It happens. I remember when “African-American” was born. Jesse Jackson said it should be the new term.
Nobody here is arguing that.
So you’re saying no one had ever used the term “African American” before Jesse Jackson, that white academic, coined it and imposed it on the nation by force? Do you also remember how that other white academic, Malcolm X, coined the word “black”?
UltraVires claims that evil white academics, who secretly control the world, perhaps along with the Jews and the Illuminati, exercise their power over us by forcing us to use a different term very decade or face ridicule, job loss, and ostracization.
He doesn’t seem to accept that terms could simply emerge and spread naturally, eventually establishing a de facto consensus, including among those directly involved. Or occasionally not gain long-term acceptance (like Afro-American) and fade from common use.
ISTM that when a prominent member of a minority group looks around at the various terms that are being used to identify his group, from [N-word] to colored to negro to black to Afro-American to African American, and expresses his preference for one, perhaps because it lacks the negative connations and baggage that the others carry, and others agree and start using it more frequently, that is not an example of the imposition of a new word by white academics on an unwilling population. It’s how language works.
People have been banned from the SDMB for saying that kids are in cages? Do you have a link to that?
Also, this, QFT:
Here’s a great example from another thread here.
The context: we’re talking about trans athletes. I’ve cited several peer reviewed papers and experts, all of which point to the same conclusion. In response, a certain poster with a bit of a transphobic streak offered this juicy nugget.
Seriously, look at that shit! “Nobody has to “prove” anything”. “It’s just common sense”. The overall effect: facts don’t matter when they disagree with what I believe. This is the kind of thought-terminating cliche I’m talking about. The person may not understand that they’re arguing in bad faith, but they absolutely are.
How do you respond to that? How do you apply option #2 to that? I mean, to be perfectly honest, I did apply option #2 to that! I went out, I found the scientific research, I read it, I cited it.
It doesn’t matter. This person does not care.
Now, in this case, we’re talking about an individual on a message board with a pretty small footprint. But imagine it’s not that. Imagine it’s a youtuber with millions of subscribers. Imagine it’s the owner of a facebook page with millions of followers. Imagine it’s the entirety of senate and house republicans. And you start to see why option 2 kinda sucks.
To be honest, it’s not clear to me what people opposed to political correctness are arguing, other than they dont want to make any effort to be accepting of other people, but don’t want to be called out on it.
Racism is the dumbest thing on earth - pre-judging those you don’t know, usually generalizations and cliche comparing, but I wish people would think further than the binary. If you don’t like one thing, it doesn’t mean you love the other.
It also seems that racists use the politically correct to say “See, they’re taking away our speech”. I’m a liberal, I believe in free speech, and feel that a stupid idea should die on its own. Why give them ammunition? I also remember when it was the religious-right who were politically correct when anyone criticized christianity.
People might be aware of right-wing de-platforming, but its also happening with guys like Jimmy Dore, who isn’t even a leftist; just a liberal who is anti-war… Marc Lamont Hill was fired from CNN for reasons never made clear. Another problem I see with PC is the self-censorship, especially in a time where we could use all voices. Maybe someone will say something we didn’t consider before.
I live in a city with a slight black majority, so I’ve had a lot of conversations, and the first thing I hear is, “We never asked for it” and some would be angry with the notion of “Why are rich white men saying what we can or cannot handle”. I’ve also heard how (indirectly) that Native Americans prefer the word “Indian”, but I think a lot of this is done by those who want to look good, have a residual morality without really doing anything to help said minority groups. Urban renewal would be a start.
(Bolding mine)
Methinks there may be something of a contradiction here. Bad ideas should die on their own, right? And we all agree racism is crazy dumb, right? So what the hell is going on here? Why are the nazis of all things making a comeback?!
Well, I mean, as I keep having to point out, we’re literally not. When we deplatform big-name jerkwads, the result is that their outreach shrinks, not grows. Alex Jones’s viewership has tanked since he got kicked off of social media. Milo Yiannopolous has, in his own words, “had a really rough year”, probably at least in part because every platform worth its salt is sick of his shit and it’s really hard to advertise when you’re banned from Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and more. What, exactly, is “giving them more ammunition” here? Because they’re going to “blame PC”? But - here’s the thing. They’re going to do that anyways. If we don’t do anything, they’re going to make shit up - case in point, literally anything relating to that “gender-neutral santa” fiasco.
Well, what it does do is to make the remaining members even more fanatical. But, that’s really the case with any sort of group that holds anti-social views. The ones who leave early are the ones least committed, and the ones that are left are the ones most committed, who are no longer held back by the less fanatical.
There’s obviously nothing you can do about that, other than to give in and give them everything they want, which I see as rather counterproductive in limiting and marginalizing their beliefs.
So long as it is not the government itself shutting down people’s speech, I have little concern over the implications of citizens criticizing the speech of other citizens.
In times of fear, bigotry seems to be the reactionary response. Of course, we don’t know, but the provocateurs use anything. The most dangerous person is one who has nothing left to lose, and the only thing left for them is to get violent.
A person with nothing left to lose is a danger. A mob inspired by hate is a greater one.
We are not in a time of fear. We are in a time of the greatest peace and prosperity ever known to mankind. This is the single best time to live on this planet for nearly anyone. These fears only comes from fear mongering, and from that fear grows bigotry and hatred.
We have bigots who are spouting that we should be afraid of “the other”, whether that be ethnic minorities or religious sects or global conspiracies. They cultivate that fear, in order to get your* reactionary response of bigotry.
If you* live in a time of fear, then the greatest threat to your* future may just be yourself* and your* responses to an irrational emotion, not the things that you* have been convinced to be terrified of.
*royal you
Fear doesn’t have to be rational. Maybe you just live in a bubble?
This just doesn’t make any sense, even if you leave out the PC part. Various immigrants who spoke no common language are somehow aided by terms in a language they don’t understand?
Do you mean that non-PC terms help them learn a common language? How does that help? What is special about non-PC terms that make them easier to learn?
And how does it help people come together? Is the idea that they are all racist towards some other group that isn’t them, and they come together in bigotry towards a common enemy?
You’ve said that before, and I pointed out the big problems before. I will do so again.
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The right does not believe this is an extreme subset. They preach that it is extremely common.
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The left’s definition of PC comes from observing how the right actually uses it. Anyone who says “don’t call people queers, the N-word, retard, etc” is called PC by the Right. I know because it’s happened to me. ON this very board, in fact.
As such, it is quite clear we are not talking past each other. PC is a derogatory term created by the right to attack the left. **The mixup is entirely intentional by the right. **
(At least, the right who aren’t misled. The ones that are misled think there really thinks that all liberals believe what the extreme subset do. Because it’s useful for those in power to have true believers.)
And so encouraging people to have irrational fears is a good thing, in your opinion?
No, I just actually pay attention to reality, and don’t live in fear of it.
I know! Remember way back when that old president, I can’t remember which one, probably Taft or Adams or something, declared during his candidacy that he will get people saying Merry Christmas again instead of Happy Holidays? Man, that was so long ago. There was some TV network that had annual news items on some bullshit War On Christmas back then, too – wait, I don’t know that there were TV Networks back in Garfield’s days. Well, anyway, it sure was a long time ago. Man, those wacky religious-right types who used to get all PC about Christianity. I’m amazed you remember those days – you must be some kind of history buff.