Look up “hate speech” - it doesn’t just mean calling someone nasty names. That was my point.
But nobody said they were equal.
I think the original criticism of the person who went on and on about how fat the woman was, even though it had nothing to do with her hitting his car, was justified. So no, that would not be the place to “stop”.
No my dear moron, but we’re in the pit, and a some what free form expression of my opinion of your idiocy is in order.
Insofar as as I am not from some dumbfuck midwestern wilting violet background, I see no connexion between age and a bit of strong lang.
On the Comparisions
The explicit comparisions, e.g., by this Alice person are indeed making that implied statement, the just as bad part indeed also is found.
As to the trivial things you note, well that’s life. Children are cruel to each other, and always will be. Acne, overweight, wrong parents. I am rather more concerned about those cruelties that systematically and regularly lead to real oppresion and violence.
Again the connexion between weight and race is offensive.
I could give a fuck what the majority of hyper-sensitiving whinging pampered professionallly insulted North Americans conclude.
Shouldn’t that be, “I couldn’t give a fuck…”? 
Canvas Shoes, don’t bother with Collounsbury. He’s obviously got some mean-spirited agenda going on.
I really don’t know what his point is, exactly. That it’s OK to pick on fat kids with bad skin? No, I don’t think he’d fess up to that. That people should just suck it up when they are picked on for being fat or having bad skin? I don’t see why he’d suggest that. I don’t see why anyone should take shitty treatment and bullying.
::shrug:: Oh well.
It seemed to me that he was willing to discuss it until the first attack (from Mockingbird) came. Then he was in defence mode. Granted, that 1st attack came pretty early, and his willingness was demonstrated in only 1 post.
I submit that we will defend our bad ideas if attacked in a particular fashion and will possibly surrender them if confronted with a more accepting reason.
What the fuck is your problem with the midwest?
Come, now. Col has a long legacy of familial ties to the Northeast. A mild disdain for everything west of the Hudson is probably genetic, at this point.*
- Although, for as long as his family has been around the social climes they inhabit, he might have some mild tolerance for inhabitants of Philadelphia, Charleston, and Savannah with periodic kind thoughts for denizens of San Francisco.
I’m from the midwest.
It SUCKS
My apologies in advance, but this is one of my pet peeves. Since the law is a technical field that applies to everyday-life situations, there’s a fair amount of overlap between legal terms of art and colloquial expressions. The legal term of art and the colloquial expression are not one and the same thing, even though they may be the same words or phrases. The language will evolve as it will, and people are not incorrect for using colloquial terms appropriately, even if the colloquial use of a phrase diverges from its use in the legal world. The lawyers don’t own the language.
Well, I also would have the entire West Coast sold into slavery and then sold off to new immigrants just to be safe, but yes, that would be right. Except for the tolerance of things below the Mason Dixon line, but with an exception for Chicago.
I should note that having spent an awful year of my life in the rolling plains, I would sooner driver an ice pick through my head than permantly return to the unremitting flatness and politeness of the Mid West, whose namby pamby floral pattern wearing saltof the erth type earnest bloody freakishly polite inhabitants should simply recognize the inherent superiority of coastal born people, and sell themselves into indentured servitude to "Eastern Banking Interests[sub]TM[/sub] as penance for the boring politeness and namby pamby earnest good manners.
Nothing personal of course, it’s an ideological position required by my breeding.
The issue that I have with PC behavior is that a person gets denounced for a position, simply because they hold the position, or, worse yet, because that position has been attributed to them.
It seems to me that perhaps the worst thing you can do to a person on a message board, is falsely attribute a stance to them, in order to denounce them.
To my eyes, this happens here all the time. It really is a horrible form of outright and deliberate lying.
I’ll take a WAG as to why it happens, and that is because if you can denounce somebody outright for having or expressing a particular attitude, than that means that you don’t have to engage their arguments, be polite to them, or even acknowledge them as a person due consideration.
To do this is a lot easier than to actually engage.
I think that PC is a tactic that backfires. The idea is to create an environment of consideration. The reality is that it is an excuse for hostility (as evidenced by the general tenure of this board.)
I see your point, spooje, and I think I agree with you, but I’m not sure of the connection with my post.
I was describing the apparent belief of some posters that their attacks on others should, for inexplicable reasons, be immune to counterattack in kind. (This seems to me to be the gist of the OP of this thread.) That’s not the same as an advocacy of flaming as a means of response.
I’d say the validity of such behavior completely depends on the position. For instance, if someone says the Biblical creation story ought to be taught in the public schools as an equally valid alternative to the theory of evolution, I may assume that previous dissections of the total idiocy of this position suffice, and I can simply denounce them for holding this position.
But I agree that in most instances, such conduct is simply a way of slamming the debater without dealing with their arguments. I’m just not sure what it has to do with ‘PC’ specifically, unless you’re defining PC as something like “all thoughtless knee-jerk opposition, independent of ideology” in which case I’d agree with you there too.
I agree that it happens, and it’s wrong, but IMHO it gets corrected pretty fast. There was a good example of this just in the past day.
Problem I have is that it’s rude, pure and simple.
It’s not as bad as racial epithets, it’s not putting people into gas chambers, but it is rude.
Now, are we all required to be polite? Heavens no, nor should we be. Being polite means to go out of your way to be a decent, pleasant human being. If you were required by law to be polite, that would take all the fun out of it.
It is as socially unacceptable for an adult to call another adult a “fat-ass bastard” as it is for a child to sing the “Fatty, Fatty” song at another kid.
It is rude.
I’m not saying we all have to be drawing-room perfect here. But I don’t understand – and I think this is at the heart of the matter – the belief that being rude is a laudable act and something to be cherished. “I’m a straight shooter,” someone says. “I say what I think, and if you don’t like that, fuck you.”
The beauty of being an adult, rational being is that you are able to have your own opinions and make your own choices. You can choose to be crude in speech and insulting – you are even free to be crude and insulting on these boards – but do not ever be shocked when your insults offend. That is, after all, what insults are meant to do.
Calling a person fat – or even a mounded, stinking, blubbery piece of shit – is not hate speech.
It’s just hateful. There’s a difference.
RTF:
It appears that we’re in pretty close to perfect agreement, with the exception that it doesn’t always get corrected, or fast.
Not true, unless they removed Chicago from the midwest.
Great City, Great People, tons of fun stuff to do, great food and culture, and really nice weather 5 months a year.
Do you think we could trouble you for a quote?
Oh, is this the quote in question? Geez, I hope that’s not your supposed proof that anyone said overweight people’s suffering is equivalent to the Jews under Hitler. Is that really how you read it? Help me out, here. How is it that you are disagreeing with the quoted statement? Are you saying that it IS more correct to discriminate based on weight rather than race? Neither is correct at all; how can one be more correct than the other?
Either give us a better example, or admit you are arguing against a strawman.
What is “whinging”? I keep seeing this word, but it’s not in my dictionary.
You’re just not looking in the right dictionary:
whinge Verb. To persistently complain, in an irritating manner. {Informal}.
Noun. To act in the manner of the verb. {Informal}.
whinger Noun. A person who complains incessently, see ‘whinge’. {Informal}.
whingey Adj. In the manner of a ‘whinger’, see above. {Informal}.
I know it doesn’t mean that, other people have said what I would like to say much better.
Why is everyone else (besides one other poster–thanks) missing the point that being fat does have something to do with running into someone else and then not pulling over?
The connection is that a fat person is more likely to be lazy and to let problems persist without taking care of them (which is how many fat people get fat in the first place), and someone who does a hit and run is lazy and creates a problem without taking care of it.
As I argued ad nauseum with a certain loud fat person in the original thread,** this does not mean that I believe all fat people will run away after hitting a car. In fact, let me affirmatively state that I do not believe that all fat people are lazy and will not take care of problems they create. **
The impact of all this is that calling the hit and run driver a “fat moronic bitch” is a lot different than calling her a “gay moronic bitch” or a “[insert racial epithet of choice here] moronic bitch” because of the fat-lazy-let problems lie connection.