There is a reason to worry about the racist/sexist/homophobic man staring at you on the bus though. If it were true that all angry staring can ever amount to is angry staring, or that all racism could ever amount to is awkward jokes, then I'd probably take it all less seriously. But there is in a hateful stare the thin possibility of real violence. And if somebody is constantly dealing with thin threats of violence like that all the time... yeh, they are going to say something.

I think this might be a key to understanding some of the shit the left says. Nobody knows if, or when for that matter, the passive aggressive everyday sort of bigotry might explode into a full blow extermination campaign (barring sexism obviously lol). It's ridiculously unlikely of course, but if you are a Mexican or a Muslim watching something like a Trump Rally and you see all these people spewing hate of you and your kind, how can you not be worried that this might escalate? And if it does escalate, well, you're the target.

I think its kind of like reading something like the [url=http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/shivers/rants/scum.html]SCUM manifesto [/url] if you are a regular guy. Sure, there is no chance that will happen, but the idea of it is uncomfortable even if it mostly seems like reading a train wreck. Well, with minorities the possibility of a pogrom of some sort isn't impossible. It has happened. Plenty of times. 

So I guess to paraphrase, the reason I think the left gets so worried about these things is because, for them, in the back of their minds, they are worried society is one step away from the right wing going rabid and committing a mass murder. Or for women, whether or not what they have won might be reversed in another conservative revolution of some sort.