4 ms·

Yes.

by lawly 9y ago

Yes.

jballanc 9y ago
I mean, I'm no fan of the British, but I wouldn't call them "scum". Oh, or did you mean a different situation where a misunderstanding via text led to a murder? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1356632/Man-killed-friend-row-mis-spelt-text-message.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1356632/Man-killed-f...
- lawly 9y ago
  Oh, yes, let's pretend it's the same thing when a nutjob commits manslaughter and a family comes together over knives to commit premeditated murder of a man coming to apologize to defend the honor of the family's daughter.
jancsika 9y ago
This is an instructive escalation. User ewjordan's original comment is clearly calling out a bad institution-- an "honor-based patriarchal culture"-- for encouraging a specific bad actor (or at least a specific class of bad actors) to murder other human beings. I say bad actor because ewjordan saw fit to emphasize-- using the heightened language "damn well"-- that everyone knows about the potential for ambiguity in the choice of text. People who jump on an ambiguity in a patriarchal society for a chance to do murder are clearly bad actors. Hence, the word scum probably seems like a fitting epithet for such a bad actor. The problem is that heightened language always ends up obscuring one's point. For example, is user dvfjsdhgfv agreeing with ewjordan or extending the critique more broadly to include people who aren't obviously bad actors? It isn't clear to me. User Kenji's logic is less ambiguous, however. Since it is "their culture" which "causes causes behaviour you'd expect of savages a couple thousand years ago", the use of the word "scum" is deemed appropriate. Yet, using "scum" to describe a "culture" is awkward, and seems to suggest that it is the inhabitants of that culture who are in fact being called "scum" here. Does that include both bad faith and good faith actors? User jballanc asks for clarification on this, and by now user lawly is apparently confident enough to give a one-word answer: "Yes." Finally, just to confirm that the understanding is that we're indeed applying the descriptor "scum" to large swaths of human beings, user jballanc gives the counter-argument based on that logic: > I mean, I'm no fan of the British, but I wouldn't call them "scum". This is why I try to avoid using heightened language especially when describing people who commit horrific acts.
- ewjordan 9y ago
  FWIW I'm totally with you here: this particular family was who I was aiming the "scum" comment at, not the entire culture. I'm never going to do a song and dance in favor of that culture, though, because it is pretty messed up if it encourages that kind of behavior. That doesn't mean that everyone in the fold is a bad actor, so I'd hesitate to paint so many people with the same brush. Some or most are probably decent folk that would never support shit like this. I do stand behind my word choice as written and clarified here, though.

Yes.

by lawly 9y ago

Yes.

I mean, I'm no fan of the British, but I wouldn't call them "scum". Oh, or did you mean a different situation where a misunderstanding via text led to a murder? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1356632/Man-killed-friend-row-mis-spelt-text-message.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1356632/Man-killed-f...

lawly 9y ago
Oh, yes, let's pretend it's the same thing when a nutjob commits manslaughter and a family comes together over knives to commit premeditated murder of a man coming to apologize to defend the honor of the family's daughter.

jancsika 9y ago

This is an instructive escalation. User ewjordan's original comment is clearly calling out a bad institution-- an "honor-based patriarchal culture"-- for encouraging a specific bad actor (or at least a specific class of bad actors) to murder other human beings. I say bad actor because ewjordan saw fit to emphasize-- using the heightened language "damn well"-- that everyone knows about the potential for ambiguity in the choice of text. People who jump on an ambiguity in a patriarchal society for a chance to do murder are clearly bad actors. Hence, the word scum probably seems like a fitting epithet for such a bad actor. The problem is that heightened language always ends up obscuring one's point. For example, is user dvfjsdhgfv agreeing with ewjordan or extending the critique more broadly to include people who aren't obviously bad actors? It isn't clear to me. User Kenji's logic is less ambiguous, however. Since it is "their culture" which "causes causes behaviour you'd expect of savages a couple thousand years ago", the use of the word "scum" is deemed appropriate. Yet, using "scum" to describe a "culture" is awkward, and seems to suggest that it is the inhabitants of that culture who are in fact being called "scum" here. Does that include both bad faith and good faith actors? User jballanc asks for clarification on this, and by now user lawly is apparently confident enough to give a one-word answer: "Yes." Finally, just to confirm that the understanding is that we're indeed applying the descriptor "scum" to large swaths of human beings, user jballanc gives the counter-argument based on that logic: > I mean, I'm no fan of the British, but I wouldn't call them "scum". This is why I try to avoid using heightened language especially when describing people who commit horrific acts.

ewjordan 9y ago
FWIW I'm totally with you here: this particular family was who I was aiming the "scum" comment at, not the entire culture. I'm never going to do a song and dance in favor of that culture, though, because it is pretty messed up if it encourages that kind of behavior. That doesn't mean that everyone in the fold is a bad actor, so I'd hesitate to paint so many people with the same brush. Some or most are probably decent folk that would never support shit like this. I do stand behind my word choice as written and clarified here, though.