So you’re no longer claiming I said it was offensive or should be censored? You understand I just think it is an interesting discussion?
My post also makes it clear that I don’t think they picked a phrase that has to do with slavery on purpose. Just that “cotton-XXXXX” is a comedic way of phrasing things in American culture, going back to “cotton-picking”, which comes from slavery. I don’t see how that is at all controversial, nor why you are getting so upset about it.
Yeah, I am surprised to see any controversy in claiming that “cotton-…” to describer a person in an American context has its roots in slavery.
This is the lie I was referring to, by the way. I didn’t say that the phrase is offensive, and I have no idea how you twisted my words to read it that way. Clearly in context they meant “cotton-headed” because Buddy the Elf is friends with some living stuffed animals whose heads are literally full of cotton.
But the writers didn’t find “cotton-XXXXX” funny in a vacuum. Buddy’s insults and exclamations (“Son of a Nutcracker!”) Are meant to both evoke the vulgar (he says this when a more mature character would curse) in a humorous and child-like way. So asking, why does the phrase “cotton-headed” have the trappings of an insult, is completely fair. And that’s just examining Elf as a literary work, not taking offense to anything.
I never claimed it to begin with.
Nobody accused you of saying it was picked on purpose. Just that it was based on slavery non-the-less. You put 2+2 together, got 7, and thought it would be an interesting conclusion on which to have a discussion. It isn’t.
Also you accused me of lying because you can’t parse a response aimed at two posters.
A literary waaat… It’s a fucking chidlren’s holiday movie!
Yes, it is. And it’s ALSO a literary work. This is hardly a groundbreaking realization.
Are you referring to those who find out a word is offensive to some? or those who find out that a word can be used in an inoffensive way?
Is one side obliged to change their language or the other to accept the inoffensive usage?
You accused me of telling people what they must do.
When I point out that I said no such thing, you jump to saying that the issue is that I asserted that the term is offensive. Well, that’s not the same thing.
But sure, it’s pretty easy to find a cite that the word is offensive to some people. Here you go. Note I didn’t suggest it’s offensive to all people (what word is?), the point is that it’s offensive to a non-trivial number of people and cites like this article are evidence of that.
Peter Noone who was the Herman in Herman’s Hermits, but that’s not important right now.
Somewhere around 20 years ago, I was selling eggplant through a growers’ coop. One day, the manager called me up and asked me, "What’s the name of that variety of eggplant you’re growing that we’re selling as ‘Oriental eggplant’? I said, “Orient Express.” She said, ‘no, that won’t do either. We just found out that some people find the word offensive.’ So we sold them [ETA: that general type of eggplant, the long thin ones] for a while as Japanese eggplant; until a relative of mine who’s from China pointed out that they’re common in China, also – and India, I discovered, and other places. So we switched to “Asian eggplant.”
Expecting that one particular region gets to decide that the term’s inoffensive seems to me at least as arrogant.
People change how they use their language all of the time. It’s how every language currently on the planet was created.
See cite just below. [ETA: it isn’t.]
Quite a lot of people. Here’s one out of multiple cites from my first page of google results for “moron and idiot as insults”:
Start with abusive, corrosive slurs to avoid in all cases, effective yesterday.
- “Retarded,” “moron,” “idiot”
These words are peppered throughout some people’s everyday conversation, and have many different shades of contextual meaning. However, they are all terms that have historically been used to label people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. And while these and similar words were at one time considered technical or “scientific” labels, they have always also carried a heavy social stigma and power to inflict real harm. Most people with these disabilities have intensely painful experiences being called “retarded,” “moron,” or “idiot” in clearly insulting ways. The fact that a people still use such terms without intending to hurt disabled people doesn’t matter.
I think it’s interesting. Are you the official designator of what people should be interested in?
One region deciding whether a term is inoffensive or offensive would indeed be arrogant. We would be in agreement on that.
Wow, this thread has gone completely off the rails.
Clearly I am not. I assume the context was clear that it isn’t interesting to me. Not that I forbid anyone from having that conversation. Have at it. I will endeavor not to join in.
Hmm…
Nope, not clear at all.
I’m sorry I didn’t provide any evidence for my claim (other than the evidence I did provide that you apparently didn’t read, of course).
Given the OP it was never on the rails to begin with.
You did?
Because I did some research of my own and found:
also,
Now you show me what you found.
Man, for someone who thinks this conversation isn’t interesting, you absolutely will not shut the fuck up about it, will you?
Well, at least it arguably had a theme centered around the alleged uselessness of conservatives. Now it’s gone off into ranting analyses of what seems to be the linguistic anthropology of insults.
Throughout the movie, Buddy uses a number of exclamations. None of them are vulgar, but all are clearly based on real exclamations. For example, you wouldn’t argue that “Son of a Nutcracker” refers to anything other than “son of a bitch”, right?
We see Buddy use phrases that have all the trappings of an insult from our world (“Son of a Nutcracker”) but which are Christmas themed. The humor comes from the inherent dichotomy, the contrast between the innocent child-like Buddy and the vulgar, adult language the joke evokes.
So if Buddy uses an insult like “cotton-headed”, we have to look to the culture that the writers of Elf are a part of. We know that “son of a Nutcracker” is a reference to “son of a bitch” because that’s a very common exclamation in America.
Note also that the phrase isn’t simply “cotton-headed”. It’s “cotton-headed niny muggins”. Here, Cotton-XXXXX is serving as an intensifier, like the word “fucking” or “damned” would do if this wasn’t a kids’ movie. And guess what phrase can be used in American English specifically as an intensifier?
“Cotton-something blah blah blah” is as much a reference to the phrase “cotton-picking” as “son of a Nutcracker” is to “son of a bitch”.
Considering the rails it was on, I’d say this is an improvement