My way or the highway doesn’t usually work so well. Especially when the community already voted and our vote lost.
Right now, his position is winning.
Toxic masculinity
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Yeah, I mean, this ends if the poll holds out, and we can stop arguing over this. And if the poll doesn’t hold out, I"m gone anyway, so either way, this’ll be over soon.
There are people who object to the term, but imo they can’t really object to it for the same reasons as Americans, because the word simply doesn’t mean the same thing here as it does in America. You can argue (as I think Wookie does) that it’s trivially sexist by virtue of being an occasionally derogatory term that refers to/descends from a term for female genitalia. But there are many terms, often far more reliably derogatory, that derive from terms for genitals. And it can be argued, as Germaine Greer once did, that the canonical position of ’ ■■■■ ’ as the worst of the worst represented its own form of misogyny (we’re told the word is the worst possible term, but what about innately violent terms like slit, gash and axe-wound? Greer argues these are objectively far worse and even by American standards it’s hard to argue, no?)
So yeah, there are people who object to it (10% sounds awfully high), but I don’t agree with them, as much about the implied theory of how words come to have meaning as about the strict sense of this particular word. Just not liking the word doesn’t really move me; plenty of people will tell you they’re absolutely repulsed by the phrase ‘moist panties’ (I think that might even predate the internet) but I’m not going to agree that using that phrase is morally transgressive.
If we agree that the word’s meaning is determined by its use, then the existence of a minority who deviate from that determined meaning doesn’t undermine that it is that meaning. It doesn’t mean everybody gets to assert their own, perfectly equally valid meaning — quite the reverse. If my private view of a term differs sharply from the publicly determined meaning, it’s so much the worse for my private view.
None of which is to suggest that I wouldn’t consider it very often rude and obnoxious to casually use the term around someone who found it objectionable. But the apt comparison here (imo and may not apply to all concerned posters) would be that I cheerfully agree not to use it and am then called on to agree that all other instances where I’ve used it have also been objectionable — to simply agree that the objector is universally correct. I’m just not going to do that. I don’t agree, that’s all.
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There’s a poll about locking this thread.
It was brought to my attention that some people by default don’t see new threads very easily because of their settings. Buried polls get missed as well. A little of both maybe?
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This fight has been going for months. Nobody is going to win. It’s just old grudges being brought up over and over and over and over and over and over again.
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I’m ambivalent. As a poster, I’m really against locking threads. Anyone can mute the thread anytime they want.
As far as both fidget’s and clovis’s points there, I think they both have merit, but the “engage in good faith” thing might only be possible if there’s a break and the underlying issues are approached differently.
Kind of like the Pirahã people who converted a missionary to atheism and messed up Chomsky’s language theory.
“According to Everett, the Pirahã have no concept of a supreme spirit or god,[9] and they lost interest in Jesus when they discovered that Everett had never seen him.”
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Douche is offensive to some in America. Its why you would not say it in public work settings. And its obviously rooted in sexism.
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Testing. ■■■■■
Why is it censored when it hasn’t been agreed upon?
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How did the poll go? Did that thread vanish or merge back here?
It’s really surprising that this whole controversy is happening. As the forum grows it will attract a wider range of users but this place was essentially formed by a fairly progressive bunch of folks. And here we are arguing about whether intent overrides harm in the use of a word.
this thread is one big example in nimby-ism. or do as I say.
Some people are offended by the word. That really ought to be enough.
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It does seem to be enough for a majority of them. They are just arguing with people who insist that their usage of it is sexist, regardless of the fact that it’s not sexist where they come from. This is basically the entire argument as far as I can tell.
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What are you talking about? We’re just waiting for the pole to close. There’s really no reason to keep talking about this once it does.
Like 12 people have repeatedly stated that they didn’t think using the word was evidence that the person was sexist. They stated over and over again that the intent of censoring the word is two-fold: to avoid unintentionally offending someone of the disadvantaged group; to avoid creating a situation where the moderators are forced to read the user of the words intent to determine the motive of their use of the word. I’m not aware of anyone who has taken the position that you are now. I’m sure some people’s thoughts are a bit more nuanced or slightly different flavor than the above but that’s probably >50% of the people’s view.
There are a few outliers like one person who stated that if a word offended anyone we should consider banning it but I don’t think there would be majority support for this as its a pretty problematic idea.
Hope you can put this strawman to rest because you keep saying it over and over but its simply not true. Sorry in advance if I’m misunderstanding what you are saying.
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You should instead apologize for confusing me and my strawman for somebody else.
I’m probably not the one who should apologize from this exchange.
u wot m8
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In case you missed it, Wookies viewpoint is an outlier here and jman doesn’t even say what you are claiming. Obviously neither camp in this discussion is a homogenous group with a single viewpoint and I state that pretty clearly. Why is that lost in the plot here? Do you really just want to argue for arguments sake?
Your earlier mention of outliers didn’t include people taking Wookie’s position and jman’s post is saying exactly what it appears to be saying.