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Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

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Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#31

Post by bryanrasmussen »

yosamino wrote: post #4
DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #2

> On Friday, Bill Maher said the N-word on live television. And that's all the context we get. Not the full sentence, not whether it was part of a joke, I don't even know if the guy who said it was black (though I suppose not, given what follows). How am I supposed to evaluate an apology if I don't know what is being apologized for? And without that evaluation, this example adds nothing to the article. It fails as an…

What do you need the full sentence for, though? A passing familiarity with ethnic slurs and why they're tabooed, will already give you the answer that once you start splitting hairs about why or why not something that was said is offensive, then that is probably an indicator that - even if if it was a joke or the person saying it was part of the minority being slurred - it was inappropriate to say it. A passing famil…

once you have evaluated the structures of apologies to find what constitutes a good apology, and disseminated your findings far enough, it will cease to be a good apology because it would become a target and cease to be meaningful, everyone who didn't actually believe in apologizing would nonetheless use the well-structured apology to get what they wanted out of it - forgiveness of their fault.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#32

Post by foldr »

lldbg wrote: post #25
kenjackson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge difference IMHO. Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. Saying “n-word” is intended to do neither. Both are simply a collection of letters, but they carry a lot of baggage.

Surely meaning is foremost dictated by context? English does not have a context free grammar. I can say the actual n-word without meaning to enflame or diminish - it is very easy in fact: take a sentence where I would have used the literal n-word, and replace it with the actual n-word.

>English does not have a context free grammar.

Pedantic note: the 'context' in context free grammar has no relation to the kind of context you're talking about here. It's a very technical notion.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#33

Post by perl4ever »

RicoElectrico wrote: post #5
DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #2

> On Friday, Bill Maher said the N-word on live television. And that's all the context we get. Not the full sentence, not whether it was part of a joke, I don't even know if the guy who said it was black (though I suppose not, given what follows). How am I supposed to evaluate an apology if I don't know what is being apologized for? And without that evaluation, this example adds nothing to the article. It fails as an…

The use-mention distinction, any nuance and context whatsoever stopped mattering. Some on the left just want to get their "social justice fix" by pressuring to get people fired or shame them for absurd reasons like "cultural appropriation". And then they are surprised why far-right grows in reaction to this. Or maybe not, maybe that was the point of both sides to have an enemy you can fight with for eternity. Horsesh…

>The use-mention distinction, any nuance and context whatsoever stopped mattering

There is a certain amount of ambiguity between use/mention. The possibility of ambiguity leads to people being paranoid. Everything that is "mentioned" is being "used" for the purpose of mentioning it. It's a choice that is made, and intentions can be inferred. It's easy to see it as passive-aggressive behavior, and impossible to know what is in someone's heart.

Just because you know or claim to know the truth about something doesn't mean it's automatically logical for someone else to agree. Thinking about things carefully often leads to less certainty.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#34

Post by kenjackson »

lldbg wrote: post #25
kenjackson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge difference IMHO. Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. Saying “n-word” is intended to do neither. Both are simply a collection of letters, but they carry a lot of baggage.

Surely meaning is foremost dictated by context? English does not have a context free grammar. I can say the actual n-word without meaning to enflame or diminish - it is very easy in fact: take a sentence where I would have used the literal n-word, and replace it with the actual n-word.

But the existence of the “n-word” as the less inflammatory alternative always draws into question why you’d use the actual word. In most cases with the example you give, the use of the actual word is probably much more offensive.

That said I think there are a few places where the use is acceptable, but it’s not common and those uses almost never get called out anyways (so it is generally understood).

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#35

Post by bill_mon »

foldr wrote: post #30
lldbg wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that "sort of feel" is a bar high enough, when the consequences for an individual can and have been so severe.

Well that's really the only bar we have for offensive language, isn't it? If we need a higher bar than that then I suppose we can all just go around insulting each other and expecting nothing to happen as a consequence. Good luck with that. If you want something more objective, why don't you just ask a sample of people whether they react the same to 'n-word' as they do to the n-word?

> Well that's really the only bar we have for offensive language, isn't it?

We can construct any bar we'd like.

You seem to completely dismiss concern for the bar being too low, why is that? Lots of people might feel sort of offended by women showing their hair -- should we accept that bar?

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#36

Post by kenjackson »

bill_mon wrote: post #26
kenjackson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge difference IMHO. Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. Saying “n-word” is intended to do neither. Both are simply a collection of letters, but they carry a lot of baggage.

> Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. How could you possibly know this? Also, it's obviously just not true. You're saying that the intent matters, but what we're seeing these days is that the mere mention of a word is enough.

I’m saying that the word carries intent. In part because there is a well known alternative that can be used in almost any situation if intent is not intended.

There are a few exceptional situations, but none have been noted here.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#37

Post by bill_mon »

kenjackson wrote: post #36
bill_mon wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. How could you possibly know this? Also, it's obviously just not true. You're saying that the intent matters, but what we're seeing these days is that the mere mention of a word is enough.

I’m saying that the word carries intent. In part because there is a well known alternative that can be used in almost any situation if intent is not intended. There are a few exceptional situations, but none have been noted here.

> I’m saying that the word carries intent.

No, you're saying that you know the intent.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#38

Post by enriquto »

foldr wrote: post #29
enriquto wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are having a discussion about this taboo word right now and no-one is stopping us. I'm not a native English speaker and I was not talking about any specific word; my argument was general. What word do you refer to by "the n-word", precisely? Can you write it down, please? > The problem is the inference from "it may in some special circumstances be necessary to mention the n-word" to "anyone should be free to say…

>I'm not a native English speaker and I was not talking about any specific word; my argument was general. What word do you refer to by "the n-word", precisely? Can you write it down, please? I’m sure if you genuinely don’t know what the n-word refers to then an English speaker will be happy to explain it to you – although given your existing command of English it seems odd that you couldn’t find out the answer using…

> I’m sure if you genuinely don’t know what the n-word refers to

I do; I just wanted to see if you dared to dogfood your own argument and write down the word "nigger".

> I could roam the streets shouting the n-word at the top of my lungs as long as I wasn’t directing it at anyone in particular.

It seems OK to me, and this is certainly already the case. For example, I learned a lot of English vocabulary thanks to the song "WAP", which is so over the top that it becomes hilarious. This song uses many times the word that you don't dare to write. What's the problem, exactly? It's a rather famous song. Can't people repeat the lyrics of this song? It seems that you can utter the word everywhere (as a synonym of "good friend") without any trouble, unless there are north-american journalists around.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#39

Post by kenjackson »

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #27
kenjackson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge difference IMHO. Saying the actual word is meant to inflame or diminish. Saying “n-word” is intended to do neither. Both are simply a collection of letters, but they carry a lot of baggage.

I could have sworn I saw a comedy one time in which a uptight racist lady said about some other character something like "I don't want to say anything but they are just a real n-word if you know what I mean" with the pursed lips and nodding that one would assume such a character would do - late 80s early 90s movie. So obviously one can imagine a scenario where the word is used to inflame or diminish while at the same…

True. You can use the phrase n-word with negative connotation. But the existence of the term is meant to be non-inflammatory to discuss the n-word precisely because the n-word itself is inflammatory. Any word could be offensive with context, but some words can be offensive without context — which again is why the term n-word is used.

So why is the actual n-word, outside of context offensive? Because it was often used in contexts that were non-offensive to the speaker but offensive to the listener. For example, “Tom you’re a good n-word, but you know you can’t go with us to the show.” To the speaker this is a cordial use, given the subject.

And then there is the David Chapelle effect, where some people just really enjoy saying it in the “right context” a little too much.

Re: Apology critics who want to teach you how to say you’re sorry (2017)

#40

Post by kenjackson »

bill_mon wrote: post #37
kenjackson wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m saying that the word carries intent. In part because there is a well known alternative that can be used in almost any situation if intent is not intended. There are a few exceptional situations, but none have been noted here.

> I’m saying that the word carries intent. No, you're saying that you know the intent.

Yes. Even more than that. I’m saying virtually everyone knows the intent.
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