# tomndebb
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961
**Category:** About This Message Board
**Created:** [August 11, 2010, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961 "2010-08-11T18:25:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2010, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961/1 "2010-08-11T18:25:28Z")
I object to your participating in a hijack in a silly GD thread with your silly opinion, qualifying the hijack as a serious derailing and then ordering the termination of the hijack resulting in your opinion as the final word.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/80):
>
> **TWEEEET!**
>
> While the classist (not racist) term “hillbilly” was not a particularly appropriate choice of terms for this forum, the hijack over whether it should be permitted is seriously derailing this thread.
>
> That topic is closed in this thread.
> \*\*
> [/Moderating]\*\*
Regardless of the merits of your contrary opinion on whether the term “hillbilly” is classist or racist, the following post is definitely offensive to a group of people with replete with modifying negative stereotypes.
> [@](#):
>
> None of her hillbilly brood are ever going to be on the public dole.
Since I reported that post and one other suggesting hillbillies can’t read for which **Marley23** thought funny enough so as not to merit censure, and you don’t either, forgive me for wondering why you are so protective of Japanese-American sensitivities but willing to go full bore on demeaning residents of the hills of Appalachia.
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### Author:  [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2010, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961/2 "2010-08-11T18:47:54Z")
> [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](#):
>
> I object to your participating in a hijack in a silly GD thread with your silly opinion, qualifying the hijack as a serious derailing and then ordering the termination of the hijack resulting in your opinion as the final word.
He did right, I would have done the same. In fact I told you specifically (by private message) that if that hijack continued, I was going to shut it down. A poster used the word “hillbilly,” you objected, a few other people made jokes about it and you continued to object. Everybody was then told to knock it off. You had a chance to register your opinion and you did so. There was no reason to let a dispute over the h-word drag that thread off track.
EDIT: In fact **tomndebb** comes pretty close to agreeing with your contention that it is offensive, since he said it was not a good choice of terms in Great Debates. So I don’t know why you’re complaining.
> [@](#):
>
> Regardless of the merits of your contrary opinion on whether the term “hillbilly” is classist or racist
There is no dispute to be had over this. Not by anyone who knows what a hillbilly is, anyway. It is not a racist term because it does not refer to people of any race specifically. [It refers to people from a particular region](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillbilly) and it’s associated with stereotypes of poverty and ignorance. It doesn’t refer to all white people. If you find it obnoxious I won’t argue against you, but it is not related to race. And I think the last time “Jap” came up in Great Debates, we handled it the same way: by telling people to stop it and not warning them. So we treated the words equivalently even though I don’t think they are equally offensive.
> [@](#):
>
> Hillbilly is a term referring to people who dwell in rural, mountainous areas of the United States, primarily Appalachia.
I’ve never heard of any white people from a major city or a suburb called a hillbilly.
> [@](#):
>
> the following post is definitely offensive to a group of people with replete with modifying negative stereotypes.
It looks like you’re positing that hillbilly is equivalent to Jap, which is ridiculous. It’s connected to some mean stereotypes, I agree, but it doesn’t merit moderation for hate speech or anything of that type. It was used in that debate as an insult directed at some specific people. Not a race, a class, or anything else.
> [@](#):
>
> Since I reported that post and one other suggesting hillbillies can’t read for which **Marley23** thought funny enough so as not to merit censure
I did not say it was funny. I said **Jack Batty** ’s post was a joke, which it obviously was. He was poking fun at you for taking umbrage at the use of the word hillbilly. Here is the entire hijack, starting with just the relevant quote from **The Second Stone** ’s post:
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/70):
>
> None of her hillbilly brood are ever going to be on the public dole.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/73):
>
> From [wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillbilly)
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > Due to its strongly stereotypical connotations, the term is frequently considered derogatory, and so is usually offensive to those Americans of Appalachian heritage
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/74):
>
> You should write a letter to the producers of the “Beverly Hillbillies.”
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/75):
>
> Don’t worry, no one from Appalachia can read worth a shit anyway.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/76):
>
> > [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/74):
> >
> > You should write a letter to the producers of the “Beverly Hillbillies.”
>
> Why don’t you ? And you might as well write to all those American newspapers for their offensive language towards the Japanese in WWII.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/77):
>
> You must have mistaken me for somebody who gives a shit about either word.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/78):
>
> The proper term is Hill-Williams.
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/79):
>
> Allow me to introduce Mr. William-Joseph Robert…
> [@Why did Sarah Palin resign as Alaska's governor?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-sarah-palin-resign-as-alaskas-governor/549736/80):
>
> **TWEEEET!**
>
> While the classist (not racist) term “hillbilly” was not a particularly appropriate choice of terms for this forum, the hijack over whether it should be permitted is seriously derailing this thread.
>
> That topic is closed in this thread.
> \*\*
> [/Moderating]\*\*
---
### Author:  [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2010, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961/3 "2010-08-12T04:45:49Z")
Since the, um, “side topic” was declared closed in that thread, I felt it inappropriate to mention there that the football team at my mother’s old high school in Ozark, Arkansas, named, appropriately enough, Ozark High School, is the Ozark Hillbillies. So I’ll throw it in here. The town promotes a strong hillbilly theme, too, for tourists. I come from a long line of “hillbillies” on my mother’s side, my mother’s mother being the first one to come down from the Ozarks and live in a town. I admit it can be used derogatorily though, but unlike some epithets this one largely depends on the intent of the user. The residents of Ozark to this day proudly proclaim themselves “hillbillies.”
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### Author:  [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2010, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomndebb/549961/4 "2010-08-12T18:57:38Z")
I am not quite sure what your objection actually is. I am not “protecting” people from being called “Japs.” The question is whether the term is offensive and in the U.S. (from which this board originates) the word Jap is sufficiently offensive as to be noted as such in the definitions, (not the usage notes), of most U.S. collegiate dictionaries.
I did not make any claim that “hillbilly” was an acceptable term–rather the opposite–but my explicit Mod statement was that the hijack was now closed. My use of the word “hijack” and the phrase “in this thread” would, of course, indicate to an observant reader that the topic was not prohibited, but that it was a hijack that would no longer be permitted. I made no effort to prevent someone from opening a separate thread to discuss the topic.