ETA: I’ll add that it’s also naive to suppose that having no rules of etiquette is even possible. In politics, anarchy or extreme libertarianism are in themselves an implicit set of rules of social interaction. Similarly, agreeing that we will use certain vocabulary in this community is just as much a social rule as agreeing that we will not.
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You just did it again.
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I’m saying it’s not helpful and results in negative outcomes, and you’re denying that you’re even doing it, while doing it. :dubious:
It’s not just incredibly naive to suppose that words do not have immense power. It’s also a sign of unexamined privilege to suppose that tolerance for the use of certain words in a community does not carry a strong message of social exclusion, and to dismiss this as “internalized victimhood”.
Ah. My youngest interacts with a lot of genocide studies majors at her college - mostly Jewish (although the Armenian genocide is getting some notice). And they said one day “Genocide studies majors who think the Holocaust was only against Jews can kiss my queer disabled Romani Marxist ass.” To me, what’s stupefying is it took until the 1970s for us to even admit that it was a genocide against the Romani people as well.
Slurs against Jews aren’t as big a deal in the U.S. as slurs against African Americans or women or queers or Asians or other groups because OUR original sin is slavery. Which isn’t to say we haven’t been homophobic, misogynistic, antisemitic or racist in other ways, just that our biggest sin is African slavery.
But really, we have gotten through eight years of an Obama presidency without having to call him a n******. Two Sanders candidacies and an entire Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse and rape deal without needing to refer to either of them as a k***. It doesn’t seem to have impacted discourse on this board. We could maybe refer to Speaker Pelosi without saying c*** and yet still have reasonable discourse without making a some (not all) women feel like they’ve been slapped every time they read the word.
And here is an exercise for moderators - look at the people who have insisted on using the word over the years. Look at the ones who “rejoiced” over its reinstatement in our lexicon. And compare it to the list of banned posters and posters who have received a lot of warnings. Its a word for jerks and I wouldn’t be surprised if you find there is a lot of overlap.
…to be more concrete, Ale:
Are you suggesting that a black man should feel indifferent to the active use of anti-black racial slurs among members of a social group in which he participates (even if not directed at him personally)? That it’s “magical thinking” to suppose that the use of such vocabulary with that social group has any power? Or that any impact on him is just attributable to his “internalized victimhood”?
I’m not aware of a ban (I assume you mean *Kaffir Boy *by Mark Mathabane?) but it’s not a well-known book here. Can’t really find it for sale easily locally.
I did say “can”, not “will” - it depends on usage. Direct it at another person, and you’ll land up in court. That doesn’t mean you will go to jail, but it’s certainly possible.
Yes, that one. Had to read it in college. Liked the first one, didnt really like the second one.
This comparison of racial/gender insults are inapt. If you call a woman a bitch, a cunt, or a harpy, you are not demeaning all women, just this particular one. You object to particular qualities that this particular woman has. If you call a man a pussy, you are not demeaning women, you are saying that this particular man should act like a man and not a woman (perhaps that is a bit archaic but you see the point). You don’t then turn around and tell your wife that she should quit acting like a woman.
So when you insult someone by race or sexual orientation using certain words, you are insulting an entire group (e.g. Dammit this nigger cut me off in traffic; Dammit this faggot cut me off in traffic). Your descriptor goes to your feelings about the entire group. You are showing your disdain for all blacks and all gay people by your choice of words which in and of themselves have been known to be offensive descriptors of those groups for a long time in addition to the individual who cut you off.
But when you use gendered insults, you are not insulting the group (e.g. Dammit this bitch cut me off in traffic; Dammit this dick cut me off in traffic) you are merely insulting the person using gendered terms. You are NOT expressing disdain for the gender, hell, you may be telling your wife the story of how the bitch cut you off in traffic. It is know that those terms only apply to specific types of women who act in certain ways. (Although, if you said, “Dammit, this broad cut me off in traffic” I would put that in the former category).
Oh, it can only be said of women so it is bad? What if I say that this waitress ruined my meal because the service was bad? Is that misogynistic because, after all, a waitress can only be a woman? Or am I merely using a gender based descriptor of the person?
Further, for all of the talk about how women are so sensitive that they are leaving the boards because of such harsh language, I can just offer my anecdotal experience that I see nothing like that at all in real life. I think the board is listening to the most vocal and extreme minority of women, which would be overrepresented by the political leanings of this board anyways, and using it to justify these restrictions and tell us how “women” think as if they all held a conference and took a vote.
You assert this difference without presenting any argument to support it; and it’s simply wrong.
The use of the specific word “cunt” as an insult does not rest on literally describing someone as genitalia, because there’s nothing intrinsically bad about genitilia. “You are a vagina!” is not an insult, except perhaps to a 12-year-old who things gurls are icky in some ill-defined sense. People would simply scratch their heads if an adult said that. So the word only has any meaning as an insult because of its broader cultural significance. It’s completely without foundation to suggest that your use of the word can only narrowly demean your explicit target, and that your choice of vocabulary says nothing in itself, that you are somehow immune from this cultural baggage. The cultural baggage is the only reason it works at all as a severe insult.
Racial slurs symbolize a cultural history of racism, and although all are disparaged, certain racial slurs are far more severe, conventionally deemed to carry far greater symbolic weight. Their use in any context is not seen as merely insensitive, but is widely acknowledged to be tantamount to embracing racism. Similarly, the reason that “cunt” is so severe an insult is precisely because it is the word that most strongly symbolizes a cultural history of misogyny. Just as with racial slurs, the use of vocabulary that most strongly symbolizes a cultural history of misogyny carries far more semantic baggage than just insulting a specific person.
You have nothing to support your argument either. What I am saying is that these gendered insults are far more common precisely because people use them even though:
- They are women themselves.
- They are a man who has a wife, mother, sister, and/or daughter.
You wouldn’t use the word if you thought you were disparaging either yourself or any of these people. But you have the burden of proof here, not me. I’m not the one saying that these terms are directed at women as a whole and it is linguistically silly to say that they are.
So, if you are going to decree by fiat that women as a group have decided that certain words are offensive, then I think it is only proper to provide a list so that the rest of us who don’t have the power to gauge the thoughts of millions of people at once can abide by the rules that we, including many women, are somehow too imperceptive to follow.
You’re insulting the group just as much in one case as in the other. The fact that your particular wife is used to this and either genuinely doesn’t mind or thinks there’s no sense in complaining about it doesn’t change that a bit.
I once called somebody on using the N-word in my presence (everyone in hearing was white.) He said that he only used it for people he thought were acting like it; he didn’t use it for black people he thought were acting properly. I told him, vehemently, to find a different word.
Your argument is no better than his; and it’s wrong.
I’m not surprised that you don’t see it if you can say something like this:
and think that’s some sort of argument that using gendered insults has nothing to do with the entire group. There’s nothing wrong with a particular man doing something that you think is womanly, unless you think there’s something wrong with being womanly.
You can’t see it when you’re doing it yourself. That’s why you’re not seeing it when anybody else does it.
That’s simply untrue. I don’t use that word to describe men, but I see what it means. It means that a man should act like a man and a woman should act like a woman. It’s not that the person sees anything wrong with acting like a woman, just that a man shouldn’t act like a woman. If the same person criticizes a woman for being too manly, does he then think that there is something wrong with both being a woman and being a man???
If this guy thought there was “something wrong with being womanly” then why does get married or talk to his mother or his sister? He just tolerates them secretly wishing they would act like men?
This revisionist language etymology just makes no sense.
This part doesn’t make sense either. If my wife doesn’t mind, did she just not get the memo from the other women that voted this in? But she certainly got the memo (I’m making this up) that if I say “You fucking bitch” that is an insult. Her and every single other woman I’ve never known in my entire life except for liberal academics and those looking to be offended.
Why is she able to see the difference between the two, the difference that you claim is non-existent?
Prescribed gender roles are not a good thing – they are a tool that has been used to oppress and control for centuries. Just for an obvious example, they’ve been used to denigrate gay men for a long, long time. Denigrating someone for not acting as you think their gender should act is hateful and demeaning whatever your intention and belief about gender roles.
Some few black people might not find the n word insulting when spoken by a white person. That doesn’t mean it’s not a hateful slur to most. Similarly, that some women might not see misogynistic slurs insulting doesn’t make those slurs somehow not hateful and demeaning.
Hateful and demeaning to who? Men or women? We could argue about gender roles in another thread, but if I have an archaic view of gender that men should be tough and box and play football and catch deer with there bare hands while women should be soft and genteel, then it seems that your objection would be to my archaic beliefs, not that I am demeaning a particular gender. You cannot accuse me of hating women if I “hate” everyone equally.
So where is your evidence, your empirical studies, that “most” women would view the term bitch the way we have been talking about are insulting to all women? You’ve made the accusation that that term used it that context is “misogynistic” and “hateful and demeaning” presumably to an overwhelming majority of women, to the same extent that the term nigger is hateful to blacks.
Let’s see your work because that’s not my experience.
At least I gave some arguments that make some sense.
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The number of women who oppose misogyny says nothing about its prevalence. If more American women than Saudi women profess opposition to misogyny, does that imply that American culture is more misogynistic than Saudi culture?
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This is completely ridiculous. If all six of my wives are women, and all my slaves are black, does that imply that I cannot be a misogynist or a racist?
The Straight Dope: Bunch of White Dudes Fighting for the Right to Say Cunt Since 1973.
nm
Usually women; sometimes both.
Something can be demeaning and denigrating without necessarily requiring hate. If you like black people just fine, but think they oughta “know their place”, which is necessarily lower than the place of white people, then you’re being extremely demeaning and denigrating, no matter whether you bear any hatred in your heart or not.
If you don’t care what women tell you they find demeaning and denigrating, or if you discount the opinion of women who aren’t your wife/mother, then it’s not going to be convincing to you. I don’t have numbers handy, and I doubt that they’re the same for various ethnic slurs anyway – but enough women (it doesn’t take much!) have told me that they find these words demeaning that I’ve removed them from my vocabulary. It sounds like you have too, at least for some of them – if so, great! Then what’s the problem? Language changes over time, and it’s obvious to me that it’s changing pretty rapidly when it comes to demeaning language against women. Society has demeand and denigrated women for a long, long time, and this language is a real part of it, if far from the whole thing.