Banning words won’t make the world more just • Hacker News Board

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#31

Post by scarmig » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:33 PM UTC

paulv wrote: post #24

scarmig wrote: post #9

The semantic turn of the Left is one of the worst signs of intellectual decay. There's approximately zero evidence that linguistic changes influence thought: the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is rejected by linguists except perhaps in some very narrow situations. The euphemism treadmill is a running joke, from negro, to black, to African American, to Black, to person of color. And none of them are better or worse than the o…

> The euphemism treadmill is a running joke, from negro, to black, to African American, to Black, to person of color. You missed a couple at the beginning of your list. A really significant one in particular.

Including it would distract from the main point (though IIRC there was no point at which it wasn't a slur; replacing non-slurs with novel non-slurs is a different category).

That said, I think it supports my point. How effective has tabooing that slur been at eliminating racism in the USA?

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#32

Post by majormajor » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:33 PM UTC

t344344 wrote: post #3

Is not "equity language" just another form of neocolonialism? How can "rich educated people" rename entire ethnic group (latinx) without their consent? Also there is nothing offensive about being "poor"... Equity language is just another tool to oppress people.

The term latinx didn't come out of "rich educated people" - certainly a lot of educated folk have been pushing it in the last decade (self-identifying grad students and recent college grads, for instance) - but there's a weird sort of prejudice going on in assuming everything can only come out of "rich educated [non-latino, based on your use of "their" there] people"

Some discussion here: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-01-27/op-ed-latin...

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#33

Post by QuercusMax » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:33 PM UTC

freitzkriesler2 wrote: post #30

wonderwonder wrote: post #6

"The American Cancer Society advises that Latinx, along with the equally gender-neutral Latine, Latin@, and Latinu, “may or may not be fully embraced by older generations and may need additional explanation.” Cool cool, I look forward as a white guy to explaining to a group of Spanish people why they are wrong and are really LatinX and I'm doing it for their protection. Imagine being an immigrant and having to learn…

As a Hispanic American, I very regularly tell people I am Latino and that Latinx is incredibly offensive to my heritage. I'm in my 30s and the younger people I know also find it offensive.

[flagged]

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#34

Post by variant » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:34 PM UTC

Can we just all start operating from the perspective that we're not trying to offend each other?

Do away with all these rules that serve no purpose other than to slot each other into buckets of enlightened and evil.

It's a sign that we have things way too good.

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#35

Post by tgv » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:34 PM UTC

gumby wrote: post #2

The use of Sierra Club as the lead example is a good one because of the racialist motivations in the founding of the club. The change of usage to “enslaved people” is an important one because of the lack of agency in being enslaved (!). It’s easy for the brain to make the connection that a term like “slave” is an inherent property of the person so described, like “brown-haired” rather than something imposed upon them…

> the lack of agency in being enslaved

I don't get this, at all. It makes at least one fallacy, namely assuming that people are born free. They are not. Every newborn is restricted by parents, society, environment, etc. We must accept that: we can't think, act or sustain ourselves until much older. Thus, we loose our restrictions slowly, and we don't loose them all. Some people were actually born as slaves. That's the horror of it: to be born as property.

Agency has nothing to do with it: suggesting that it does implies the possibility to avoid it, and ipso facto that staying enslaved is the slave's problem. The appeal to a made-up brain process doesn't improve your case.

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#36

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:34 PM UTC

wonderwonder wrote: post #6

"The American Cancer Society advises that Latinx, along with the equally gender-neutral Latine, Latin@, and Latinu, “may or may not be fully embraced by older generations and may need additional explanation.” Cool cool, I look forward as a white guy to explaining to a group of Spanish people why they are wrong and are really LatinX and I'm doing it for their protection. Imagine being an immigrant and having to learn…

> Imagine being an immigrant and having to learn both English and then a made up filter created by well paid academics on top of it.

Latine and LatinX both originate in (different geographical parts of) the spanish-first-language non-binary community, originally for use in Spanish, neither (AFAIK) by “well-paid academics”.

Latinu and Latin@ I’m less sure about, but wouldn’t be surprised if they are the same. While there’s legitimate debates about their use, the “created by white English-speaking academics and imposed on the people labelled by them” narrative is itself White-centering myth.

(OTOH, the anglicized, instead of mixed, pronunciation of LatinX is probably a White anglophone invention, the original is like latino/a with the final vowel removed, and with the english name of the letter “X” in its place.)

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#37

Post by JohnFen » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:35 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #23

Is this going anywhere outside the US? The "pronouns" thing went nowhere in France. It was considered damaging to the French language. > The euphemism treadmill is a running joke, from negro, to black, to African American, to Black, to person of color. Also, the shift from moron to mentally defective to retarded to whatever. This is such a sideshow. First, conservatism lost its way. Then liberalism lost its way. If o…

> First, conservatism lost its way. Then liberalism lost its way.

It's almost as if the underlying issue is independent of political leanings.

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#38

Post by lazyasciiart » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:36 PM UTC

autodev1 wrote: post #10

SubiculumCode wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People want to recognize inequities and lived experiences and choose to do something about it that is within their power, change their language. As the article embraces, this is a morally driven impulse that is unimpeachable in its intent, but in aggregate, fails and sometimes, even oppresses. Interesting article.

I wonder... what is the difference between an "experience" vs a "lived experience"? If I have an experience-- such as walking through the park, this afternoon and picking a blackberry... What is a "lived experience" version of that same experience?

It's the difference between growing up blind and growing up with a sister who is blind. Only one of those is 'lived' experience with blindness.

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#39

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:36 PM UTC

wonderwonder wrote: post #6

"The American Cancer Society advises that Latinx, along with the equally gender-neutral Latine, Latin@, and Latinu, “may or may not be fully embraced by older generations and may need additional explanation.” Cool cool, I look forward as a white guy to explaining to a group of Spanish people why they are wrong and are really LatinX and I'm doing it for their protection. Imagine being an immigrant and having to learn…

[deleted]

Re: Banning words won’t make the world more just

#40

Post by majormajor » Thu, Mar 02, 2023, 7:36 PM UTC

scarmig wrote: post #9

The semantic turn of the Left is one of the worst signs of intellectual decay. There's approximately zero evidence that linguistic changes influence thought: the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is rejected by linguists except perhaps in some very narrow situations. The euphemism treadmill is a running joke, from negro, to black, to African American, to Black, to person of color. And none of them are better or worse than the o…

You say it's both "intellectual decay" and "feeling powerless" but I see no reason that the two are connected, causal, or both happening. Hand people victimized by the past few centuries of American history the ability to fix, say, the generational wealth gap that resulted from denied opportunities and seizure of property, and see if they still only focus on words.