Note that your first two links both used different methods in their headlines (the TM and single quotes) to emphasis that they were not using this word, but reporting on it. And I think even something as simple as those quotes would have absolutely changed the tone of Grr’s post.
Mom is pretty oblivious, I don’t think she realizes it’s a ‘breastuarant.’
Of course we also have “boob-din[n]er” in there, which is not an industry term as best I can tell. Just an excuse to bring up boobs.
This seems to fall neatly into “shit I wouldn’t say at a dinner party in front of people I’d just meant.” Both words bring to mind nothing but dudes elbowing each other and giving not-so-sly winks. Breastaurant. Get it? 'Cause it’s a a restaurant with breasts?
And then some other guy chimes in with, “YEAH IT’S A BOOB-DINNER” and everyone gets uncomfortable because it’s not even clever. It’s just some guy who thinks he had an excuse to say BOOBS really loud. Probably the same guy who thinks it’s funny to ask women at bars whether they like great tits.
Honestly, it’s more that the concept is crude, but you did refer to it in a deliberately crude way, when the concept was mostly adjacent to the thread. “Maybe you didn’t notice that breasts are the point” to a guy who has carefully said that he’s considered that option, and it’s not that kind of place, is only marginally helpful.
If we’re talking about literature, sure, the author sets the tone. But when it comes to things like Emails or texts; the reader sets the tone. I’ve heard this from two separate councilors and a HR rep giving a class on sensitivity. And they are right.
I can see this being a useful bellwether in cases where offense is taken at potentially innocuous stuff - to consider whether the reader is applying a tone that doesn’t exist. But as a universal rule, it would be the literal definition of victim blaming.
Do you think your mother wouldn’t have noticed if she went there with the question in her head, “IS this a restaurant that attracts customers more with the bodies of the servers than with the food?” Because that seems like a much more stringent test than just, “would she notice if she went there to eat?”
Despite the extreme rhetoric in this thread, i don’t think this is a huge deal, fwiw.
This is hilarious but whether you can see why I don’t know.
When @Grrr first said “it’s the reader not the writer that sets the tone” I was pretty dubious. But your real live apparently oblivious demonstration of why he might just be right is really pretty funny.
I see where you’re coming from - and saw it when I made that post - but I don’t consider Grrr’s language in the linked thread to be at all innocuous.
Writers set a tone. Readers interpret it. I’ve never heard anything to the contrary. It’s certainly possible for readers to make incorrect or unsubstantiated interpretations! But I don’t think that happened here.
I did do a bit of searching on the topic, but there are too many sites about appropriate language in the workplace to filter anything as specific as that. In any event, I find the concept interesting and will probably start an alternate thread to discuss it without a hijack.
I think it’s a good demonstration of why bright line rules don’t work as well. In the context of the thread the language was disruptive. In another thread, even in the same category, it might not have been.
Like, take two MPSIMS threads. One is talking about the passing of a community member. The other is talking about silly-looking cat pictures. A crude joke would be horrific in the former thread but might be welcomed in the latter thread. A mod note chastising someone about the crude joke when people are mourning the loss of an online friend would be warranted but that doesn’t mean it should also be moderated in the other one.
And again, it’s just a note. I’ve gotten notes before. I try to avoid them but when I get one, I say sorry and move on.
I could maybe defend “this is unnecessarily rowdy for FQ, let’s dial it back a notch.” Maybe, if I had to.
However I absolutely despise the finger-wagging, pearl-clutching “I don’t like your tone, mister, do better in the future.” This isn’t the first note or mod we’ve seen this from lately, either. We have a few folks who seem to enjoy tone-scolding a bit too much.