“Map pride” isn't something you'll hear often within the map community. Yet it's often pushed onto maps by antis, both as a part of the incorrect belief that maps want to join LGBT, and on its own. Positivity, aesthetic posts, just a simple statement that you don't hate yourself, all can get classified as proof that you're proud of being a map and therefore dangerous.
Nobody in reality is proud of being minor attracted. What antis are observing is lack of shame and self hate, which is a good thing, because there's nothing healthy in being ashamed of who you are, and doctors will tell you the same thing (see my earlier post about the stigma of minor attraction). Attempts to dress up conditions you have to live with and have fun with them can be found throughout the whole spectrum of human self expression, it's one of characterizing features of mental illness & disability communities, small or marginalized ethnicities, people recovering from traumas. Maps are doing something very human and natural with their mapness.
And just as their self expression isn't unique, the persecution of this self expression isn't unique either. If you take a closer look at online communities uniting mentally ill people, you'll see hundreds of haters telling them not to glorify, not to normalize their disorders - yes, the same exact language you see used against maps. For modern day humanity this is a trend. It appeared as a reaction to a push for more radical acceptance of everything weird, weirdness is slowly becoming recognized as a part of humanity, but weird people are supposed to be ashamed of it and strive to become normal. Only then you can be given a voice and accepted as inferior, but still human.
It's no wonder to see people with conservative beliefs shaming maps for not giving in to self hate, but what really puzzles me is that people who are normally at the receiving end of such harassment also can indulge in such behavior. I've seen MOGAI ( Marginalized Orientations, Genders and Intersex) and neuroatypical (neurologically atypical, related to mental disorders and unusual conditions) advocates attacking maps for this imaginary pride. One possible explanation is that they're very aware of their own vulnerability and eager to join their oppressors to ostracize someone more oppressed together. There can be a less sinister reason, as the meme goes, you're not immune to propaganda. They can just blindly copy their peers.
Shaming of your weirdness is the next step on your way to acceptance after being ignored. It doesn't mean there is something wrong with you or how you try to love yourself, it means that other people are finally noticing that you exist. Maps right now are dealing with the same sort of bigotry any other human rights movement faced or is currently facing. It means we're on the right road.
