Well, to be fair to the person I corrected, she was a person of color herself (I believe she said she was biracial). And from the content of her post, I could tell she was an older person. I am able to put myself in her shoes as someone who is rapidly approaching the “woman of a certain age” category. She probably thought–like many internet denizens do–that I was 1) white, 2) young, and 3) an obnoxious SJW, so how dare I lecture her on the terminology she’s been using for centuries? I probably will be her one day. A lot of us probably will be her.
To her credit, she eventually thanked me for schooling her once other commenters cosigned what I was saying.
I tried to respond with the same thing last night, and I couldn’t put my finger on how to express it so I gave up. I was going to say that the problem with “Ann is a Jew”, much like with “Ann is a gay” or “Ann is a black” is that the leading article makes the statement sound…reductive …like you are reducing the persons identity down to one aspect.
I also think that this kind of analysis plays into the right-wing accusations of political correctness, in that it sounds intellectualized. I can hear it now - “I’m supposed to analyze every sentence I speak to make sure the sentence structure doesn’t insult someone?”
But the truth is I worked it backwards. It’s obvious to me that “Ann is a Jew” or “Ann is a gay” sounds vaguely insulting and contextually, it’s usually used to associate someone with a stereotype. It was only when I went back and looked at it that I figured out why.
I’m really not the best person to say, iiandyiiii. I’m less concerned about political correctness specifically and more that progressives aren’t listening to what ordinary people are saying. I’m working on a list, but you could try looking at some of the examples already given or ask people on other forums or in real life.
Any (trivial) cost is borne by the manufacturer. As for “user impact” and “confusion”, I don’t buy that there’s any beyond the most trivial. Things change all the time. This is just another small reason why sometimes things change.
I have asked. So far the examples seem either on the extremes (i.e. not supported by the vast majority of progressives and social justice advocates) or totally trivial in nature. I’m waiting for something to reasonably cause worry. Maybe it’s just tone, like I suggested.
Here’s an example. I wouldn’t have called anything ‘ethnic’ because that’s not really a thing in the UK, but I didn’t know what the (politically) correct term for afro-textured hair was. So maybe I would try and guess a descriptor, or risk using a name that might get me frowned on, or maybe I would avoid discussing it at all.
This is a particularly trivial example, true. But I feel like this kind of worrying about offending people adds up and makes me act less natural and comfortable around whatever minorities are the subject of it. And I don’t like that, and I think it’s the opposite of a good outcome. You can tell me I shouldn’t feel this way, but I do, and I know other people do too.
We (all of us) are hopefully making our society better, fairer, and more just. This includes being more thoughtful with language when it comes to our neighbors who have different backgrounds than we do, especially those neighbors who are members of historically oppressed/discriminated groups. There’s no perfect approach and tone that’s going to hit all the exact right notes and make no one feel a bit awkward about the language they use sometimes. So occasionally you might feel a bit uncertain and awkward. It’s okay. It’s not going to kill you, or even hurt you. Most progressives and social justice advocates will be kind and decent to those who genuinely want to learn and be more thoughtful. It’s okay to ask. And if you’re afraid to ask, then maybe you’re not up to this kind of discussion. And maybe very occasionally you’ll happen to ask an asshole, or make a mistake in front of someone who had a bad day, and you’ll get a very minor sharp lesson, or even someone will be a total jerk. That’s also survivable – it happens sometimes. But feel free to call out jerks for jerkish behavior, and the vast majority of us will agree with you.
This is not even remotely a fraction of 1% of the most minor-league discrimination faced everyday by thousands or millions of black folks, or gay folks, or trans folks, or women, etc. If this is really a significant concern for you, then maybe you’re not up for difficult discussions about the experiences of others in the world. I’ll note that this is probably very true for most Trump supporters, and many others. Many or most white folks, at least in America, really don’t know how to handle discussions about the experiences of non-white people in America.
I think if you were in a conversation with me about kinky hair, I would be OK with any descriptor besides those that are used as insults. Like “nappy”. That term is loaded and I try to avoid it unless I know the person I’m talking too very well (and vice versa). But tightly coiled, wiry, kinky, et al. are all fine. “Afro-textured” would be the term I would use if I were giving a professional lecture about black hair.
I was listening to NPR one day and they did a segment on black hair salons and natural hair. A black stylist was interviewed and she said something like, “We choose to refer to our natural hair texture as ‘circle hair’ because we have circular follicles.” I raised my eyebrows at that. I have never heard anyone use that terminology before. Google confirmed that it has very low traction. I pictured a bunch of woke white people referring to black hair as “circle hair” after hearing that interview, with all the black people looking at them confused.
Not necessarily trivial: documentation, testing, etc. all impacted. And where do you think those costs wind up?
Change for no benefit isn’t “free”. And again, who gets to decide what’s an offense? I asked before: If I’m offended by the capital letter P, do they have to rename it again?
There has to be some plausible argument here, or it’s chaos.
I work in a regulated industry. There are standards that get changed all the time.
Every few years we have to change templates, languages, warnings, etc. It is usually not required to go back and change everything old, just switch over to the new requirements going forward. I would not expect a company to take on a project to purge all their documentation to match new language guidelines. But there would be almost no cost increase to change the word “master” to “parent” on the next revision as we change Class IIIB to Class 3b.
For the OP, why is the only a problem for progressives? Why is conservative language/idea policing not a problem? In many ways it is much worse. It is much more common to hear about someone getting publicly chastised for saying “Happy Holidays” than “Merry Christmas”. The (formerly Dixie) Chicks got shut down a lot harder than anyone I know of for using archaic language frowned on by the left. Heck, it looks like Louis CK is recovering faster from long term sexual harassment then they did for daring to criticize the Iraq war.
The conservative version is also, in my opinion, more often “virtue signalling” and in bad faith. Conservative pundits routinely called criticism of GWB treason, while criticism of Clinton or Obama was patriotic. Flag pins, the war on Christmas, etc. all seem to be either just showing “we” are better than “them” or defending the cultural racial power structure.
I get that. But you should realize that a lot of minorities are made uncomfortable and unnatural by social pressures on them every day, and figure out how to navigate a world full of minor hostilities against them (what would be a good term for these microscopic aggressions? someone come up with one).
The solution isn’t to silence those conversations that make white people uncomfortable. The solution is for white people to be okay with being uncomfortable, to know that they’ll mess up sometimes, and to try anyway.
I just learned that “nappy” is not an okay description of hair, but “kinky” is. Okay, cool. I can’t remember the last time I described anyone’s hair texture, so it’s not a big deal in my life; but if I’d innocently referred to someone’s hair as “nappy,” and they’d been offended, I hope I’d apologize and ask what description they preferred.
Back in the nineties, when I was first starting to learn about build-your-own PCs (not that I know much, I’m very much the amateur who builds one every seven years or so), I encountered the “master” and “slave” drive. I vaguely recognized that that was kind of fucked up, even back then. The change away from this terminology is long overdue.
What’s the benefit? The benefit is that people whose ancestors were enslaved don’t have to work with this grotesque terminology, don’t have to metaphorically re-enact family atrocities.
Most of the conversation I’ve seen around this issue has been around getting rid of the master/slave relationship in hardware/software. There’s comparatively little conversation about getting rid of “master” by itself, although some folks have advocated for it.
In any case, I don’t see the conversation as a problem at all. Names cahnge all the time; standards chagne all the time. The benefit of some changes is that it makes some people feel better, and falls under the category of linguistic kindness. That’s a fine goal by itself.
The whole “BUT WHAT IF I’M OFFENDED BY THE LETTER P” silliness is pretty self-explanatory, but for the kids who are having trouble keeping up: you’re not offended by the letter p.
No.
No you’re not.
Stop it.
That’s the point: in order to come up with a silly analogy, you have to come up with one that’s not true.
Exactly, non-white, non-male, non-straight, non-able, etc., people spend their entire lives dealing with the uncomfortability of living in a cis-straight-white-able-male society and having to temper our every word and deed taking cis-straight-able-white-men’s comfort in mind. It is a matter of life and death to do so. That the majority cannot tolerate the discomfort of even considering what might be making minorities uncomfortable is ironic.
But master/slave for drives is descriptive, not normative. There’s no relation to actual slavery. That makes no sense.
As for making up the example: sure, I made that up. The idea Master Password relating to actual slavery is equally implausible. Might as well complain about “niggardly”. Or boycott Master Locks. Meaning matters, not orders of letters.
Here’s another, more real-world example: my sister saw a reference to ganged switches and thought it was some sort of gang-bang reference. It’s not, and once she understood that, she was OK; if she decided to be offended by it in the meantime, does that mean it should change?
Or what about fetlife folks: they see master/slave as a positive relationship in their context. Does that mean it “should” change?
Of course language evolves. But it tends to do so naturally, for reasons relating to meaning or actual usage. Worrying about things like Master Password is artificial and actually removes significance from fixing usages that DO matter.