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Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative

itcommunity.stanford.edu

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

#661

Post by laserdancepony »

at_a_remove wrote: post #469
PopePompus wrote: post #378

I got yelled at by a female graduate student for using the term "rule of thumb". The Standford page says: "Although no written record exists today, this phrase is attributed to an old British law that allowed men to beat their wives with sticks no wider than their thumb.", which I translate as "this is bullshit, but some people have decided to be offended by it".

Used in a similar fashion in Boondock Saints .

Using this as a reputable secondary source in the OP document would not surprise me the least.

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

#662

Post by laserdancepony »

sn41 wrote: post #382
ARandomerDude wrote: post #329

> master (v) > become adept in > Historically, masters enslaved people, didn't consider them human and didn't allow them to express free will, so this term should generally be avoided. I assume Stanford now hands out an Adept Degree at the end of grad school.

I personally would prefer a Journeyman exit degree option :)

I would not want some snotty academics to devalue my trade school degree.

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

#663

Post by luuuzeta »

bsimpson wrote: post #429
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-…

A euphemism treadmill, in fact https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/euphemism_treadmill

Comic Doug Stanhope did a bit about the euphemism treadmill. For example, before "retarded" was a medical term doctors used the terms "moron" and "imbecile" which people co-opted to call someone that does something incredibly stupid. In turn, "retarded" ended up co-opted as well because it stuck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy_a2C7VSWg

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

#664

Post by himinlomax »

cipheredStones wrote: post #332

It's pretty remarkable that this conflates: - Well-known slurs like "Jewed" - Outdated, now-offensive terms like "hermaphrodite" - Touchy metaphorical language like "slave replica" - Gendered terms that if you're being assiduous you probably want to avoid, like "manpower" - Words that have long since lost any stigmatizing meaning by virtue of the original use being so ancient ("lame", "dumb", "stupid") - Words that,…

> - Touchy metaphorical language like "slave replica"

> "submit" ("Depending on the context, the term can imply allowing others to have power over you.")

In both those cases, the problem is when it applies to a person, because enslaving someone or having someone submit by force is obviously bad, but there's equally no problem with enslaving a computer or submitting a form, even if you have to force it into a jammed letterbox.

The obvious next step is banning cut, kill, brand or maim, because that's what bad people did to innocent victims; never mind that you can cut paper, kill viruses, brand a product or describe an industrial accident.

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

#665

Post by shireboy »

“It’s a beautiful thing, the Destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives, but there are hundreds of nouns that can be got rid of as well… in the final version of Newspeak there’ll be nothing else. In the end the whole notion of goodness and badness will be covered by only six words – in reality, only one word. Don’t you see the beauty of that, Winston?”

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

#666

Post by aaron695 »

cipheredStones wrote: post #332

It's pretty remarkable that this conflates: - Well-known slurs like "Jewed" - Outdated, now-offensive terms like "hermaphrodite" - Touchy metaphorical language like "slave replica" - Gendered terms that if you're being assiduous you probably want to avoid, like "manpower" - Words that have long since lost any stigmatizing meaning by virtue of the original use being so ancient ("lame", "dumb", "stupid") - Words that,…

No post body was provided.

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

#667

Post by amelius »

imgabe wrote: post #555

I reject the notion that anyone hearing or reading a word from this list could possibly experience anything properly categorized as "harm". This is what's known in the sports world as "flopping" - feigning an injury to elicit a penalty on the other team. Except academia has taken it even further. You don't even need to pretend that you're the one injured. You can make up an imaginary person and pretend they are injur…

> I reject the notion that anyone hearing or reading a word from this list could possibly experience anything properly categorized as "harm".

It's not from reading such words once. But if you hear them many many times, they can cause harm because they create subtle biases, prejudices, change one's self-image, etc.

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

#668

Post by laserdancepony »

McP wrote: post #657

I've helped compile guidance on inclusive language for my company. Whoever came up with this list has scored an own-goal against people who genuinely seek to make their communities more inclusive. There are words like "slave" that actually cause offense to real people when used in a trivialising way. Accordingly, terminology around databases and the like has changed, and that's a good thing. A laundry list of terms t…

I do not agree about the master/slave idiocy. These terms have been used for ages in the IT universe, and never once have I come across someone who insinuated racism. What about "server", does that not insinuate that there once were serfdom? Or "protocol", we are all on a spectrum now, that old fashioned way of thinking triggers me!

Not one step back, or they will rip us apart.

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

#670

Post by hendrikrassmann »

gtbcb wrote: post #298

It’d be funny if “conspiracy theorist” was on the list as critical of people with poor education, people less able to form rational thoughts about how the world works, people easily deceived, people unable to discern truth. I suspect conspiracy theorists find this term derogatory. Thoughts on what replacement they’d prefer? I also suspect though that they wouldn't want to be identified as a group at all. What do you…

In Germany they're calling them selves 'Querdenker' (lateral thinkers).
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