4 ms·

I'm a downvoter: I find arguments like this one to be ideological rants and not valuable. For every person and in every culture, offending people is considered

I'm a downvoter: I find arguments like this one to be ideological rants and not valuable. For every person and in every culture, offending people is considered wrong. To suggest that it doesn't matter is not a serious argument. Apparently 'slave' doesn't offend you. It doesn't offend me either (I remember being a little uncomfortable with it long ago, when I first encountered it, but I don't notice it now). But for me to say that therefore it is not offensive to others would be ignorant and self-centered, as if the world revolves around my views and experiences. If others say they are offended then I respect that; I hope they would respect my concerns if I was offended. Also, a common cause of discrimination is due to honest ignorance on the part of people in the dominant group. Like all humans, they are blind to things that they don't experience themselves; for example, consider law enforcement discrimination against minorities. It's happened for decades or centuries, but wasn't taken seriously until we actually had film of it due to the spread of cameras. That's another good reason to think that whether or not something bothers me is not evidence of whether it offends others. Finally, the dominant culture in the U.S. was built at a time of widespread, accepted discrimination, and many artefacts of that time persist. People may get tired of seeing so much of it being challenged and changed, from school buildings named after slave holders; Confederate flags; and movie casts, company executives, etc. being almost all white and mostly male, etc. But being tired of the challenge and change, rather than of the discrimination, is a 'first world' problem, so to speak.

scrollaway 11y ago
Thanks for speaking up. To answer your points: There's a line, and people are crossing it. There are words in the english language which are offensive because they are specifically employed to be offensive. Swear words, words used in offensive (as in, literally offensive) contexts, verbal abuse etc. We avoid using this words in civilized discourse not because we're afraid to offend, but because we have no need for them. We don't intend to offend. If we intend to offend, we use them - there is no political correctness involved in not using actual offensive terms. Now when a word has a non-offensive meaning and actually offends people, it's important to look at why this happens. Does it only offend one person or does it offend many? Is it meant to offend, is it used in an actual offensive context? Is the person being offended themselves or by proxy? This is a conversation I've had before when the Django PR came up, so I'll save you looking these up. You'll note that in that PR, almost everybody praising the PR was white, 18-30 years old. The people being offended are near-unanimously fighting a cause that isn't their own. There's nothing wrong with that of course - I'm not gay, yet I fight for gay rights for example. But was this ever actually an issue for the black community? Do you know why it's important to answer that question? Because if the answer is no, then you are fabricating problems for a community you are not even a part of. It is not harmless - it is actively harmful. If a word, a technical word, was not a problem one day, and is a problem the next, you have now artificially widened the gap a certain minority needs to cross in order to be part of the programming community. And if you look at it closely, you'll see this is exactly what happened. This issue got artificially popular with Django (just about a decade after the LA nonissue). Now it's causing problems in other parts of the technical community. Something which wasn't a problem a year ago, is now a problem - your FOSS project which was open to all, is now perceived as potentially racist. I don't get pissed off at these things because I get a kick out of discrimination. I get pissed off because they make things worse.
- hackuser 11y ago
  I agree that if it's not offensive to blacks (or maybe to someone I'm not thinking of) then it doesn't matter. But ... 1) You are saying that you don't know if it's offensive to blacks. Shouldn't we find out before condemning the change? 2) I think you are blowing out of proportion the consequences of erring on the side of not offending. I think they are minor. It's really about a bigger issue, which is why both of us are writing so many words about it. 3) I take your word for it that this isn't the case for you, but for many people this issue is a proxy - a dog-whistle[1] - for change to the status quo dominant culture. It's like people who objected to or advocated school busing when really it was about desegregation, or people fighting over Syrian refugees when it's really about Muslim immigrants (at least Trump was honest). Anyway, the essential thing is to get these issues out in the open and learn from each other. Good talking to you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics
  - scrollaway 11y ago
    > You are saying that you don't know if it's offensive to blacks. I was very careful not to say anything on what I know. But since you bring it up, what I know is that the original issue in the tracker was created in bad faith and people hopped on the bandwagon. Addressing this is another discussion entirely. > I think you are blowing out of proportion the consequences of erring on the side of not offending. I'm open to hear arguments as to why what I'm saying is "blowing things out of proportions", when all I'm claiming is that the direct results of these actions are producing the exact negative of the effects they intend to. So really, my argument's proportion is relative to how large of an issue you think the original premise is. Another consequence of course is opening your project up to abuse. If people see that you'll cave in to any form of "political correctness" pressure, they'll double down and find more faults, and if there are no more faults they'll create them for you. I'm speaking from experience - This is something we see a lot in the game development community.
    - foota 11y ago
      Can I ask how the issue was created in bad faith?
dragonwriter 11y ago
> For every person and in every culture, offending people is considered wrong. That's actually not at all true. For many people, and in many cultures, certain things are considered both wrong and proper subjects for offense, certain things are considered wrong when they are the subject of offense (and thus are also proper, while not necessary, subjects of offense), and other things are not considered wrong independently of whether some people find them offensive (and, in fact, being offended by them, or at least expressing such offense, may be considered wrong itself.) The idea that anything that anyone finds offensive is, ipso facto, wrong is not a cultural universal, and AFAICT not held by many people at all (even people who seem in some contexts to appeal to that idea seem to find some instances of offense unjustified and unworthy of consideration.)

scrollaway 11y ago

Thanks for speaking up. To answer your points: There's a line, and people are crossing it. There are words in the english language which are offensive because they are specifically employed to be offensive. Swear words, words used in offensive (as in, literally offensive) contexts, verbal abuse etc. We avoid using this words in civilized discourse not because we're afraid to offend, but because we have no need for them. We don't intend to offend. If we intend to offend, we use them - there is no political correctness involved in not using actual offensive terms. Now when a word has a non-offensive meaning and actually offends people, it's important to look at why this happens. Does it only offend one person or does it offend many? Is it meant to offend, is it used in an actual offensive context? Is the person being offended themselves or by proxy? This is a conversation I've had before when the Django PR came up, so I'll save you looking these up. You'll note that in that PR, almost everybody praising the PR was white, 18-30 years old. The people being offended are near-unanimously fighting a cause that isn't their own. There's nothing wrong with that of course - I'm not gay, yet I fight for gay rights for example. But was this ever actually an issue for the black community? Do you know why it's important to answer that question? Because if the answer is no, then you are fabricating problems for a community you are not even a part of. It is not harmless - it is actively harmful. If a word, a technical word, was not a problem one day, and is a problem the next, you have now artificially widened the gap a certain minority needs to cross in order to be part of the programming community. And if you look at it closely, you'll see this is exactly what happened. This issue got artificially popular with Django (just about a decade after the LA nonissue). Now it's causing problems in other parts of the technical community. Something which wasn't a problem a year ago, is now a problem - your FOSS project which was open to all, is now perceived as potentially racist. I don't get pissed off at these things because I get a kick out of discrimination. I get pissed off because they make things worse.

hackuser 11y ago
I agree that if it's not offensive to blacks (or maybe to someone I'm not thinking of) then it doesn't matter. But ... 1) You are saying that you don't know if it's offensive to blacks. Shouldn't we find out before condemning the change? 2) I think you are blowing out of proportion the consequences of erring on the side of not offending. I think they are minor. It's really about a bigger issue, which is why both of us are writing so many words about it. 3) I take your word for it that this isn't the case for you, but for many people this issue is a proxy - a dog-whistle[1] - for change to the status quo dominant culture. It's like people who objected to or advocated school busing when really it was about desegregation, or people fighting over Syrian refugees when it's really about Muslim immigrants (at least Trump was honest). Anyway, the essential thing is to get these issues out in the open and learn from each other. Good talking to you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics
- scrollaway 11y ago
  > You are saying that you don't know if it's offensive to blacks. I was very careful not to say anything on what I know. But since you bring it up, what I know is that the original issue in the tracker was created in bad faith and people hopped on the bandwagon. Addressing this is another discussion entirely. > I think you are blowing out of proportion the consequences of erring on the side of not offending. I'm open to hear arguments as to why what I'm saying is "blowing things out of proportions", when all I'm claiming is that the direct results of these actions are producing the exact negative of the effects they intend to. So really, my argument's proportion is relative to how large of an issue you think the original premise is. Another consequence of course is opening your project up to abuse. If people see that you'll cave in to any form of "political correctness" pressure, they'll double down and find more faults, and if there are no more faults they'll create them for you. I'm speaking from experience - This is something we see a lot in the game development community.
  - foota 11y ago
    Can I ask how the issue was created in bad faith?

dragonwriter 11y ago

> For every person and in every culture, offending people is considered wrong. That's actually not at all true. For many people, and in many cultures, certain things are considered both wrong and proper subjects for offense, certain things are considered wrong when they are the subject of offense (and thus are also proper, while not necessary, subjects of offense), and other things are not considered wrong independently of whether some people find them offensive (and, in fact, being offended by them, or at least expressing such offense, may be considered wrong itself.) The idea that anything that anyone finds offensive is, ipso facto, wrong is not a cultural universal, and AFAICT not held by many people at all (even people who seem in some contexts to appeal to that idea seem to find some instances of offense unjustified and unworthy of consideration.)