Interesting perspective! I get why people are wary, but it’s frustrating when that leads to unfair assumptions about genuine questions. Thanks for sharing this!

Why do people assume discussing something means justifying it?

I’ve noticed that when people bring up a topic for discussion, especially historical or social topics - others sometimes assume they’re trying to justify something rather than just explore it.

For example, i recently asked whether lead poisoning could have unintentionally reinforced sexist stereotypes in history. My question wasn’t about justifying sexism, just about whether environmental factors might have played a role in how people perceived gender. But i got accused of trying to justify sexism, even though i explicitly said multiple times i wasn’t.

Why does this happen? is it just because the topic is sensitive? or do people have a hard time separating ‘asking about something’ from ‘supporting it’? i’d love to hear thoughts on this.