OK.
Use of negative slurs is not the same thing as “hate”. It means that you look at them negatively in some sense. Considering that they’re illegal immigrants, it’s not quite as bad as looking negatively at someone for no other reason than their skin color or the like.
Exactly. But the term itself doesn’t differentiate between “good ones” and “bad ones”, other than in being a denigrating term. So it’s tautological.
Ethnic slurs ain’t the worst of it. Get it? Killing Mexicans is the punchline. Hardy-har har.
I think the action of using such a term is a hateful (in the sense of dehumanizing and contemptuous) action, regardless of intent – just as owning slaves is hateful, even if one doesn’t hate their slaves.
Okay, but I don’t see how this is a defense. There was (and probably still is) a big class of people that uses slurs against black people or others based on “made up definitions”, or some such… and if “made up definitions” are used long enough and by enough people, then that’s a real definition. Usage = definition, for every slur, and for every word in general. I don’t think any slur is ‘better’ just because some people use it (and define it) for sub-groups within a larger group.
I’ll grant he’s difficult to defend at times and perhaps in this instance it was futile to try. I figured I’d give it a go though. Despite the assertion above that there are no degrees in ethnic slurs there clearly are. Terms like wetback have nowhere near the same power to shock as nigger, a word probably unique in the sheer force of its offensiveness.
For anyone confused by my use of ****s – that’s not ideological (I have no problem in such a discussion with spelling it out in full, nor in using hyphens or symbols or whatever), it’s just because of where I am right now, and what computer I’m using.
I think there’s a difference between hate and contemptuous. But more than that, there’s a difference between denigrating a group whose defining characteristic is nothing more than their ethnicity and denigrating a group whose defining characteristic is their having done some illegal act.
I’m not recommending using such terms, of either sort.
But there’s a difference between using such terms if the original usage was in line with your usage and using such terms if you yourself have invented some tautology-based alternative usage.
Calling a Mexican a “wetback” around here would, at best, result you getting punched in the face. It might be slightly, just slightly better than “spic,” but the level of offense is about the same.
There’s nothing illegal about swimming in the Rio Grande. I think this kind of thing is rationalization and excuse, but not an actual explanation or reason.
Perhaps, but I don’t think it’s an important one for this conversation.
Bullshit. They are just using that as an excuse to fling around ethnic slurs. “at some time in the past I’m pretty sure it wasn’t really an insult so, ummm-I’m not really insulting anybody. Yeah, that’s the ticket”
Which is why I wouldn’t use it, not so much for the punch but for the fact that I dislike offending people who are as human and as susceptible to hurt as I am.
The term “wetbacks” didn’t apply to people swimming in the Rio Grande. It applied to people who had illegally immigrated to the US. The term was based on the notion that many or most of these people sneaked in by swimming across the Rio Grande. (I assume you were aware of all this, so I’m not sure what point you were trying to make about swimming in the Rio Grande.)
I am happy to hear that. It would be nice if everyone understood this and that it really doesn’t matter what you think the word means, but if people who it’s aimed at say it’s offensive and hurtful, if you’re not an asshole, you choose another word. If you want to continue being viewed as an asshole and assert your “independent spirit” by using the word, go right ahead. But I’ll still think you’re an asshole. And I’m sure you won’t care (because you’re an asshole.)
Note: “you” is the universal “you.”
If you are doing it to illegally enter the US, then yes, it is illegal.
Hatred, or at least using a slur against illegal immigrants is, indeed, less hateful. Because the slur is directed at them for breaking the law. Not their ethnicity, which Clothahump made quite clear.
This is like that thing where one is not supposed to call a black criminal a “thug”, because it is a slur against black people. No it isn’t, it’s a slur against criminals. Truthful accusations against specific individuals do not constitute an insult against groups.
He’s not an illegal immigrant; he’s just undocumented. He’s not a burglar; he’s just an uninvited guest. :rolleyes:
‘When you insult a criminal, you hurt the feelings of his whole group!’ Come on, you gotta recognize how silly that sounds.
Regards,
Shodan
Don’t you think complaining that an insult hurts people’s feelings kind of misses the point of an insult? Or don’t you think “asshole” is intended to be offensive?
Note: “you” is the universal “you”, because we are all assholes in the Pit.
Regards,
Shodan
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with “thug,” but it has become a bit of a code word, at least around here, to mean “blacks.” (There are various ones. “Democrats” and “Canadians” being other ones.) I try to avoid it because it can be misunderstood.
Wrong. “Wetback” is a slur directed at people of a specific ethnicity, that is, Mexicans. Even if they may have done something illegal, it still targets their ethnicity. No one would refer to a French overstayer on a tourist visa as a wetback, even though the illegal act is the same.
“Thug” on the other hand does not in origin have that ethnic component (although I do believe today it is preferentially applied to black criminals).
I do feel there is a difference between simply being called an “asshole,” which is a behavior I can control, and being called a “Polack,” where I am singled out for otherness because of being Polish, something I cannot control.
Really? So you think Clothahump would use “wetback” as his go-to insult for a blonde Swede who overstayed her visa, for a black Haitian who flew in on a Piper, even for a redhead Canadian who jumped off a boat in Lake Erie and swam to shore in New York? He’d be all, “Fucking wetbacks” to describe them?
Folks: it’s not hard to condemn the assholes on your own side. It’s like free brownie points, a super-easy way to pretend to be nonpartisan! Why the fuck would you want to contort yourself to defend his obvious racism?
Yep – “wetback” has always been about Mexicans (or some sub-group of Mexicans). If it were about illegal immigrants in general, it wouldn’t have morphed into an ethnic slur for people of Mexican descent.
Nobody, including Clothahump, uses it in the old sense. Let’s get real here.
“Nigger” is actually derived from the generic “Negro” - the pronouinciation was just how people said words like that in the early nineteenth century. (“Zebra” was commonly pronounced "Zebber’) In fact, “Negro” pronounced the way we say it now is probably a more recently invented word, at least in English. So, at one point it also didn’t mean what it means now. Would you believe anyone if they claimed that’s how they were using it today?
