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At my last job we had a message shown when a certain view was empty that said something along the lines of: "Bummer, you don't appear to have any messages" We

At my last job we had a message shown when a certain view was empty that said something along the lines of: "Bummer, you don't appear to have any messages" We got a very very angry message from a user one day, telling us they didn't appreciate us using the word "bummer" and that it was extremely offensive. Apparently it's a slang term in the UK. Internationalization is tough :\

pmx 11y ago
I'm from the UK and I've only ever seen "Bummer" as a mild disappointment. That one person was probably just looking for things to complain about.
- LukeB_UK 11y ago
  I'm also from the UK and I've definitely heard it used as a derogatory term towards gay men or to try and put someone down by implying that they're gay.
- rustynails 11y ago
  A "bummer" is a slang term for a gay man. I haven't heard that for about 30 years. I wouldn't have linked the two meanings until the controversy was mentioned.
  - ericwood 11y ago
    I think the consensus we reached was it was a much older bit of slang and mostly localized to a specific region, although it was tough for us to confirm.
- OJFord 11y ago
  I haven't ever heard it used in that derogatory sense - but I've always been under the impression that that was the etymology. (Also British). Just as other words, e.g. referring to illegitimate children (I think even medical doctors no longer use it) are used differently to their original meaning. The meaning of most slang/swear words are - ahem - bastardised, if you will.
300bps 11y ago
You'll get complaints no matter what. 16 years ago I created a website for a large insurance company. When a customer signed up for policyholder functions it generated a random password for the person to use initially in the format of consonant, vowel, vowel, consonant then four numbers. We got a nasty email from someone who got the password DUUD7573. They were insulted as a pre-operative transsexual that we were calling them a "dude" and that we must've known they were a transsexual.
- MichaelGG 11y ago
  On his blog, Raymond Chen mentions how Windows' random choice of user pic offended some people. Apparently some Asian user got the karate pic, and decided it was picked on purpose for him, instead of at random. The best way to handle this is say "No, it's at random." and let people un-offend themselves.
  - copperx 11y ago
    As a person that never gets offended, I wonder whether I should get my head checked. There are so many things I could get offended by!
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Camillo 11y ago
You should have explained that the word is completely innocent, like in "bum a fag".

pmx 11y ago

I'm from the UK and I've only ever seen "Bummer" as a mild disappointment. That one person was probably just looking for things to complain about.

LukeB_UK 11y ago
I'm also from the UK and I've definitely heard it used as a derogatory term towards gay men or to try and put someone down by implying that they're gay.
rustynails 11y ago
A "bummer" is a slang term for a gay man. I haven't heard that for about 30 years. I wouldn't have linked the two meanings until the controversy was mentioned.
- ericwood 11y ago
  I think the consensus we reached was it was a much older bit of slang and mostly localized to a specific region, although it was tough for us to confirm.
OJFord 11y ago
I haven't ever heard it used in that derogatory sense - but I've always been under the impression that that was the etymology. (Also British). Just as other words, e.g. referring to illegitimate children (I think even medical doctors no longer use it) are used differently to their original meaning. The meaning of most slang/swear words are - ahem - bastardised, if you will.

300bps 11y ago

You'll get complaints no matter what. 16 years ago I created a website for a large insurance company. When a customer signed up for policyholder functions it generated a random password for the person to use initially in the format of consonant, vowel, vowel, consonant then four numbers. We got a nasty email from someone who got the password DUUD7573. They were insulted as a pre-operative transsexual that we were calling them a "dude" and that we must've known they were a transsexual.

MichaelGG 11y ago
On his blog, Raymond Chen mentions how Windows' random choice of user pic offended some people. Apparently some Asian user got the karate pic, and decided it was picked on purpose for him, instead of at random. The best way to handle this is say "No, it's at random." and let people un-offend themselves.
- copperx 11y ago
  As a person that never gets offended, I wonder whether I should get my head checked. There are so many things I could get offended by!

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Camillo 11y ago

You should have explained that the word is completely innocent, like in "bum a fag".