I Steadfastly Reject This Sudden Rush to Redefine "Thug" as a Racial Slur

[Kimstu]

@The_Other_Waldo_Pepper

Folks used those words to describe homosexuals, and once that connotation was acquired we were, y’know, done. We had plenty of no-such-connotation synonyms left for “gay” and “queer”, and people who weren’t homosexual didn’t say hey, when you use that word to refer to homosexuals, I suspect you’re thinking of me.

So we didn’t need to let those go and start burning through synonyms.

We did “burn through synonyms”, though: it’s just that “gay” and “queer” are two synonyms that happen to have stuck around up to now. Other synonyms that were once considered acceptable for descriptive use, such as “fairy”, “sodomite”, and “pansy”, have been “burned through” and thrown away.

We “burn through synonyms” in this way all the time, even when the word in question, like “thug”, starts out as a specific descriptor that isn’t exclusive to any one race/gender/sexual orientation. If it gets attached to a marginalized group, it often ends up acquiring connotations of bias and subsequently discarded.

For instance, the word “mammy” used to mean just a child’s nurse/nanny, with no racial category implied. Once it became identified with uneducated-motherly-black-woman-devoting-herself-to-white-employer’s-children, everybody stopped applying it to non-black nannies. And eventually the racial bias inherent in the connotations of “jolly domestic nurturing black woman” resulted in the term falling out of use almost entirely.

Does it bother you that we introduced other terms to replace “mammy”? I doubt it. That’s just the cost of doing business with language and the endless subtle cultural implications of language.

Another word that may be heading for the burn pile is “illegal” used as a noun, especially in the plural form “illegals”. Of course, it has a perfectly good non-racist core meaning as a short form of “illegal immigrant”, in the sense of an undocumented or unauthorized resident. And there are undocumented immigrants of all races all over the world that could with equal validity be called “illegals” in that sense.

But many non-Latino Americans use “illegals” to speak of specifically Latino undocumented immigrants. And it’s not uncommon for racist non-Latinos in the US to refer to groups of Latinos as “illegals” even if they have no idea what their residency status happens to be. The term “illegals” in that usage isn’t referring to faked papers: it’s referring to speaking Spanish or playing salsa music or shopping at a bodega or other characteristics related to culture rather than legality.

Illegals: Undocumented immigrants -> Latino undocumented immigrants -> Latinos who seem “unassimilated/foreign” irrespective of whether they’re actually in this country illegally.

Thugs: Violent brutal guys -> violent brutal black guys -> black guys who seem “intimidating” irrespective of whether they’re actually guilty of any violence or brutality.

If we end up losing both those terms from common usage because they’ve become more about expressing racial prejudice than about identifying a particular type of behavior that’s not racially specific, well, so be it. Other synonyms to describe those particular types of non-racially-specific behavior will be found.

[Robert163]

@Kimstu

We did “burn through synonyms”, though: it’s just that “gay” and “queer” are two synonyms that happen to have stuck around up to now. Other synonyms that were once considered acceptable for descriptive use, such as “fairy”, “sodomite”, and “pansy”, have been “burned through” and thrown away.

We “burn through synonyms” in this way all the time, even when the word in question, like “thug”, starts out as a specific descriptor that isn’t exclusive to any one race/gender/sexual orientation. If it gets attached to a marginalized group, it often ends up acquiring connotations of bias and subsequently discarded.

For instance, the word “mammy” used to mean just a child’s nurse/nanny, with no racial category implied. Once it became identified with uneducated-motherly-black-woman-devoting-herself-to-white-employer’s-children, everybody stopped applying it to non-black nannies. And eventually the racial bias inherent in the connotations of “jolly domestic nurturing black woman” resulted in the term falling out of use almost entirely.

Does it bother you that we introduced other terms to replace “mammy”? I doubt it. That’s just the cost of doing business with language and the endless subtle cultural implications of language.

Another word that may be heading for the burn pile is “illegal” used as a noun, especially in the plural form “illegals”. Of course, it has a perfectly good non-racist core meaning as a short form of “illegal immigrant”, in the sense of an undocumented or unauthorized resident. And there are undocumented immigrants of all races all over the world that could with equal validity be called “illegals” in that sense.

But many non-Latino Americans use “illegals” to speak of specifically Latino undocumented immigrants. And it’s not uncommon for racist non-Latinos in the US to refer to groups of Latinos as “illegals” even if they have no idea what their residency status happens to be. The term “illegals” in that usage isn’t referring to faked papers: it’s referring to speaking Spanish or playing salsa music or shopping at a bodega or other characteristics related to culture rather than legality.

Illegals: Undocumented immigrants -> Latino undocumented immigrants -> Latinos who seem “unassimilated/foreign” irrespective of whether they’re actually in this country illegally.

Thugs: Violent brutal guys -> violent brutal black guys -> black guys who seem “intimidating” irrespective of whether they’re actually guilty of any violence or brutality.

If we end up losing both those terms from common usage because they’ve become more about expressing racial prejudice than about identifying a particular type of behavior that’s not racially specific, well, so be it. Other synonyms to describe those particular types of non-racially-specific behavior will be found.

I endorse this post

[stanger]

@marshmallow

Thug has been a racist dog whistle for like 10 years by now, at least.

I guess I am terribly out of the loop.

I admit that I do not live a lifestyle where I associate with people that are thugs or would be personally familiar with the part of society that a thug would come from, so it is not something I would expect to be up to date with.

But I see a lot or references to a lot of things on the internet and media that do keep me up fairly well on a lot of culture that I have no reason or opportunity to personally participate in, so I think I am familiar with the more commonly known and accepted words of slang and such.

But I can only recall the word “thug” being in anything close to common use a thing that only goes back a couple of years. Before that, it was usually pretty specific and used to describe someone who was a criminal that was capable and ready to use violent means to get whatever they wanted. I see it most commonly used in a comedic spirit to show some trivial behavior as pseudo-tough.

Could be that “thug” has been used a lot over the years in rap music, and not liking that music form, have never heard it as often as a result.

I find it rather surprising that – to me – the word has sprung up fairly recently in common use and is already being affected by its use to connotate something it was not originally intended to mean.

[Robert163]

@stanger

I guess I am terribly out of the loop.

I admit that I do not live a lifestyle where I associate with people that are thugs or would be personally familiar with the part of society that a thug would come from, so it is not something I would expect to be up to date with.

But I see a lot or references to a lot of things on the internet and media that do keep me up fairly well on a lot of culture that I have no reason or opportunity to personally participate in, so I think I am familiar with the more commonly known and accepted words of slang and such.

But I can only recall the word “thug” being in anything close to common use a thing that only goes back a couple of years. Before that, it was usually pretty specific and used to describe someone who was a criminal that was capable and ready to use violent means to get whatever they wanted. I see it most commonly used in a comedic spirit to show some trivial behavior as pseudo-tough.

Could be that “thug” has been used a lot over the years in rap music, and not liking that music form, have never heard it as often as a result.

I find it rather surprising that – to me – the word has sprung up fairly recently in common use and is already being affected by its use to connotate something it was not originally intended to mean.

its used a lot in rap music

[John_Mace]

@Kimstu

We did “burn through synonyms”, though: it’s just that “gay” and “queer” are two synonyms that happen to have stuck around up to now. Other synonyms that were once considered acceptable for descriptive use, such as “fairy”, “sodomite”, and “pansy”, have been “burned through” and thrown away.

We “burn through synonyms” in this way all the time, even when the word in question, like “thug”, starts out as a specific descriptor that isn’t exclusive to any one race/gender/sexual orientation. If it gets attached to a marginalized group, it often ends up acquiring connotations of bias and subsequently discarded.

For instance, the word “mammy” used to mean just a child’s nurse/nanny, with no racial category implied. Once it became identified with uneducated-motherly-black-woman-devoting-herself-to-white-employer’s-children, everybody stopped applying it to non-black nannies. And eventually the racial bias inherent in the connotations of “jolly domestic nurturing black woman” resulted in the term falling out of use almost entirely.

Does it bother you that we introduced other terms to replace “mammy”? I doubt it. That’s just the cost of doing business with language and the endless subtle cultural implications of language.

Another word that may be heading for the burn pile is “illegal” used as a noun, especially in the plural form “illegals”. Of course, it has a perfectly good non-racist core meaning as a short form of “illegal immigrant”, in the sense of an undocumented or unauthorized resident. And there are undocumented immigrants of all races all over the world that could with equal validity be called “illegals” in that sense.

But many non-Latino Americans use “illegals” to speak of specifically Latino undocumented immigrants. And it’s not uncommon for racist non-Latinos in the US to refer to groups of Latinos as “illegals” even if they have no idea what their residency status happens to be. The term “illegals” in that usage isn’t referring to faked papers: it’s referring to speaking Spanish or playing salsa music or shopping at a bodega or other characteristics related to culture rather than legality.

Illegals: Undocumented immigrants -> Latino undocumented immigrants -> Latinos who seem “unassimilated/foreign” irrespective of whether they’re actually in this country illegally.

Thugs: Violent brutal guys -> violent brutal black guys -> black guys who seem “intimidating” irrespective of whether they’re actually guilty of any violence or brutality.

If we end up losing both those terms from common usage because they’ve become more about expressing racial prejudice than about identifying a particular type of behavior that’s not racially specific, well, so be it. Other synonyms to describe those particular types of non-racially-specific behavior will be found.

And let’s not forget people who rob banks. We should not disparage them by referring to the law they are breaking. Better to refer to their actions as “unauthorized bank withdrawals”.

You know sometimes is cigar is just a cigar. “Illegal immigrant”, which is precisely what they*, are is a mouthful, and so “illegals” is a natural linguistic progression. Just like in the 60s we used the term “mods” to refer to “moderns”.

*They being the folks here illegally.

[Miller]

@John_Mace

And let’s not forget people who rob banks. We should not disparage them by referring to the law they are breaking. Better to refer to their actions as “unauthorized bank withdrawals”.

Should we take your consistent use of this strawman as evidence that you don’t understand the argument being put to you, or simply that you’re unable to refute it?

[Kobal2]

@Waymore

No. See above about how I put self expression above not hurting somebodies feelings.

It’s not about not hurting somebody’s feelings, least not as far as I’m concerned.

There’s (obviously) no clear consensus that the word is loaded.

There is among people who don’t deliberately put their heads in the sand.

It is relevant though. Calling somebody a thug because they’re acting like one isn’t racist.

It can be both.

And the idea that any cognitively normal, fluent speaker of English doesn’t have a clear of idea of what thug-like behavior is asinine.

Is it ? Is it really ? **Robert163 **provided evidence ITT of an NFL player who was heavily referenced as a thug in the media following a bout of post-game trash-talking. I was actually familiar with him via the Daily Show. Is bragging after your team won a football game thug-like behaviour ? Well obviously many sports commentators opine it is. I would respectfully disagree with them on that. Or not-so-respectfully.

Hey, watch the offensive language.

Cute. Again, it’s not about not being offensive. I’ll go one further and opine that “I’ll do what I want/say what I want and don’t care what others think” is the textbook definition of “being an asshole”. See ? This is me not caring whether or not I’m being offensive.

Just earlier in this post you complained about using “loaded language.” In your original post that I responded to, you constructed your hypothetical such that a person should avoid using the word thug so you wouldn’t think they’re racists.

Clearly, this is about using language you and others approve of. This ad hoc objection about “clearly and concisely conveying your thoughts” is just moving the goal posts.

It’s not about whether or not I approve of it, for fuck’s sake. The whole shebang is about making people aware, who could conceivably have not been before, of the growing use of the word as a dog-whistle, in the media in particular. Which, BTW, sleestak, it was long before the Baltimore riots.

If you, having been made aware that it is an increasingly popular loaded word, keep using that word regardless, then you have to be prepared to face the social consequences borne of people expecting you’re using that word as a dog-whistle. And you can’t plead ignorance any more. That’s all there is to it, and the rash of feature articles about the word.

You are perfectly within your rights to not give a hoot that people around you think you’re coming off as a racist. Most people, being social creatures and whatnot, do care about that shit.

Because 1) if it’s a dog whistle, it’s only because artificial outrage has been ginned up

No. It’s not. That’s not how dog-whistles work. The “outrage”, such as it is, is rather prompted by people cottoning up to the use as a dog-whistle. The dog-whistle can only, and does, predate the outrage. By years.

and 2) I don’t care how you might interpret what I say.

See above.

[tomndebb]

@Richard_Parker

No, you suggested that the fact of them being black was a strong reason to think they were not being racist. Here’s what you wrote:

Just bad inference on your part. Nothing in my posts suggests that they could not be racist simply because they were black. There is, however, a strong element of irony in accusing someone who has actively struggled against racism in society and in their own lives of simply being a racist tool just because some other member of their group gets offended at a single word that had not the universal connotation that the offenderati claimed.

[tomndebb]

@Robert163

I never said the term was in common usage. I said it had started to be used as a derogatory term.

While Terr’s further silliness can be ignored, your post #262 was a direct response to his question as to why common usage should be dictated by a minority of users. Your responded with a rather weak effort that did nothing to establish that it was used by any large body of speakers.
OldOlds then noted that your response was not terribly persuasive. You responded, then, that you were not talking about general usage.
However, when I noted that the current foofaraw is what will probably cause it to become a widespread meaning, you made a point of referring to your earlier post to show that there was usage prior to the riots.
Now, when I point out that such a claim is irrelevant, because it does not address the issue of how widespread that usage may be, you want to make an issue of saying that you did not claim it was widespread–effectively reinforcing the fact that your Post #262 was rather pointless.

• ::: shrug ::: *

[Kimstu]

@John_Mace

You know sometimes is cigar is just a cigar. “Illegal immigrant”, which is precisely what they*, are is a mouthful, and so “illegals” is a natural linguistic progression. Just like in the 60s we used the term “mods” to refer to “moderns”.

*They being the folks here illegally.

John, somehow or other you entirely missed the whole point of my last post.

I wasn’t making any objection whatever to the fact that the term “illegal immigrants” sometimes gets shortened to “illegals” for convenience in speaking.

What I was pointing out is that the term “illegals” for “illegal immigrants” has begun acquiring specific racial connotations:

• first meaning “Latino illegal immigrants” (because in the US, Latino illegal immigrants are the most numerous and most newsworthy kind),

• and then sometimes as a contemptuous slur for “unassimilated” Latinos irrespective of their actual immigration status.

Likewise, the term “thug” for “violent brutal guys” acquired racial connotations:

• first of “violent brutal young black guys”,

• and then sometimes as a contemptuous slur for “young black guys with ‘ghetto’ attitude” irrespective of whether they’re actually involved in any violence or brutality.
  Is that any clearer? I’m afraid I don’t know a better way to explain it if you’re still not getting it.

[Salvor]

Remember those beltway sniper attacks? The assailants were black, they were straight up murdering people with guns from afar, but you did not hear them referred to as “Thugs” in the way people being disruptive in the streets are. Why? They are both black, so if that is the trigger why was there a difference there?

Thuggery (in societal aether) refers to a type of behavior that generally involves street crime and bad behavior, theft of peoples property up close like robbing them in the streets or some liquor store. Vandalism, and destruction of community property, a general disregard for the larger society around them not because they are crazy or believe some sort of religious dogma that leads to terrorism, but because they don’t give a shit about their own community or anyone else because of their own sense of ostracization from the larger society. That guy who cut the water hose trying to put out the cvs fire did not give a fuck about other peoples property or safety, he was in a rage over what happened and was like fuck them, burn and suffer. That type of attitude that encompasses a sort of community rejection lends itself to the term “thug.”

Now some of you will point out that this gets levied at black people more often and that is completely true. But the “why” is not because people are racists against blacks, it’s because it fits the observed pattern of black people being more likely to feel that way. I’m black, but so what, black people are more likely to commit crimes and murder against other black people, more likely to assault others. Those stats and OBSERVATIONS of REALITY are not ignored and asserted away by the PC police. They live in the minds of all who see them, and they do affect the perceptions of black people. It’s not fair, but it’s also not intrinsic to black peoples “blackness.”

If a hundred years from now the stats and rates of violence and assaults from the black population was no different from the white population - if we saw a proportionate number of them in colleges and higher skilled jobs, then that perception would vanish.

When I pass a slow wobbly driver and look to the side to see who it is, the fact that it’s often an older person or an elderly asian lady is empirical evidence that puts ideas into my mind about that group of people. Just because it does not apply to all old people or asian women does not take away the perception. And while many of you may think the negative perceptions about black people behaving badly are unearned, they are NOT. Deal with it, or don’t, pretend there is no difference in crime and bad behavior that is the primary source of this negative perception that lingers. You will solve nothing. I don’t give a damn how loudly anyone hollers and screams about racism, you cannot wipe away what people actually observe with their own eyes.

[Robert163]

@Salvor

Now some of you will point out that this gets levied at black people more often and that is completely true. But the “why” is not because people are racists against blacks, it’s because it fits the observed pattern of black people being more likely to feel that way. I’m black, but so what, black people are more likely to commit crimes and murder against other black people, more likely to assault others. Those stats and OBSERVATIONS of REALITY are not ignored and asserted away by the PC police. They live in the minds of all who see them, and they do affect the perceptions of black people. It’s not fair, but it’s also not intrinsic to black peoples “blackness.”

Do I understand this correctly? You are black? Well if that is true my question is, do you get bothered when other people associate to you characteristics that actually don’t belong to you but belong instead to black people who are criminals?

My next point. I’m white. Here is what I learned by having lots of black friends and a black roommate/landlord. That you have to treat each individual as an individual. Not that my friends were criminals, they were not, but prior to 10/15 years ago I had almost no black friends. After getting to know some black people I was much more open to getting to know more of them. Some of these additional black people I got to know, in NYC, would seem “suspicious” to many people. I found that often, if someone looked suspicious they probably were suspicious. But there is the problem. This, observation of reality, as you call it. Reality is not allways what it seems. Maybe that person who is dressed suspiciously is on their way to the gym or to meet friends and has a perfectly legitimate day job with proper attire and attitude to match. Maybe the guy who appears “thuggish” is not a thug at all but is just in a bad mood because he lost a job or a girlfriend. Operating off of the theory that observations match reality is one of the worst ways to operate because ultimately it is going to lead to the wrong assumptions. This is why I approach each person, to the best of my ability, as an individual, no matter what race they are or job they appear to have…

[Salvor]

@Robert163

Do I understand this correctly? You are black? Well if that is true my question is, do you get bothered when other people associate to you characteristics that actually don’t belong to you but belong instead to black people who are criminals?

Yes I am bothered and annoyed (but I don’t dwell on it as much as others do). My general rule and idea about how people ought to behave is to treat each person as an individual not as a member of the larger group. I think people ought to try to overrule their own negative perceptions about group characteristics when dealing with others. I do not expect them to comb their own brains and remove group perceptions though because I don’t think that’s possible. I expect men to be more violent than women on average, not because I am sexist against men, but because that is what I and everyone else observes. The only way to change those sorts of internal perceptions about groups at large is to change the ACTUAL rates of behaviors that lead to the perceptions in the first place. And assertions different groups are no different than any other does not achieve that goal.

My next point. I’m white. Here is what I learned by having lots of black friends and a black roommate/landlord. That you have to treat each individual as an individual. Not that my friends were criminals, they were not, but prior to 10/15 years ago I had almost no black friends. After getting to know some black people I was much more open to getting to know more of them. Some of these additional black people I got to know, in NYC, would seem “suspicious” to many people. I found that often, if someone looked suspicious they probably were suspicious. But there is the problem. This, observation of reality, as you call it. Reality is not allways what it seems. Maybe that person who is dressed suspiciously is on their way to the gym or to meet friends and has a perfectly legitimate day job with proper attire and attitude to match. Maybe the guy who appears “thuggish” is not a thug at all but is just in a bad mood because he lost a job or a girlfriend. Operating off of the theory that observations match reality is one of the worst ways to operate because ultimately it is going to lead to the wrong assumptions. This is why I approach each person, to the best of my ability, as an individual, no matter what race they are or job they appear to have…

I don’t disagree with any of that, the problem is that that is not how most people work. This is a mechanic that is more basic to how brains work. You make observations about the world, when errors crop up (you expect some characteristic from an object or person but see something else) you adjust your expectations to account for the new information. This is a never ending process as far as I can tell. And while I think it’s a good thing to actively overrule the automatic association of negative stereotypes from members of a group applied the group at large (and vice verse), it’s extremely difficult to completely wipe away the links to negative stereotypes based on observation. And that last can color how you interact with others.

Be honest, if you heard there was another terrorist attack in the US, what would you guess was the motivation of the perpetrator? Some random nutter? Or some Islamic extremist? A lot of us, probably most of us would be more surprised if it was not that last, because so many examples of murderous terror attacks have similar types of people with similar belief systems. This is what I’m talking about. Those negative perceptions that live in the minds of men, can be overruled at an individual level in many ways, but to completely wipe away the perceptions that the brain observes and vets with it’s error checking observational system, it NEEDS to see it’s expectations repeatedly falsified.

One of the reasons the perception of women in the workforce changed so quickly and radically is that we have example after example of women going to college and medical/law school and thriving in those fields. The presumption about women being less capable of doing well in such endeavors evaporated with their success. It does not scale to all fields, but you get the idea. Now people don’t like to hear this because they want a solution to the problem that does not involve the people the negative perception is placed upon having to do anything or change anything. The idea is that the negative perceptions are someone else’s problem for having them in the first place. If the perceptions are based on something as superficial as skin color alone, they are right, but when the perception is linked in part to actual behavior, you cannot just focus on other peoples perception issues. Behavior is what it is, and they can’t change what they see, the group/individual in question has to do that. They are the only ones who can.

This is why on an individual level, while I’m annoyed by negative perceptions based on skin color (I’m actually mixed black/korean), I am not losing sleep over it. For the most part, especially on an individual level, peoples perceptions can be quickly swatted away by breaking their expectations by how you behave and carry yourself. There is still a problem with people not even engaging with people based off negative perceptions, which is why what you said earlier is a good policy for people to follow. If only they would.

[Robert163]

@Salvor

This is why on an individual level, while I’m annoyed by negative perceptions based on skin color (I’m actually mixed black/korean), I am not losing sleep over it. For the most part, especially on an individual level, peoples perceptions can be quickly swatted away by breaking their expectations by how you behave and carry yourself. There is still a problem with people not even engaging with people based off negative perceptions, which is why what you said earlier is a good policy for people to follow. If only they would.

Ok, I agree with pretty much everything you said I shortened the post however just to reduce it’s size. I enjoyed reading your remarks but it is 4:30 AM here so I will have to be getting to sleep. Have a good night.

[Captain_Amazing]

@Robert163

I never said the term was in common usage. I said it had started to be used as a derogatory term.

There was apparently some use of “Canadian” as a code term for black a few years back…some DA in Texas sent an e-mail congratulating a prosecutor for winning a case in spite of the large number of “Canadians” on the jury, a restaurant in Kansas City would refer to tables where large numbers of blacks (who the restaurant assumed would be poor tippers) were seated as “Canadian tables”, and so on.

That being said, I think somebody referring to Michelle Jean as “Canadian” could do so without being inappropriate.

[Robert163]

@Captain_Amazing

There was apparently some use of “Canadian” as a code term for black a few years back…some DA in Texas sent an e-mail congratulating a prosecutor for winning a case in spite of the large number of “Canadians” on the jury, a restaurant in Kansas City would refer to tables where large numbers of blacks (who the restaurant assumed would be poor tippers) were seated as “Canadian tables”, and so on.

That being said, I think somebody referring to Michelle Jean as “Canadian” could do so without being inappropriate.

wow… what a bizarre set of trivia… and totally totally under the radar

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@Kimstu

We did “burn through synonyms”, though: it’s just that “gay” and “queer” are two synonyms that happen to have stuck around up to now. Other synonyms that were once considered acceptable for descriptive use, such as “fairy”, “sodomite”, and “pansy”, have been “burned through” and thrown away.

My point was the other way around.

People referred to homosexuals – who were, in fact, “homosexual” – as “queer”. There was no need for that; we could have only ever used the word “homosexual”; but if “queer” acquired a homosexual connotation, it’s no big loss, because synonyms for what queer used to mean abound. We could say “odd” or “unusual” or “strange” without implying “homosexual”.

Likewise, once “gay” acquired a homosexual connotation, we still had plenty of words for what gay used to mean; we hadn’t needed another way of saying “homosexual” in the first place, and other words for cheery exuberance could stay put.

But this is the other way around. There I was, using the classic definition of “thug” to accurately describe a thug, only to be told hey, I’m not a thug, and when you call that guy a thug, I infer that I’m being implied.

If we just lose that one word, it’s no big loss; I can switch to a synonym for what “thug” used to mean. But if I start using a word that means the same thing to describe those same people, why wouldn’t it eventually draw the same response? Why won’t I need another synonym, and another, and another?

I didn’t need a new way to refer to homosexuals; I always had at least one perfectly good word for that, and never needed a synonym; I could keep saying “homosexual” even if other words acquired that connotation, and heterosexuals never thought I meant them. But here, I do need a new way to refer to – hoodlums? As of this writing, we can still call them “hoodlums”, right?

[OldOlds]

I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before, but for whatever it’s worth, I just looked at the Wikipedia page on Thug. There are the standard definitions we’ve all heard, and a lengthy list of rap artists who have adopted the moniker (back to the badass thing above) and zero mention of any racial slur aspect of the word. If this word were so charged (before last week, anyway) I would expect some mention in there.

So far the most compelling argument we’ve seen here (and it isn’t very) is that young black people are adopting it in the above way. I knew some kids of Italian descent growing up who thought the mobster affectation was cool in (I think) a similar way. And I reject that such a voluntary affectation makes the word off-limits to- or offensive when used by- others.

[Kimstu]

[QUOTE=The Other Waldo Pepper]

If we just lose that one word, it’s no big loss; I can switch to a synonym for what “thug” used to mean. But if I start using a word that means the same thing to describe those same people, why wouldn’t it eventually draw the same response? Why won’t I need another synonym, and another, and another?

[/QUOTE]

You probably will, as long as significant racial bias against black people exists. Racially biased people tend to associate derogatory terms with people of the race they’re biased against. And as a result, sometimes that term’s connotations end up being more about race than about the specific characteristic that the derogatory term was originally intended to derogate.

And so people who don’t want to sound racially biased end up just dropping the use of the term altogether, to avoid its connotations.

And as I said, I agree that that can be a frustrating and inefficient way for language to work. But it happens to be the way that language does work. Don’t shoot the messenger: I’m not accusing you of using “thug” as a racial slur or attempting to decree that “thug” may no longer be used in its original non-racial-slur sense.

I’m just mentioning that I’ve noticed indications that “thug” is acquiring connotations of racial slur. And that is likely to affect the way people think about the use of the word “thug” in the future.

[Terr]

@Kimstu

And so people who don’t want to sound racially biased end up just dropping the use of the term altogether, to avoid its connotations.

I have no problem with people not using the word for whatever silly reason. I have a problem with people telling me I should not/cannot use the word because of THEIR silly reasons.