose of categorisation of humanity in a nazi framework. The term originates with Lothrop Stoddard and Alfred Rosenberg who both used it for this purpose, and was brought into prominence by Julius Streicher. It cannot be overstated how intrinsically linked the concept of the "subhuman" is with nazis.
In this sense it is similar to the term Life Unworthy of Life, even if you think a fascist doesn't deserve to live that is still not a term you should be using. It doesn't matter if you think you are epically trolling the nazis, you are agreeing with their premise and using their rhetoric.
Jesus fucking christ I did not know that. I really apologize for using the term, that is so fucked up. If you google the word "subhuman" then it just gives the oxford definition without any history behind the etymology of the word and does not label it a slur. Thank you so much for educating me on this. I thought it was just some archaic insult that the nazis stole, not that it was literally invented by one of them... I will not be spreading a nazi psyop anymore.
Come to think of it, I think that instead of writing "sub-human" I should just write "fascist" or "nazi".
When people were sterilised and killed they were called subhuman, the people who began calling people subhuman were the ones who inspired those actions. The term originates with eugenicists to justify their murderous ideology.
Yeah like this really highlights the projection though because isn't it really rich to go around killing and sterilizing people so you can destroy their society for your own gain, and then use the excuse that they are the "subhumans" for being different and/or suffering from the adverse effects of the colonization campaign you run? ("you" as in a western power like not implying you agree with that at all)
I have spoken to people called subhuman and sterilised actually, many people have. They're still around you know. The last official governmentally sanctioned eugenics campaign named explicitly as such in Europe (Of which I am aware) ended in the 70s, unofficially later. This isn't ancient history man, and it isn't history that spared people "in the west". My dad tells stories of how they were told how to behave around potential escapees from the eugenics facility.
The words you want for what the nazis were is inhumane, cruel, evil, and a variety of other things. Not subhuman. No one is subhuman. We are all human, and allowing the possibility of removing humanity from others is how you get fascism.
Yep totally agree, thank you for your explanation, I did not know the history and just spread some nazi psyop. I'm sorry.
You didn't know, now you do. We all learn and grow.
Not by using their terms and conceding their intellectual basis as being correct (Just applied the other way). You don't defeat homophobes by calling them slurs because you feel the stereotypes they apply to homosexuals apply better to them, the same goes for white supremacists, eugenicists , fascists et al. Subhuman is literally the term the nazis used man. You don't win by conceding that the idea that someone can be or make themselves be less than human and that this is a correct way to frame other humans.
Fascists are humans, their flaws are human flaws, people who commit SA are humans, and they should be treated with these things in mind. That does not excuse them, the fact that they choose to abuse our shared humanity is wrong.
Yep now that I remember, thats correct, the word "untermensch" translates to "subhuman" in english. I will be more careful about using the term from now on.
For the sake of discussion though;
I agree, and, to communicate what I meant clearly, when I used the term "sub-human" I meant it literally, as in "below the standard of good/neutral human behaviour" i.e. "pathologically harmful to others".
I don't mean to say that the nazis stereotypes about disabled people/slavs/roma apply more to them, I frankly do not know any of the stereotypes nazis had about the people they persecuted other than their genocidal Judeophobic propaganda.
I meant it more in a stark literal way (sub-human, below human), not in a way that relied on racial/ableist/queerphobic stereotypes created by the nazis.
*No actually I think that part of it is acknowledging that when racists call nonwhite people "civilization destroying, barbaric, etc." as qualifiers for the term "sub-human" I think these terms apply more to whites and the west than anyone else. Look at history.
Genuinely asking, isn't the idea of prison or capital punishment based on the idea that the person has made themselves less of a human being and thus deserves to have some or all of their rights removed? I agree that most western and imperialist countries unfairly fill their prisons with ethnic minorities, torture, and kill them, but what about when you need to throw reactionaries in jail?
For the record I don't want to "win" here per se and I know it would be insane to declare that everyone should start using the word "sub-human" as its a winning strategy. I'm just angry.
Well I don't think I share any humanity with a being that is rabidly genocidal, sees me as inferior to them, and either wants to destroy me without mercy or wouldn't mind doing so to further their own personal gain. *Why should I conceptually share humanity with someone who doesn't even see me as a human being?