No, I am not SURE of anything . I am not Cecil, nor do I have a time machine.
If you look at my Flinstones reference, you can see that I am of the understanding that the word gay meant (or at the very least also meant) something OTHER than homosexuality and also meant something generally positive.
My point about homosexual men accepting the “previously derogatory” word gay and making it their own was this. Back when gay meant evil sex prefences, but after the time when it generally meant fun or carefree, it wasnt used in a good way. It was meant or at least implied to be offensive/derogatory. Then gay men started using in a non-derogatory way, somewhat taking the sting off of it and “making it their own” so to speak. IMO very much like black people did with the N word. THATS what I mean by previously derogatory.
And I still think my point about both groups painting themselves into a corner by doing so holds some water. Short term it was probably a good idea. Long term they just muddled the waters and made sure the cursed word stayed around with now ambigious conotations.
No one will ever accuse you of being, uhhh, how can I say it, nnnnnnn…uhhh, parsimonius with the rolleyeyes.
As for the Flinstones, I am old, but I aint THAT damn old. Probably half the Americans alive today heard “gay old time” and didnt think of the village people when they heard it.
Have you been reading the thread? Seriously, have you? I already discussed that definition. Everybody knows it, so you’re not shocking us into another viewpoint by uncovering a new piece of evidence. It has nothing to do with “that’s so gay.” It’s a complete non sequitur. It’s no different than strolling in and saying “apple means tasty red fruit so gay people really need to stfu.”
I considered each one at length and decided one at a time that you deserved them.
I’ve heard that an organisation composed of people who are happy and cheerful are trying to organise a campaign to educate people not to use the word Gay to mean Homosexual.
Meanwhile I’ve heard that homosexuals who suffer from clinical depression are also offended at being called gay because it trivialises their serious,potentially life threatening condition.
I don’t see what the big deal about not using it is. Why would anyone want to use a term that offends people? Yeah, a lot of you will say, “Why should I stop using a perfectly normal word?” But I don’t think this is like someone getting up in arms over “niggardly” or something like that. It’s someone getting up in arms over a term that’s meant to be offensive. Why do you want to persist in making people feel uncomfortable?
So your complaint with me that I am noting that gay used to mean “happy”, which some folks apparently don’t know.
And for a while now gay apparently ONLY means “man on man sex”, so I am supposed to keep up with the latestest definition.
So, I need to get with the times because a definitions are a changing.
Might I suggest you do the same, cause in another 40 years when the latest Paris Hilton Christmas special comes out and my grandkids say “thats so gay”, nobody on the planet will thinking “evil butt sex”.
Either definition change over time…in which case get over it…or they don’t and I want my “gay old time” back.
Of course, the irony that the gay community shot themselves in the ass, figuratively speaking, by co-opting the word in the first place doesnt escape me.
The reality is that all the protestations, all the disapproving tut-tuts, will not change the speech of young people one iota. Nor should it. The young are far more accepting of homosexuality than their elders, they are not using the term hatefully but playfully.
People are just going to have to live with it until word fashions move on.
You keep saying this, but I don’t see the irony. How did they “co-opt” the word? Words evolve–I doubt they all just decided to take it over.
Besides, even if they had used another word, I’m sure bigots would have found a way to use that one for the worse. Jew is a perfectly normal word, but there are creeps who say “Jew doctor” or “Jew lawyer.” You can’t blame the minority group for the actions of bigots.
Eh. I’d say that’s true for the most part - and i’d probably say that the average youngster calling something “gay” is quite likely not doing so having chosen that word specifically. It’s not out of a hatred of gay people, but just the idea that “gay” sums up a general wrongness, unpleasantness or otherwise insulting idea. Because that’s the point when it is used; to insult, to denigrate. Just as I may call my friend an idiot, yet mean no true harm nor reveal my burning hatred of idiots, someone may call their friend or something gay yet be doing so “playfully”, as you put it. Problem is, being an idiot is a bad thing to me, and likely to my friend, and that’s why I use it. Just because i’m not using it as a selected, choice insult doesn’t mean that I don’t think idiocy is a bad thing. Likewise, a person using gay as an insult doesn’t make them evil homophobes, but it does mean they think that “gay” is an insult - it’s something bad. And beyond that, simply because the young are more accepting does not mean therefore that they are at the correct accepting level. I mean, I imagine you could say that middle-aged people are more accepting of homosexuality than older people, and by that logic they are the ones who shouldn’t change. And so on backwards. “Better” doesn’t mean “best”.
But you’re right to say that the speech of young people won’t be changed by complaints and the like.
Reference that the use of Gay to mean Homosexuals was originally used in an abusive way by hetrosexuals just doesn’t add up to me.
A gay ex workmate told me many years ago that when homosexuality was a lot more vilified by society in general then it is today it was a code word used by closet homosexuals to check out if a certain person was of the same sexual orientation as them in much the same way as Free Masons recognise each other covertly by their handshake.
So they themselves hijacked the word and can’t really complain that the kids have changed the “In” meaning of the word yet again as so many other people upthread have already said.
OK. You’re obviously saying that gay meant homosexual, context-neutral, before it was an all-purpose slur.
But then you say that “they themselves hijacked the word.” So you’re making the same accusation as billfish, but in the exact opposite direction. In other words, you disagree with him that gays co-opted the homosexual meaning; instead you’re saying they co-opted the happy/carefree meaning of the word and replaced it with the homosexual meaning.
As long as I’m with you so far, could you just tell me one thing? Doesn’t it mean anything at all that the new “in” meaning can be directly traced to homophobia? Isn’t it a bit of a misdirection to claim that the complaint is about the word having a new meaning, rather than the fact that the new meaning is directly abusive of the people described by the old meaning?
In other words, you don’t really believe, do you, that calling somebody “gay” for acting a certain way has its roots in a different tradition than the one of associating certain negative qualities with homosexuals? If you do, could you please tell us how you believe that distinction arose?
Besides, it’s not like all gay people got together and hijacked the word in a conscious effort. If homosexuals used the word “gay” and it came to mean something bad, how is that their fault? I still blame the bigots.
Lesbian means a homosexual woman. Is referring to a woman you want to denigrate as a “lesbo” a good thing? And if it’s an insult, then should we blame gay women for calling themselves lesbians to begin with?
Exactly. Who cares if homosexuals hijacked the meaning of the word “gay” from “happy” to “homosexual”? No one is complaining about a word simply being hijacked.
What isn’t acceptable is using a word used to describe a class of people to describe negative behavior. That is vastly different from just changing the meaning of a word. It has the effect of re-enforcing a negative view of the class of people whether that is the intent of the person using the word or not. The utility of using the word “gay” to describe stupidity or lameness is undermined by the negative public perception of homosexuals that it produces. People who do not want to spread homophobia should stop using it.
No, I don’t think they would. And that’s the fundamental point of the argument here- “gay” does not automatically equate to “homosexual”.
You can’t co-opt a word to describe your minority then get annoyed when another group co-opts the same word to mean something you don’t like.
And, for the record, I’m all in favour of gay marriage. I don’t hate gay people, but I will say that “telling people how to think” isn’t going to win them many supporters, IMHO.
But not all gay people are the same person, and I imagine it wasn’t particularly anything as simple as an actual choice to co-opt for most people.
I didn’t co-opt the word, for example. It has meant homosexual since before I was born; it stopped meaning happy and lighthearted and so forth for the vast majority again before I was born. Why should I be limited in my behaviour and views based on the actions of people whose only connection to me is that they are, loosely, within the same group as me many years ago? I didn’t co-opt the word. There is no gay governing body that decides these things. So why on Earth do you feel that I, personally, hold responsibility for the actions of other people on whom I have no influence?