Do you have a clue how to apologize?
Many people have great respect for people that can admit when they get carried away or are wrong. Your posts in this thread shows a cluelessness I did not believe you had, this is a shame. You really should work on some self-appraisal and see how you come off to others.
The bulk of the posts in this thread were civil and polite. Many posters were asking for you to do the right thing, come in, apologize and prove that you can be a stand up guy. I think you have failed us.
Aww, you’re too kind. I, um, I’m not sure if you noticed but I used a couple more swear words than you did in your opening salvo.
I hate to play junior psychologist, but I have to wonder if maybe you’re literally correct in this, and he’s suffering from some sort of psychological disorder. His behavior is simply ridiculous - he’s not right, and I have a hard time believing even he thinks he is. Even if he “won” this argument, it would only mean that everyone else got bored with him bitching. At any point he could have simply acknowledged that he was wrong and left with some measure of dignity, but he’s made such a ridiculous ass of himself that I don’t think he could even do that anymore.
Absolutely.
Exactly. I don’t know why he doesn’t understand that a refusal to admit he was wrong and to apologize for his actions just makes him look worse.
How was I “wrong”? Have you not read my cites? There’s no objective standard by which I was “wrong,” unless you further say that all the authors of all of my cites are equally “wrong.”
Serious question. How was I “wrong”?
(Please try to read the cites without my ill-considered introduction.)
*Ai, lissener, no tienes la verdad aqui! Se llaman la lengua actual de España español o castellano, pero ya los de hablan ingles no dice <<Castilian>>, solamente te y los traduciones literales tuyos. *
And a literal translation of that is going to fall flat on unshared idiom, sir. Just as your argument did.
If this is correct, then I would sincerely urge you to get some kind of therapy or treatment. You have had ample material here that explains how and why you were wrong. If you honestly do not understand it, you have some deep-seated problem that is beyond anyone’s capacity to deal with on a message board.
Besides the Omelette, I don’t know much about Spain or things Spanish, but I do know this:
At the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade the ground opens up to swallow the Holy Grail, and this Nazi Bitch Slut, Elsa dives into grab it. Indiana Jones barely grabs her hand. She won’t give him her other hand though because she is still reaching for the Grail and she falls to her doom. Moments later, Indiana Jones also falls. This time his father grabs Indy’s hand. Indiana Jones starts reaching for the Grail and we are sure he is about to befall Elsa’s fate.
“Son,” says Sean Connery as Indiana Jones’ father (Sean Connery is pretty cool.)
“I can reach it, Dad!” Shouts the younger Jones.
“Let it go, Indy. Let it go.” And when Sean Connery gives you an order, you listen. He takes his father’s hand and is pulled to safety. Lissener
Let it go, Indy. Let it go.
Seriously, someone, Scylla, read my cites. Someone please. If someone can reconcile those cites with my “being wrong,” or at least make the effort, I’ll let it go.
My baby sister, who is studying in Barcelona now (native speaker of Spanish and fluent in French since childhood) is now learning Catalan. She told me that Catalan sounds much closer to French to her ears than to Spanish.
Except that your argument that “Castilian” is a better or more technically accurate term than “Spanish” is simply wrong. It’s not “technical pedantry”, it’s falsehood, pure and simple.
Which has been roundly disproven; Colibri’s invitation that you admit that you were wrong was in no way a personal attack. If you don’t feel you are a victim, then your pathetic whining about how this thread will inevitably revolve around your taste in movies was an awfully good victim impression.
Congratulations. You have proven that some Spanish professors regard “Castilian” or “Castilian Spanish” as a better translation of one particular phrase in the Spanish Constitution. This doesn’t even approach proof of your silly little hijack. It’s true that the term “Castilian” is useful in one very narrow sense - there is the potential for “Spanish” to be a loaded term, since it could potentially be taken to imply that the other languages spoken in Spain are not “Spanish” - that is, since the term “Spanish” has two meanings - a language and a nationality - the term “Castilian” might potentially be useful simply to assuage potentially oversensitive speakers of minority languages and convince them that their languages are not in any sense less “Spanish” - that is, less belonging to the nation of Spain - than is Castilian. The term is used here in order to be abundantly specific as to which language is being referenced, since all of those languages are “lenguas españolas”, while only one of them could be called “la lengua castellana”. If you wish to debate the rather boring point of literary style used here, you may do so, though you will probably find yourself debating alone. If you wish to argue that “Castilian” is a better, or more “technical”, term in English, then note that you went to the “Spanish” departments of universities in order to ask.
Finally, note that they haven’t addressed the broader point (because you conveniently didn’t ask them to) - whether “Castilian” is a better term for the language than “Spanish” in any other context besides translating that phrase in the Spanish Constitution. Since at the time of your original hijack the exact wording of the Spanish Constitution was not even a topic of discussion, once again you have not even come close to proving that your original point was correct.
Then reread the original thread, and see how your misbegotten attempt to be “pedantic” and “technical” ruined it. Compare your posts and Colibri’s. You will then, if you are still being honest, no longer be bewildered.
You must admit to being a bit of a coward in refusing to even acknowledge the points I’ve made in this thread.
(Oh, and the rest of you: can I get some props for my discussion - bolstered by personal experience no less! - of the sociolinguistics of Catalan and Galician? It was that big long post back on page one. :))
Sir, one more try. Scylla and I are not qualified to make a judgment on the facts of the Spanish question. We can only comment on how you are acting. Googling for cites and posting them does not put you on equal footing with experts like Colibri, Polycarp & Nava or even **Excalibre ** who while not expert has studied in the areas in question. Why would you continue to insist you must be right in the face of 4 people far more qualified that you, I or Scylla? One last plea and I will bow out. Apologize. or as Scylla so aptly put it, just let it go.
Light dawns. That is the ONLY context I was addressing. I have repeatedly tried to make it clear how very narrowly I was speaking. It was a thread on *official *languages; in the very narrowest sense, according to the Constitution, the official language of the State of Spain is Castilian. That is the ONLY context which I was addressing.
Ooh, meanwhile, has lissener offered up some half-assed excuse for why Basque and Catalan and Galician are “Spanish”? He’s acknowledged that they’re not linguistically Spanish, but I didn’t see anything to retract his original claim that they are “Spanish” in some broader sense. Maybe he meant “in a broader sense that exists only inside my head.”
Ahh. So you only meant it in terms of that exact phrase in the Constitution. In other words, it was a hijack that was wholly irrelevant to the topic of conversation, and you explained it so poorly that no one even realized that the only actual topic of discussion was the wording of the Spanish Constitution. No one except you.
Wow, you’re either a fantastically poor writer or really bad at coming up with convincing excuses for your behavior.
Again, I have not claimed to be right; I have only claimed that it is worthy of debate; that intelligent people can disagree; and that Colibri jumped the gun when he called me outright “wrong.” You cannot dismiss my cites, here, at the Dope, merely by accusing me of having “Googled” for them. This is the only instance I have ever seen where one or another doper’s personal opinion on a matter, however experienced, has been held up to trump a slew of cites.
I understand that the dopers you name interpret it differently; I understand that there is room for different interpretations. In my googling I also found cites that agreed with their interpretation. But I’m not trying to define who’s right and who’s wrong; I’m merely arguing that such terms are not applicable in this discussion. That we can each quote our experts, discuss it academically, and still walk away with differing opinions. Period. My first words in this entire episode were "It’s my understanding . . . " Not “You’re wrong,” or “Nuh uh,” or anything like that. And I then backed up my limited understanding with cites. Which, unfortunately, were dismissed instead of discussed.
I can understand the disagreement; I cannot understand the vitriol.
Since we are nit-picking about the spanish language, I will insert my corrections in brackets in the quote.
Poly here is my version, the changes are small but in my opinion consequential.
Ai, lissener, no tienes [del]la[/del] [del]verdad[/del][razon] aqui! Se [del]llaman[/del] [lama] la lengua actual de España español o castellano [or bette still- La lengua actual de Espana es espanol o castelleno], pero ya los [del]de[/del][que] hablan ingles no [del]dice[/del] [dicen] <<Castilian>>, solamente [del]te[/del][tu] y los traduciones literales tuyos. *
That’s as may be. But it seemed to me that the word “official” put the discussion in that realm. The translation of that phrase in the Constitution is, it seems to me, what this entire discussion boils down to. Again, in a thread on “official languages,” I thought that a government’s legislation on what that official language is was relevant. That’s why I referenced the Constitution. If you see that as a hijack, I see it differently. I saw it as getting to the crux of the discussion.
Since we are nit-picking about the spanish language, I will insert my corrections in brackets in the quote.
Poly here is my version, the changes are small but in my opinion consequential.
Ai, lissener, no tienes [del]la[/del] [del]verdad[/del][razon] aqui! Se [del]llaman[/del] [llama] la lengua actual de España español o castellano [or bette still- La lengua actual de Espana es espanol o castelleno], pero ya los [del]de[/del][que] hablan ingles no [del]dice[/del] [dicen] <<Castilian>>, solamente [del]te[/del][tu] y los traduciones literales tuyos.