Re: The New Political Incorrectness
blurbees
> The New Political Incorrectness
>
> I submit to you that people who have lately announced that they are
> "not PC" are with rare exception a bunch of fucking assholes.
LOL
it's especially funny on second read in context with the rest of your
piece.
> It is
> understandable that many will balk at using awkward terms, such as
> "vertically challenged" for "short," when we introduce the concept of
> politically sensitive speech.
perhaps we ought to come up with a politcially correct term for:
"people who have lately announced that
they are 'not PC' [but whom] are with rare
exception a bunch of fucking assholes"
let's see, we could call them:
socially challenged hate-embracers
or perhaps:
differently abled feeling hurters
nah.
i think your label is far more politically correct.
so we'll skip that part.
> But this new form of political
> incorrectness has nothing to do with eschewing euphemisms and
> preserving the richness of the language; it is simply a vehicle with
> which to express ugly hatreds and bigotry.
maybe they should be issued a great big box of crayolas and some
coloring books so that they can rediscover their inner humanity?
of course, someone would need to review the drawings periodically to
make sure that the coloring book therapy hadn't gone astray and made
matters worse somehow.
> If you call them on it, the
> new not-PC types will tell you that you have your "panties in a bunch"
probably while imagining same.
> or some such nonsense for daring to suggest that perhaps they might
> think twice about using racist slurs and homophobic phrases.
think twice, cut once.
no wait...
that doesn't really work too well.
let me try that again:
think twice, spare someone's feelings forever.
much better.
> Announcing that they belong to the Not PC club apparently gives these
> folks a license to try to be as offensive as possible.
apparently because they actually think it takes some sort of skill.
bzzzt.
wrong.
being offensive is like one of the easiest things imaginable.
offensive is easy, helpful is hard.
not to say that being offensive can't be artfully done:
Bon Appetite!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDlSlwqNcmY
it all depends on the spirit behind it.
like this, at first, would probably be offensive to many many people:
don't grumble
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCWw6W5NEa8
but when one considers the spirit behind it, one can't help but be non-
offended because it's actually quite sublime and reverent.
so again, in most cases, being offensive doesn't take ANY skill at
all.
it's just the lazy resort of assholes, like you implied.
but being offensive CAN be artfully done without actually meaning to
offend anyone.
> If there is any
> doubt, tell them that they have hurt you and watch the reaction.
better yet, video tape their reaction and show it to them.
put them in the Alex chair and play the ninth, full blast!
> It's ironic that "not PC" has itself become a euphemism for
> "fucking rude."
brilliant!
> Why not simply call yourselves that?
the sadistically hypocritical ALWAYS look for the easy loopholes.
> What are you afraid of?
perhaps they fear themselves.
> Hmmmm?
you're such a good accentuator.
...
beautiful piece, Paula!
packs a whallop.
encore, encore!
...
Sincerely,
Mr. B$ Blurbees
http://bickerfest.blogspot.com
(where a good argument is worth its weight in B$)
Jennyjinx
hide their inner hater and so they break free by announcing "I'm too
cool to be PC!" To which we all must stand and applaud while removing
our own PC mantel. And being rude is sooo in. Are you just an old
biddy with thin skin who can't handle it? HUH?
I would add to your submission that people who declare themselves to
be free from the chains of PCness will most assuredly bawl like a
fucking baby if their own hot buttons are pushed. They will rant and
rave and wonder "WHY ME?" Of course, the PCness that they refuse to
accept anymore isn't really PCness, is it? In reality they're thumbing
their noses at common decency and tolerance. The fun is in the
bigotry. Everyone jump on the bus! Otherwise, you suck and should be
mocked.
Unless you mention that this chick's eyes look funny, or that guy's
religion sucks, then you're the asshole bigot for ignoring their
sensitive feelings regarding [fill in the blank]. Then you should also
be mocked.
Can I just mention one funny observation? Someone offends someone else
and then promptly says "Oh, lighten up! I was just funnin'" Then
carries on and on and on about why their feelings are hurt that
someone number two just didn't get their joke, how SO #2 is so PC and
the original someone just isn't. Someone #1 doesn't get offended EVAR-
unless someone else doesn't get their lame attempt at a joke aimed at
[fill in the blank]. Then they cry for weeks, while defending their
non-hurt feelings.
I love it.
P.S.
I'm an over-medicated friend of Paula's. Hope you don't mind me just
jumping in with a bunch of whatever. I kind of get on my soap box
sometimes.
On Jul 30, 4:57 pm, Ultraviolet <paula.li...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The New Political Incorrectness
>
> I submit to you that people who have lately announced that they are
> "not PC" are with rare exception a bunch of fucking assholes. It is
> understandable that many will balk at using awkward terms, such as
> "vertically challenged" for "short," when we introduce the concept of
> politically sensitive speech. But this new form of political
> incorrectness has nothing to do with eschewing euphemisms and
> preserving the richness of the language; it is simply a vehicle with
> which to express ugly hatreds and bigotry. If you call them on it, the
> new not-PC types will tell you that you have your "panties in a bunch"
> or some such nonsense for daring to suggest that perhaps they might
> think twice about using racist slurs and homophobic phrases.
> Announcing that they belong to the Not PC club apparently gives these
> folks a license to try to be as offensive as possible. If there is any
> doubt, tell them that they have hurt you and watch the reaction.
>
> It's ironic that "not PC" has itself become a euphemism for "fucking
> rude." Why not simply call yourselves that? What are you afraid of?
> Hmmmm?
aj
Jennyjinx's post and would mostly be nodding my head along with her.
Here are my own musings on the matter.
There is no question that certain words offend, or that they are
intended to offend. There is also no question that words evolve and
change meaning over time. Some people think it's a good idea to take
the "bad" words and make them so common they lose their edge of hate.
"They're just words," they say. But the words also fall into different
groups. There are what I will call the potty words, and then there are
words that label groups of people.
Within my lifetime I have observed the potty words that people were
careful not to say around children, most women, and those they felt
might be offended by them, become every day words that come out of the
mouths of five and six year olds. When I was growing up, I rarely
heard that language even in school. It was not common to speak that
way among your peers unless you belonged to the group of kids who
regularly got into trouble and were often suspended from school. Even
now, though I have become freer in writing out certain words, I still
sometimes cringe to hear them spoken and cannot bring myself to speak
them except under extreme circumstances, such as climax and fury.
It has been argued that there is nothing wrong with such words,
provided they be used as they should be used, under circumstances that
give them the power that they can have. If you smash your finger when
using a hammer, who's going to fault you for crying out, "Oh, shit!"
"Dadgummit!" just doesn't carry the same weight under the
circumstances. But if you say shit this and shit that with every other
sentence, well, that's just language abuse. People say, show some
creativity, or why do you want to sound like you live in a gutter, or
other such comments.
The argument back is, it's just a word. What's the difference between
saying that and poop, which some people will use instead. My
replacement word is crap, and I say it with some frequency when I find
myself frustrated, but I have to ask as well, what's the difference?
Why am I saying crap? Just so that I don't say shit? But they mean the
very same thing. That's just stupid. Of course, I've known people to
not like the word crap, too, but they're of an older generation. And
crap is so much a part of my vocabulary, I don't think that I could
stop saying it if I knew it offended someone I was around, though I
would certainly try.
Should we stop using certain words when we know they offend people? Or
should we overuse them, push their evolution, so that they lose the
offensiveness? In a sense, help people get over their phobias about
them? Cause them to become just another word? Because that is what
some people believe we should do.
In 1997 (I think, may have been '98. Long time ago, anyway), a friend
of mine got into a serious argument with the "good" folks of a
newsgroup. One of those folks did something very hateful and ugly
toward this friend. He responded in fury and called her a cunt. Now
this is someone who, if I've understood his arguments in the past,
thinks a bit like that last argument I mentioned and thinks we should
get over our phobias; however, he did not use such words with such
frequency that they lost all power when he used them, and he never
used this word. Well, back then, there was a collective gasp of shock
and the group as a whole condemned the guy and stood up for the woman,
never mind that what she did was horrible and he had complete
justification in his anger. Oh, my, no. What he did was worse. He
called her a terrible name. A name that defamed women.
That same word can be used today in that same group fairly regularly,
and while there are people who don't like it, they tolerate it. There
is no hue and cry over it. It's just a word. We don't say it in the
workplace, but among this rowdy lot, big deal.
????
Okay, so I've been talking about potty words so far, though I've
recently read someone argue cunt actually belongs in the second group
of labeling a group of people whose identity is somehow tied in with
the word, but if that's the case then the word dick would have to come
under the same argument, but I don't think people have the same
problem with that as they do cunt. Why is that? In my opinion, all
words that have to do with body functions or organs that we consider
private can remain under the potty word group, and as such should
simply be taken on a case by case basis. If you're using them to
insult and hurt someone, then the person being insulted has every
right to be angry. If you're just using them because you smashed your
finger or you're with your peeps and they don't mind, well, what's the
big deal? But as in everything, I do think that there is a time and
place for such words. Even though I may be a bit of a prude about
them, I'm not going to allow the use of those words to stop me from
developing a relationship with someone who is otherwise someone I find
quite delightful.
The second group of words are identity words based on race, religion
or sexual preference, words meant as slurs against groups of people.
What I then find strange is how those races, religions, etc. take on
those words with a kind of defiant pride and can call each other those
things, but it's not okay for anyone else to. Of course, the
likelihood of others outside of the group using the word in any
complimentary fashion is slim, but still. And yet, that's exactly what
our younger generation has done. It is not uncommon for them to be
calling each other by racially ugly terms as friendly words. Like
women calling each other bitch and ho', which I just cannot get into,
I'm sorry, not as an endearment, though I can do it as a tease, though
it's rare. And it's a crosscultural thing. My oldest son, for example,
has a whole host of friends from a wide variety of backgrounds,
cultures and races, and they purposely call each other stereotypically
ugly things AND THEY'RE OKAY WITH IT. Personally, I'm thinking, how
can you be okay with that? That's just ugly. But they're like, what
ugly? They've become like nicknames or something. And these are people
who would put themselves in danger for each other, yet they can do
this. So then I think, maybe I'm just old. Maybe our young people get
it and they'll save us from this crap, finally. I honestly don't know
what to think, I only know what I feel, and my feeling is it's ugly,
it still hurts people, don't do it.
And then there's this word gay. It's been around for quite awhile,
apparently, as a word synonymous with homosexual. To call someone gay,
though, isn't a slur, it's just describing their sexual orientation.
Gays don't mind being called gay. What many do mind, though, is this
current evolution of the term as meaning something's stupid. "That's
so gay." What I found hilarious in a sad kind of way, was that when
arguing against people using the term that way, they kept using the
word lame as the alternative. Hello? Isn't that the same thing?
Couldn't all those who are lame become offended? And another friend of
mine gets upset when people use the word retarded because of all those
who are truly retarded. By equating retarded and gay with negative
meaning, in this case lame or stupid, groups of people whose
identities are caught up in those terms are being denigrated.
Okay, so we have those who are truly hurt by these terms, and then we
have those who say, get over it already, or even, people from those
groups who say, you've got to be kidding, what's the problem? The
words are evolving. When people use those words, the intent behind
them is not denigrating, the meaning has simply changed. "But don't
you see?" the first group argue back. You are perpetuating the
negative connotation of the word, thereby equating that negative
meaning with us.
And round and round they go. "If you truly cared," or "If you don't
want to appear homophobic, why do you use those words when you know,
because you've been told, that they offend?"
Then I begin to think of how we so easily think, "If you cared about
me, you wouldn't do that," whatever "that" might be, and you become
caught up in a world of expectations.
I don't like to hurt people, so if I know a word is considered
offensive to or among the company I'm keeping, I won't use it. It's so
ingrained in me, it's really not a problem any way. I can't think of a
situation where I would even be tempted to use an iffy word. But I
also think that sometimes people are just too sensitive, and that
their sensitivity drives us to become nannies about language. I don't
want to be a nanny. I won't bother you about your language unless
you're clearly being hateful.
There is something that does bug me, though, that doesn't really have
to do with known hateful words, but with the possibility of using some
terms ignorantly. I wonder things like, should I say "the black woman
up at the desk" when someone asks "which woman". I wonder if I'm
somehow doing wrong to single her out by her skin color that way, but
that's the easiest way to differentiate her from the other women
standing at the desk. I wouldn't be offended to know that if I were in
the midst of a group of black women I were described as the white
woman to point me out. Yes, I know this is very silly. I know it. But
these are the kinds of stupid thoughts that go through my head simply
because I am so sensitive to how what I may say might be the wrong
thing to say. Because of my heightened sensibilities to such issues, I
truly wonder about these things sometimes. As I said elsewhere, am I
to be castigated because I didn't get the memo that Oriental is
offensive and Asian is not?
The power of words. Maybe we should all just shut up and live in
silence for awhile.
-----
aj
banterboy
> On Jul 31, 7:23 pm, aj <arlee...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > Should we stop using certain words when we know they offend people? Or
> > should we overuse them, push their evolution, so that they lose the
> > offensiveness? In a sense, help people get over their phobias about
> > them? Cause them to become just another word? Because that is what
> > some people believe we should do.
>
> words online when I know they offend people because I don't believe
> that they HURT people. Some people just don't like 'em. Fine. They can
> choose not to read my writing. In meatspace I will alter my language
> depending on the situation and people's preferences. The racial slurs
> and gay-bashing are different. Those words can and do hurt people, and
> not just the "target" either. I think people should stop using them. I
> respect those who take others to task for spewing these disparaging
> terms, though I don't usually do it myself, mostly because it doesn't
> seem to accomplish anything. As I said before, the kind of people who
> use these terms WANT to be offensive and hurt others. They enjoy it.
>
> [...]
>
> > What I then find strange is how those races, religions, etc. take on
> > those words with a kind of defiant pride and can call each other those
> > things, but it's not okay for anyone else to.
>
> believe it helps anything.
>
> [...]
>
> > Gays don't mind being called gay. What many do mind, though, is this
> > current evolution of the term as meaning something's stupid. "That's
> > so gay." What I found hilarious in a sad kind of way, was that when
> > arguing against people using the term that way, they kept using the
> > word lame as the alternative. Hello? Isn't that the same thing?
> > Couldn't all those who are lame become offended?
>
> and violence against the handicapped as there has been against gays.
> That said, I try not to use "lame" either. Why not just say "stupid?"
>
> [...]
>
> > Because of my heightened sensibilities to such issues, I
> > truly wonder about these things sometimes. As I said elsewhere, am I
> > to be castigated because I didn't get the memo that Oriental is
> > offensive and Asian is not?
>
> correct? Even if you don't understand why? That's what I do. I don't
> really get the Asian/Oriental thing. But I don't have to get it -- I
> know that they prefer "Asian," so that is what I will use. Some people
> don't know that "gypped" came from Gypsy. The test is will they stop
> once they find out, or will they stubbornly insist on using the term
> anyway? If they stop, then they show they care about not hurting
> others. If they continue, they're jerks. I don't think there's a lot
> of nuance here.
>
> --http://paula-light.blogspot.com
stapler! stapler!
i need a stapler!
you people are sucking me into the bickerfest!
shit, with all of these interesting arguments going on, i'll never be
able to finish launching this bickerfest project.
discipline, $Zero, discipline.
...
banterboy
banterboy
> On Jul 31, 7:23 pm, aj <arlee...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > should we overuse them, push their evolution, so that they lose the
> > offensiveness? In a sense, help people get over their phobias about
> > them? Cause them to become just another word? Because that is what
> > some people believe we should do.
>
flip flopper!
Jennyjinx
> Within my lifetime I have observed the potty words that people were
> careful not to say around children, most women, and those they felt
> might be offended by them, become every day words that come out of the
> mouths of five and six year olds. When I was growing up, I rarely
> heard that language even in school. It was not common to speak that
> way among your peers unless you belonged to the group of kids who
> regularly got into trouble and were often suspended from school. Even
> now, though I have become freer in writing out certain words, I still
> sometimes cringe to hear them spoken and cannot bring myself to speak
> them except under extreme circumstances, such as climax and fury.
You know you're getting old when you can remember when "ass" wasn't
allowed to be muttered on public airwaves. And now I hear "bitch" used
all the time. Not long ago there would have been uproars like the one
over Janet's boob shot because of the word. Now...eh.
> Should we stop using certain words when we know they offend people?
Yes. But "certain words" is the key phrase. "Bitch" offends a lot of
people. But there are many very useful ways to use that one word. When
I say I'm being "bitchy" I mean snarly, grouchy, and that I do a lot
of growling (it's true!) so it fits me sometimes. "Nigger" is not a
word that has any useful connotations. "Gay = lame" is not useful
because what that says is that anything that can remotely be
attributed to the gay community is "lame" (regardless of what certain
people would argue).
Or
> should we overuse them, push their evolution, so that they lose the
> offensiveness? In a sense, help people get over their phobias about
> them? Cause them to become just another word? Because that is what
> some people believe we should do.
In the cases of "four letter" words, I think it's possible that their
overuse will negate their shock value and make them "just more
words".
> And yet, that's exactly what
> our younger generation has done. It is not uncommon for them to be
> calling each other by racially ugly terms as friendly words. Like
> women calling each other bitch and ho', which I just cannot get into,
> I'm sorry, not as an endearment, though I can do it as a tease, though
> it's rare. And it's a crosscultural thing. My oldest son, for example,
> has a whole host of friends from a wide variety of backgrounds,
> cultures and races, and they purposely call each other stereotypically
> ugly things AND THEY'RE OKAY WITH IT. Personally, I'm thinking, how
> can you be okay with that? That's just ugly. But they're like, what
> ugly? They've become like nicknames or something. And these are people
> who would put themselves in danger for each other, yet they can do
> this. So then I think, maybe I'm just old. Maybe our young people get
> it and they'll save us from this crap, finally. I honestly don't know
> what to think, I only know what I feel, and my feeling is it's ugly,
> it still hurts people, don't do it.
I had a discussion on my blog about this a couple of months back. I
personally don't believe that it's possible to take back the power of
a word when it's still controlled by bigots. Because when you use the
slur among your peers as terms of endearment, that gives license to
the bigots to continue using it. They say "But they call themselves
that!", disregarding the differences of meaning between the two
instances. A racist/homophobe will find any reason to denigrate a
particular group and that group's usage of the slur against them is
oftentimes all the fuel they need.
> Okay, so we have those who are truly hurt by these terms, and then we
> have those who say, get over it already, or even, people from those
> groups who say, you've got to be kidding, what's the problem? The
> words are evolving. When people use those words, the intent behind
> them is not denigrating, the meaning has simply changed. "But don't
> you see?" the first group argue back. You are perpetuating the
> negative connotation of the word, thereby equating that negative
> meaning with us.
>
As I said elsewhere, am I
> to be castigated because I didn't get the memo that Oriental is
> offensive and Asian is not?
It was explained to me that "Oriental" refers to objects and "Asian"
refers to people. Similar to "Scotch vs. Scottish/Scots".
> The power of words. Maybe we should all just shut up and live in
> silence for awhile.
>
> -----
> aj
>
> On Jul 31, 5:46 pm, Jennyjinx <grat...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Not being PC is the new PC. People are sick and tired of having to
> > hide their inner hater and so they break
>
> ...
>
> read more ยป