831–840 of 1001 posts
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[flagged]
Man: Adult Human with XY sex Chromosomes Woman: Adult Human with XX sex Chromosomes
And anyone that falls outside this binary definition... is neither man nor woman?
What was it, 10 to 20 years ago, people started to be noticeably nervous when they were coming near a description of my disability. It used to be so simple. I am 100% blind, and guess what, I prefer the term blind because it is pretty descriptive and relatively short. But all of a sudden, people external to the community started to fumble around with "visually challenged", and all the nonsense variations of that in m…
I see it as unintentional discrimination. It's treating the people they are relabeling as children that need the kind progressives to step in and save them. It's so condescending. Minorities don't need white Knights to save them, neither do the disabled. If an individual wants me to not refer to them as x because they find it offensive, no problem. But a group of academics should not be able to sit around and decide…
> But a group of academics should not be able to sit around and decide that a group as a whole needs saving
If this isn't one of the core problems with every aspect of society...
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I find it highly unlikely that Scott Adams is a "dark dog whistle" kinda guy. At best the most I'd believe would be that "some people who Scott Adams pissed off now like to say that when he says X he actually means Y".
Scott Adams' descent into reactionaryism [1] has not been subtle or quiet. If you were surprised that it eventually exploded in a public way, that just tells me you haven't heard much of anything about him in the past decade. Also, "it's okay to be white" is not a hidden rake of a dogwhistle to stumble on. If that were a serious position, it immediately leads to the question of "who is saying otherwise". And then you…
I found a few examples if you are interested:
> conservatives are objecting after the discovery of a speech by Berkeley Professor Zeus Leonardo in which he discussed the need “to abolish whiteness.” […] “to abolish whiteness is to abolish white people”
https://jonathanturley.org/2022/03/02/abolish-white-people-b...
> Abolishing whiteness has never been more urgent
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2019/11/17/abolishing-whi...
> Coca-Cola, Facing Backlash, Says 'Be Less White' Learning Plan Was About Workplace Inclusion
https://www.newsweek.com/coca-cola-facing-backlash-says-less...
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> Character and intent is what matters. This. I recently ran up against a filter on Reddit where I used a phrase that I was completely unaware of. My account was flagged for hate speech. The comment had no ill-intent. The problem with language is that we want individual words to have inherent meaning but as people adopt phrases to identify a movement, those meanings get carried along for the ride. eg: until recently,…
I would not take claims of something being a "dog whistle" at face value. The entire concept has largely been weaponized and bastardized, appropriately enough as a means of effecting language policing. A perfect example is over the past several years how the media spent quite a lot of energy dedicated to convincing people that "America first" was some sort of a secret dog whistle. [1] The "logic", so far as it can be…
The exact second you stop engaging with what people are saying, and start deciding what they actually mean, is the exact second you stop all learning and all growth.
These terms "dog whistle", "normalizing", "shifting the overton window" are all just means of being able to ignore the argument itself in favor of ad hominem.
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We have externalized what used to be an internal issues Offense is a you problem, not a me problem. We have abandoned the axiom of "sticks and stones" and replaced it with "words are violence" or even worse "silence is violence" Today it no longer enough to be "tolerant" you have to actively affirm, support, and validate everything about everyone at all times and support their emotional state no matter the practicali…
> Offense is a you problem, not a me problem Most definitely not. Of course people need to work on themselves to avoid being offended. But if you communicate with other people, it's because you want to achieve something. Probably not offending the target (or else fuck you I guess ;-)). So, usually, offense gets in the way, so you should care about not offending your target. And beyond this, as human beings, we usuall…
How about the push to rename words in technology that have been in use for decades, like changing the default git repo from master to main.
or the parent comment I replied to originally -- "This is what bothers me about the recent obsession with pronouns - I have enough trouble remembering people's names; and now I am also asked to remember how to modify my grammar or lexicon when in vicinity of a given person? " for which there is not even any social indicators of this, and for a given person could change at any given time from week to week or day to day. A person that changes their pronouns daily seems to me to have an unrealistic expectation that people will be able to keep track of that.
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> Character and intent is what matters. This. I recently ran up against a filter on Reddit where I used a phrase that I was completely unaware of. My account was flagged for hate speech. The comment had no ill-intent. The problem with language is that we want individual words to have inherent meaning but as people adopt phrases to identify a movement, those meanings get carried along for the ride. eg: until recently,…
I would not take claims of something being a "dog whistle" at face value. The entire concept has largely been weaponized and bastardized, appropriately enough as a means of effecting language policing. A perfect example is over the past several years how the media spent quite a lot of energy dedicated to convincing people that "America first" was some sort of a secret dog whistle. [1] The "logic", so far as it can be…
To put a finer point on it, what if they had chosen "America over everything"? Would you still be criticizing those who detect certain...implications in the phrase?
edit: I am generally not sympathetic to language policing. But I'm not so sure this is language policing.
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> I suspect the unease you perceive with people using different terms for blindness are unease with their own attachments to those words. Nah. I think people are just terrified of coming across as a jerk for not knowing the latest non-offensive term for things. Black? African American? Oh black is ok again? Will I get in trouble with HR/Twitter for calling you blind? And if so, what word do I use instead? Do I ask? I…
"Terrified" is a bit much, I think most people just want to get along and are happy to use whatever term is acceptable to those it describes. Our understanding of what those terms are might shift over time, and it may get muddied by well-intentioned people trying a bit hard to avoid offence (or by people clumsily trying to police it) but it's generally progressing fine. And I think as long as you're compassionate, wi…
I am definitely afraid of stepping on a verbal landmine in a work context. This is my meal ticket, and what's keeping my family housed. There is a very real fear or stepping on toes, even if accidental, and that translates to behaviors.
I'm also afraid of sticking my neck out in heated situations. I've had to push back managers, PMs, and other coworkers in ways that will often make them angry. I've seen the race card get played against other managers, so I have to CYA on any vaguely negative interaction.
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This is an academic issue, ”a solution in search of a problem” as almost all the rest of academia is. As such, it never stops at a reasonable, meaningful equilibrium; it has to be kept pacing, moving forward towards more and more ridiculous extremes. An academic, in order to stay relevant, needs to keep pushing the invisible and mostly inexistent boundaries that they perceive in whatever field they are involved in. I…
It’s important to remember, however annoying they are, their side is losing. Look at Dave Chappelle, who was the attempted target of cancellation and Netflix and people buying tickets to his shows completely ignored it. Or JK Rowling, who has been cancelled over and over again, but the latest video game based on her IP is incredibly popular. Twitter doesn’t reflect the real world.
What was it, 10 to 20 years ago, people started to be noticeably nervous when they were coming near a description of my disability. It used to be so simple. I am 100% blind, and guess what, I prefer the term blind because it is pretty descriptive and relatively short. But all of a sudden, people external to the community started to fumble around with "visually challenged", and all the nonsense variations of that in m…
I see it as unintentional discrimination. It's treating the people they are relabeling as children that need the kind progressives to step in and save them. It's so condescending. Minorities don't need white Knights to save them, neither do the disabled. If an individual wants me to not refer to them as x because they find it offensive, no problem. But a group of academics should not be able to sit around and decide…