Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

itcommunity.stanford.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

521–530 of 1001 posts

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#521

Post by lbwtaylor »

Macha wrote: post #431
crackercrews wrote: post #424

It is hard to choose which of these is silliest, but my vote goes to the replacement of "he" with [name] or "they", until you know the person's preferred pronouns. [1] The vast, vast majority of people who present as male wish to be referred to as "he". Many of them would be offended or confused if you used "they" as a term of reference. Many listeners would also be confused if you referred to a person who appears to…

This one seems fair to be honest, it's not just about those with non standard pronouns, but also women.

20 years ago, using they in this way would have really tweaked my ears, but I find myself using it in this way and hearing it in this way more and more, and I think it won't be long before we've forgotten how odd it used to feel.

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#522

Post by HideousKojima »

slavik81 wrote: post #324
School-Cotton wrote: post #60

“You guys” is the plural form of “you” for most speakers of colloquial American English, and is completely ungendered, in an empirical sense: if you observe native speakers speaking naturally and colloquially, you will find that everyone who uses it (regardless of gender) uses it consistently to address groups of multiple people (regardless of gender). It’s derived from the noun “guy”, which is indeed often gendered.…

> etymology doesn’t determine meaning. Otherwise we would have to conclude that “woman” is male-gendered because it etymologically derives from “man”. Man was not gendered when "woman" originated. In Old English, the words for men and women were "wer" and "wif", while "mann" described any person. Over time, wifmann became woman, and for whatever reason, wermann didn't end up becoming a word. Other examples of trouble…

Wer did survive in the word "werewolf" as well.

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#523

Post by arkh »

bloppe wrote: post #397

"Moron" was once considered a technical term for mental disability. Then, kids starting using it, and it became offensive. It was replaced by "mental retardation". We all know how that term evolved in kind. Many people now use "disabled" (including this list's suggestions), but that is now often seen replaced by "differently abled". If I were a betting man, I'd say that in 5 years even "differently abled" will be co-…

Or using N-word, C-word, R-word as insults.

I mean, this list already did a 180 on:

> Instead of African-American

> Consider using Black

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#524

Post by prvc »

kkoncevicius wrote: post #7

I read though the suggestions. So "trigger warning" is now problematic and the proper alternative is "content note". And "Preferred pronouns" is hate speech, because you imply that pronouns are merely a preference, as if the person can choose their identity. Godspeed.

>So "trigger warning" is now problematic and the proper alternative is "content note". And "Preferred pronouns" is hate speech, because you imply that pronouns are merely a preference, as if the person can choose their identity.

The woke shibboleth to discriminatory slur pipeline is real.

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#525

Post by skaushik92 »

mpalmer wrote: post #470

> "Indian Summer" - This term infers that Indigenous people are chronically late. I can find zero supporting evidence for this. Also it's "imply".

I was really confused by this as well because—as a Indian myself (from India)—I was under the impression that this was referencing the stereotype that Indians (from India) are chronically late.

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#527

Post by midasz »

richbell wrote: post #137

> Grandfather: This term has its roots in the "grandfather clause" adopted by Southern states to deny voting rights to Blacks. > Red team: "Red" is often used disparagingly to refer to Indigenous peoples, so its use in this context could be offensive to some groups. > Blackbox: Assigns negative connotations to the color black, racializing the term. > Brave (do not use): This term perpetuates the stereotype of the "no…

> Blackbox: Assigns negative connotations to the color black, racializing the term.

The way I think about something being 'blackbox' is neither positive or negative. It's just not knowing. Looking into a dark room and not seeing what mechanism is inside it, merely knowing there's a door with a key and something comes out of it when I open the door.

I think speech is important, but most of these seem generated by chatgpt.

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#529

Post by refurb »

jimbokun wrote: post #361
8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #25

Are humans no longer capable of recognizing context? How is "he mastered the material in the lecture" invoking centuries of internalized slavery and causing harm in the process?

I often suspect the person people coming up with these lists are white woke people, more so than the people groups supposedly offended by these terms.

I imagine it's mostly white woke people coming up with these lists. It's their attempt to "help", but at the same time reinforce their status.

Tangential to this topic, the New Yorker did an article on Clarance Thomas' views on race. He used to align with radical black nationalism before his views grew more conservative. It's a very interesting article.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/essay/clarence-thomass-rad...

These particular quotes stuck with me: "Thomas came to believe that, for the white liberal, offering help to black people was a way to express the combined privileges of race and class...The second way affirmative action continues white supremacy is by elevating whites to the status of benefactors, doling out scarce privileges to those black people they deem worthy...Put simply, Thomas believes that affirmative action is a white program for white people."

Re: Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

#530

Post by lbwtaylor »

crackercrews wrote: post #424

It is hard to choose which of these is silliest, but my vote goes to the replacement of "he" with [name] or "they", until you know the person's preferred pronouns. [1] The vast, vast majority of people who present as male wish to be referred to as "he". Many of them would be offended or confused if you used "they" as a term of reference. Many listeners would also be confused if you referred to a person who appears to…

Until 'they' got pulled into duty, English didn't have a non gendered pronoun, so if you were referring to someone where you didn't know the gender, you had a choice of defaulting to "he", randomly choosing "he" or " she", or using "he or she" or "the [descriptor like 'programmer']*

They at first sounded weird being repurposed this way, but I think now it works better than any of the list above. Once you start using it for people who's gender you don't know, it's a pretty small step to use for someone's gender you don't want to assume.

Post reply on HN