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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

#861

Post by fleddr »

crackercrews wrote: post #424

It is hard to choose which of these is silliest, but my vote goes to the replacement of "he" with [name] or "they", until you know the person's preferred pronouns. [1] The vast, vast majority of people who present as male wish to be referred to as "he". Many of them would be offended or confused if you used "they" as a term of reference. Many listeners would also be confused if you referred to a person who appears to…

Combine your two conclusions and sex (material reality) ceases to exist yet non-binary (an identity, not a sex) is to be respected as if it is a hard biological fact. After all, you don't decide to be non-binary, you just are. Yet this does not apply to sex.

It's almost as if reality, facts, logic, consistency don't matter. Which is postmodernism. A power struggle.

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

#862

Post by positus »

crackercrews wrote: post #424

It is hard to choose which of these is silliest, but my vote goes to the replacement of "he" with [name] or "they", until you know the person's preferred pronouns. [1] The vast, vast majority of people who present as male wish to be referred to as "he". Many of them would be offended or confused if you used "they" as a term of reference. Many listeners would also be confused if you referred to a person who appears to…

I think the real issue is that until recently 'they' was considered a plural pronoun, whereas the gender revolutionaries want it to now be considered a singular pronoun.

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

#863

Post by yuck39 »

crackercrews wrote: post #842
randomsearch wrote: post #823

Is there a list of universities that don't do this kind of thing? I wouldn't want to send my kids to a university that published this, I want them to think for themselves. I certainly will strongly discourage them from applying to Stanford. Are there others I should be wary of? (incidentally, not _all_ of the list is ridiculous, but most of it clearly is)

Check out ratings by FIRE [1] and the Heterodox Academy [2]. 1: https://www.thefire.org/news/just-released-2022-2023-college... 2: https://heterodoxacademy.org/library/10-colleges-where-you-w...

I had never heard of FIRE before, and assumed they were going to rank free speech by prominence of conservative idea representation on campus as most of these types of rankings tend to do.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that was not the case. Schools with high acceptance of conservative speakers trend lower on the list. The highest ranking schools are typically the ones close to the middle. Thanks for sharing.

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

#864

Post by themanmaran »

VyseofArcadia wrote: post #785
pc86 wrote: post #778

Others have called out some the silliness on this list, but honestly my biggest problem with it is that it's just so lazy , and often times flat out incorrect in its assumptions. - "Consider using 'devoted' instead of 'addicted.'" I'm sorry but you don't develop a physical devotion to heroin. It's an addiction. - They say the phrase "committed suicide" is problematic because it "trivializes the experiences of people…

> Nobody has ever said "landlady" I have heard it in exactly one place, and that place is the movie Kung-fu Hustle. Who is throwing handles?

Certainly the most prominent landlady in my mind.

But I also had a landlady for several years in SF. And that's how I referred to her. I didn't think it too strange.

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

#865

Post by fleddr »

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.

Water

- refreshing fluid needed to biologically function.

- used to drown witches in

I mean, how long do we want this list to be? Thank god (or any deity of your chosing) we can outsource language to AI soon.

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

#866

Post by bee_rider »

VyseofArcadia wrote: post #785
pc86 wrote: post #778

Others have called out some the silliness on this list, but honestly my biggest problem with it is that it's just so lazy , and often times flat out incorrect in its assumptions. - "Consider using 'devoted' instead of 'addicted.'" I'm sorry but you don't develop a physical devotion to heroin. It's an addiction. - They say the phrase "committed suicide" is problematic because it "trivializes the experiences of people…

> Nobody has ever said "landlady" I have heard it in exactly one place, and that place is the movie Kung-fu Hustle. Who is throwing handles?

She’s like a badass or something in that movie, right?

I feel vaguely like that was a sendup of a trope that is like: a landlady who kind of harries the main character but isn’t taken very seriously because she’s a woman. But that idea doesn’t resonate as much anymore (which is good!), so the sendup loses some grounding.

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

#867

Post by gorwell »

The next time someone asks, "What do you mean by woke? Isn't that just about being aware and kind?"

I thought so at first too, but no. It's use the words we tell you to use. Have the opinions we tell you to have. Otherwise it's harmful and you're a bad person.

This initiative is what is meant by “woke” and ones similar to it. It's a dangerous totalitarianism that presents itself with exactly this kind of empathetic language and emotional blackmail. It's intolerance disguised as tolerance.

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

#868

Post by arwhatever »

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…

We need a better standard of evidence for harmful language than someone's claim at offense.

I have no doubt that you could find an actual victim/target/member of a marginalized group to claim to be bothered by any of these phrases in the first person. But I'm also certain that members of such groups enjoy telling other people what to do just as much (on average) as all of humankind at large, which is to say a lot, and so a better standard of evidence is needed.

I've struggled to envision what such evidence would look like, but I think it will have to be someone who is better at devising experiments than me.

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

#869

Post by matt-attack »

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,…

> "This term is used to ridicule or demean a certain group of people based on their behaviors."

Isn’t that precisely when it’s ok to ridicule someone? Not based on properties they cannot change (race, height, sex, etc) but indeed based on behavior they choose to engage in (religion, politics, social behavior, life choices, etc.).

If ridiculing people for their behavior is now off limits then what the hell is left? Do we just talk about the weather?

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

#870

Post by dragonwriter »

gorwell wrote: post #867

The next time someone asks, "What do you mean by woke? Isn't that just about being aware and kind?" I thought so at first too, but no. It's use the words we tell you to use. Have the opinions we tell you to have. Otherwise it's harmful and you're a bad person. This initiative is what is meant by “woke” and ones similar to it. It's a dangerous totalitarianism that presents itself with exactly this kind of empathetic l…

> This initiative is what is meant by “woke”

No, this is institutional PR by an institution that is very much the antithesis of woke; it may be trying to avoid criticism from people who are woke, but it’s interests are served just as well by discrediting the entire idea (which reduces pressure on it the same way as accommodation does, and more durably), and its actions reflect that.

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