DON’T be fooled Billy. Given the chance a cow would kill you and everyone you care about.
DtW: Lastly I’ve WORKED for everything I’ve got.
Not really true. Since there’s still a lot of widespread persistent racism and discrimination in this society, all of us who don’t look like racial minorities get an automatic unearned advantage. We just don’t notice it as much because our advantage doesn’t come in an explicitly formulated affirmative-action policy; it’s pervasive but unspoken. If you woke up tomorrow as a member of a racial minority, you’d soon notice a number of things that white people never have to put up with, and you’d be more aware of the built-in racial advantage that you had as a white person.
I was taught that if you wanted something then you had to earn it.
I was taught that too, but I was also taught to acknowledge and appreciate the unearned advantages I had, and to try to make things fairer for people who hadn’t been as lucky as I was.
*I wasn’t part of those problems in the bad ol’ days and i’m not going to feel a smidge of guilt for it. *
Nobody’s saying you should feel guilty about oppression you didn’t commit, but you should at least acknowledge that you get an unfair benefit from some of the lingering consequences of the policies of the bad ol’ days.
If Smith’s great-grandfather robs Jones’s great-grandfather of his life savings, it’s not fair for Jones to blame Smith for the robbery; but if Smith is still getting benefits from that stolen money, he does have an unearned and unfair advantage. And if Great-Grandaddy Smith decreed that not only the Smith descendants but other people who just look like the Smiths get a share of the loot, then those people have an unfair advantage too.
It is not “whining” or “hypersensitive” or “overly PC” to point out that people often give themselves more credit than they deserve for their own good fortune, and fail to notice all the unearned lucky breaks they got along the way.
::: Hijack::
and more to the point: Hi- Kimstu good to see you around, still out of the country???
sleeping
In the universe I live in, “retard”–as in “look at that retard over there”-- has never been PC. How are you defining PC-ness?
And my point is, how “gay” is perceived depends on the audience and the way the word is used. If you call a homosexual man “gay” as a factual reference to his orientation, the term is no more loaded than calling him a brunette. The connotation is neutral. If you call a fervently homophobic man “gay” as a way of insulting his masculinity, the term becomes something else altogether. The connotation is not a static thing.
Like I said earlier, there is nothing inherently wrong with using gay to describe something using its old (gay = happy) meaning. I just think it doesn’t make for good communication. You may not feel there is any just cause for anyone to get offended by being called gay, but that doesn’t change the fact that some people will get offended. And that’s really my point. If you use language that walks the fine line between communication and miscommunication, be prepared to offend people. If you call someone gay with the intent of complimenting them and they get bent out of shape, it is not necessarily their fault when you knew from the start it was likely going to happen.
I made this request earlier but you haven’t answered. Can you provide some examples? From my position, what I see is some words and phrases getting phased out of the vernacular because A) there has become increased awareness that these terms are connotatively offensive ( e.g “retard”), B) some words are associated with more oppressive, unenlightened times (e.g. “colored” and “Oriental”), C) some terms serve their pupose inaccurately or inadequately (e.g. “Hispanic”), or D) some words lose their effectiveness in communication because they sound a lot like slurs (e.g. “niggardly”). The words “faggot” and “gay” are not being phased out, but their intimate association with homosexuality, for better or worse, means that the dominant definition of those words pertains to a specific sexual orientation, not to mundane things like sticks and merriness.
.
So, with examples provided, this is my description of what PCness is doing to our language. Can you give your own description, with specifics? Right now all I see is a lot of hand waving and analogy-making.
[quote]
I have no cite (and I ain’t gonna look for one, because my computer is old and slow), but I read once that bovine flatulence is making a significant contribution to the greenhouse effect. So are cows gonna fart us to death given the chance, or will it be a stampede that does the job?
No, I couldn’t find a cite for it. I was using it as an example and I’m still sure that at one point it was the “acceptable” word. However, I don’t see how my argument is reliant on that one point.
That’s what I said! Jeez.
Just to clarify: when you gave your original example of using the word gay to refer to straight people, I took it that you meant the “homosexual” definition, not the “happy” one. I understood the situation you presented to be one in which person A calls person B (who is straight) gay because he was under the mistaken impression that B was a homosexual. I see no reason for B to take offense at this; I do see a reason for B to correct A because he does not wish to be mislabeled.
I found this article to be a worthwhile read, although most of its basic points are ones I’ve already raised. But it reminded me of the case of Ken Hardy and Julia Pierre.
Ken Hardy was a very liberal professor who wanted to discuss the use of slurs and its effects on society. He has a long history of active support for civil rights and was known as someone who was eager to both discuss and promote civil rights. He wanted to discuss the word nigger in a purely rational, academic context. Julia Pierre, however, said she did not want to hear it any context. Now, I would undoubtedly characterize this as extremist–it was clear to everyone that he meant no offense by it and that the whole point was to discuss why the word had such an effect. Students called her “stupid,” and rightly so. But Hardy took up her point and asked if some words could not even be discussed. When Pierre asked Hardy not to use the word, he suggested that if she wanted, she could sit the class out. So she filed a complaint and, lo and behold, a month later he was fired. Other teachers and department heads have voiced their opinion on the matter, saying that it was completely unjustified. The university has essentially conceded as much, stating that they needed more students and could stand to alienate blacks: “If you were not a white male, this would not be an issue.” The college’s lawyer has argued that the using the word nigger is “not protected by the First Amendment.” I thought the whole purpose of guaranteed free speech was to defend unpopular ideas.
Coleman was right in saying that “there are different levels of tolerance for racial slurs. This lady had zero tolerance.” So here we have an example of one person claiming to be offended by something and, even though all her other classmates decried her objection, succeeding in ending an intelligent discussion. Even she said that she did not want the teacher to be fired. And yet he was. To me, this bespeaks of the tremendous power of such a movement–apparently, the situation was out of everybody’s control.
“…they needed more students and could not stand to alienate blacks…”
I didn’t question the fact that it was “acceptable”. The word “nigger” used to be perfectly acceptable too. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t derogatory.
You did? I guess I missed that. Then I went back over the thread, and I’m still missing it. Can you point it out?
See, the part that’s confusing me is that, earlier, you blithely assumed gobear wouldn’t be offended by the “Homophobes are fags” slogan. When it was pointed out that he, among others (me included, even though I’m not gay), did indeed find that offensive, you only said that we don’t speak for everyone. Since then, you’ve only talked about how people shouldn’t be insulted by being incorrectly labeled as gay. Again, I agree, but that’s beside the point.
Oddly enough, 9 out of 10 women say the same thing. (I think the 10th one was fat so it doesn’t matter what she thinks!) 
:eek:
DO YOU HEAR THE SIRENS IN THE DISTANCE? HERE THEY COME! 
“Acceptable” as in accordance with the PC movement at that time.
You said:
I never said that. What I did say was that it first had a negative connotation, then it had a positive (or inoffensive) connotation. But since then some have taken to using it as insult again.
I’ve never known anyone to be offended by the use of faggot as in that t-shirt. I’ve always considered the parodying of racists and homophobes to be legitimate grounds for the use of slurs.
See, that’s really fucking annoying. I’ve made several points and have cited two relevant articles which, interestingly enough, have been ignored. But if you’d like me to enumerate them:
-
The PC movement is language control because it’s directed by political organizations. Language evolution might be the popularizing of, say, a catchphrase or new meaning of a word by the members of the general populace.
-
The PC movement is bad because it succeeds in preserving the loaded meaning of slurs.
-
It has clearly gotten out of hand when even the PC extremists feel that a certain action is going to far but it still happens anyway.
You, meanwhile, have continued to claim that words shouldn’t be used because they’re offensive. Even after I explained that my problem was with why they were still offensive.
When was the last time that a so-called “PCer” was actually able to control your language?
BTW, I have no problem with your feeling offended that I feel offended by your language.
Zoe, I’ve explained this earlier in the thread. Please go back and read it.
…OK?
wring: and more to the point: Hi- Kimstu good to see you around, still out of the country???
Yepper—hi back atcha! Nice to hang at the Dope from time to time again, even in a stuffy Jaipur cybercafe.
/hijack
Speaking of discrimination, I just came across a 2001 Milwaukee study where four male testers—two white, two black—posed as job applicants applying in person for 350 various low-skilled jobs. All the “applicants” had similar resumes, grooming, manners, etc., except that two of them (one black, one white) admitted to a criminal conviction for a drug-related offense.
Percentage of employers who called the various testers back:
- White, no criminal record: 34%
- White, criminal record: 17%
- Black, no criminal record: 14% [!!]
- Black, criminal record: 5%
I’d like one of these posters who protest that discrimination isn’t really a problem any more to explain these results to me. A white applicant ** with a criminal record** is more appealing to employers than a nearly identical black applicant without one, and we’re trying to claim that we’ve got past the racism problem? Yeah, right.
Ummm…no. Perhaps “retarded child” but not “retard” as a noun. “Retard” is slang usage, and a quick check of several dictionaries shows no noun definition with the meaning “mentally disabled person” or whatever.
I think the “retard” issue comes down to:
Was the term “mentally retarded” ever the preferable, more professional, less offensive term over others used to describe such an individual?
Is “mentally retarded” currently an acceptable term? Didn’t think so. What are the preferred terms? Why the change? Is it because of the stigma stemming from the vernacular use of the terms “mental” or “retard”/“retarded”? I don’t know.
If we end up in a cycle where a technical terms are discarded shortly after they are abused in the vernacular then we are constantly developing new terminology for the same thing. I am happy with whatever terms as long as they are tolerably descriptive and fairly consistent.
Actually they are, if you believe the Global Warming alarmists. Animals give off CO2 and Methane, both purported “greenhouse gases” blamed for the so-called “Global Warming”. Why should humans take all the blame?? So yeah, fuck animals too!
You needed to wait 34 days simply to post your support for bestiality?
Sorry! I REALLY meant to check with you first!! Please forgive me!!!
Now where’s the rest of that big rubber dick so I can beat you with it?
I just saw the thread for the first time. So get over it.
Oh, I forgive you. (You might not want to broadcast that interest in fucking animals, however.)