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Banning words won’t make the world more just

theatlantic.com

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

#341

Post by suddenclarity »

undersuit wrote: post #292
tastysandwich wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For my partner's entire pregnancy, our providers only referred to "birthing people" Calling my wife a "birthing person" just made her feel like some gross vessel for having a baby. We purposefully chose providers that didn't use that language. "Chestfeeding" is another one that's cropping up and makes zero sense. Men have breasts, so breastfeeding is already gender-neutral. But it's seen as female-centric so out th…

[flagged]

Isn't that mostly a result of how much you want to focus on the outliers? XX male syndrome is estimated to exists in 1:20000 - 1:30000 people. It's so rare that we have a name for it. Somewhat like rebutting to what a car is by arguing that a handful of cars through history actually had two wheels. And yes, I'm aware that XX syndrome isn't the only outlier but the point still stands.

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

#342

Post by jimbokun »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #289
jurassic wrote: post #54

The pendulum is swinging back because equity language censors took this way way too far. People-first language ("enslaved people" not "slaves") makes complete sense to me, but making a big fuss about how common English idioms like being "blind to a problem" is somehow offensive is going to earn you nothing but eyerolls from nearly everyone. Some of these, like "grandfathering", cannot even be understood without deep…

> People-first language ("enslaved people" not "slaves") makes complete sense to me Why is that? I’m genuinely curious. Who should be offended by the word slave ? Is it I, the Slav? The etymology of the word concerns my heritage, and yet I’m not offended. It’s not as though people toying with language today is going to bring back my relatives who died as slaves, nor will it undo the suffering they endured.

Reminds me of Norm McDonald commenting on Patton Oswalt saying the worst thing about Bill Cosby was the hypocrisy. But he thought it was the raping.

https://twitter.com/rexchapman/status/1437871709911195655?s=...

I doubt slaves care so much about being called slaves or enslaved people, but having their freedom and autonomy stripped from them and treated horribly with no avenue for recompense.

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

#343

Post by ShredKazoo »

I acknowledge that language shapes the way people think. But the replacement of cost-benefit analysis and evidence-based debate with arguments regarding the connotations that different words pull in has been a huge mistake in my view.

There might have been a point at which language policing was done in good faith. But I strongly suspect that the replacement of the word felon with the term justice-involved person is essentially attempting a fait accompli on a debate regarding the extent to which convicted criminals should be considered culpable for their crimes. The problem with this mode of debating is that winning correlates with the ability to wield social power, not with having facts on your side.

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

#344

Post by gnicholas »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #323

This has got to be one of the most over-anxiated, one side arguing with itself sociological phenomena since the white slaver panic that afflicted upper-class ladies in the late 19th century. There is some magazine wash lib, crucifying themselves on this hill on the HN front page every other day. Yet there is practically no one arguing back. Except of course on Twitter. Which apparently some large set of journalists b…

I can't tell if you're referring to the phenomenon of banning words, or the phenomenon of criticizing banning words. The first sentence makes it seem like you're referring to the word-banning, but the second sentence is about magazines, which makes it seem like you're referring to The Atlantic (which is criticizing the word-banning).

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

#346

Post by WalterBright »

zarzavat wrote: post #320
tastysandwich wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For my partner's entire pregnancy, our providers only referred to "birthing people" Calling my wife a "birthing person" just made her feel like some gross vessel for having a baby. We purposefully chose providers that didn't use that language. "Chestfeeding" is another one that's cropping up and makes zero sense. Men have breasts, so breastfeeding is already gender-neutral. But it's seen as female-centric so out th…

It's ironic because the entire concept of online language policing was invented by arch rivals the radical feminists in the 2010s (anyone remember donglegate?), but the pendulum has swung so far back in the other direction that now the very concept of women is being erased. Geez! Of course offline language policing is as old as time, but until the late 20th century it was the domain of religions or regimes - those wi…

"Mail carrier" instead of postman started in the 70's. Same with "flight attendant" instead of stewardess. This has been going on a long time.

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

#347

Post by techdragon »

rippercushions wrote: post #325
low_tech_love wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

This phenomenon is known as a purity spiral, and here's a great story about one tearing an online knitting community to shreds. In game theory terms, objecting to something was now always a dominant strategy, and rejecting an allegation of racism was always a losing strategy. Inevitably, a ratchet effect took hold in which those with the most strident vision of what ‘diversity’ meant were effectively handed the keys…

I’m going to start using this terminology. It’s good to have simple phrases for this. It’s so much easier to say “I’m not going to engage in perpetuating a purity spiral” or “your not helping anyone by continuing the purity spiral long past the point of helping anyone who was genuinely affected by this”

It’s short and pithy, and it can sort of cover the core concept without needing deep academic understanding of the social dynamics involved.

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

#348

Post by ShredKazoo »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #323

This has got to be one of the most over-anxiated, one side arguing with itself sociological phenomena since the white slaver panic that afflicted upper-class ladies in the late 19th century. There is some magazine wash lib, crucifying themselves on this hill on the HN front page every other day. Yet there is practically no one arguing back. Except of course on Twitter. Which apparently some large set of journalists b…

I'm not entirely sure how to parse your comment.

Did you notice this section?

>Equity-language guides are proliferating among some of the country’s leading institutions, particularly nonprofits. The American Cancer Society has one. So do the American Heart Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Medical Association, the National Recreation and Park Association, the Columbia University School of Professional Studies, and the University of Washington.

>....

>Public criticism led Stanford to abolish outright its Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative—not for being ridiculous, but, the university announced, for being “broadly viewed as counter to inclusivity.”

Even if no one is arguing back, it seems like the language police are winning.

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

#349

Post by strangattractor »

angarg12 wrote: post #238
jurassic wrote: post #54

The pendulum is swinging back because equity language censors took this way way too far. People-first language ("enslaved people" not "slaves") makes complete sense to me, but making a big fuss about how common English idioms like being "blind to a problem" is somehow offensive is going to earn you nothing but eyerolls from nearly everyone. Some of these, like "grandfathering", cannot even be understood without deep…

It seems to me that one of the issues is that the (more extreme) woke culture has put the entire burden of communication on the speakers rather than the listeners. Is not enough that you intend to offend, or that you say something that offends someone, is whether something that you say could possibly offend someone, even if you didn't have the slightest intentions. On the other say the listeners are free to interpret…

I personally believe that 2 things have greatly affected P2P communications. Anonymity and attempting to hold meaningful conversation strictly through text. When we communicate with text we cut off non-verbal communications that are a major source of interpreting the intent of the speaker and the receptiveness of the listener. In-person conversations are constantly adjusting what and how things are said depending on non-verbal cues. This becomes impossible in text only communications so the words have to convey everything and word choice the dominant replacement for non-verbal cues. The fact that we are communicating primarily via text these days has spilled over into in person communication. IMHO

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

#350

Post by docandrew »

OrvalWintermute wrote: post #243
next_xibalba wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the poll, which has been repeated for a few years: https://thinknow.com/newsite/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/thin... It is not that large, but the tiny number of respondents who identify as Latinx has been stable. It's crazy that this label is still being pushed.

> It's crazy that this label is still being pushed. This is a great example of how intellectually bankrupt some of the social mis-movements towards redefinition truly are. First they come up with a term that is clearly not a term used by the native speakers of that group. Then they utilize that term in order to collectively identify them. Then they push it across media, education, and many other avenues to make it "a…

My guess is an English speaker was forced to take French or Spanish in college and struggled to remember the gender for a word like “bicycle” and decided the whole notion of gendered language was silly and should be abolished.
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