4 ms·

Dude, 1.) Perspective. This isn't the same at all as saddam and has nothing to do with the first amendment. 2.) This casual usage of the concept of lynchin

by LPTS 18y ago

Dude, 1.) Perspective. This isn't the same at all as saddam and has nothing to do with the first amendment. 2.) This casual usage of the concept of lynching bothers me. A lot. I would probably fire someone who threw it around casually like this, on the spot. Go have a conversation about it with people from the communities that actually dealt with lynching, and read a damn history book or two. Would you say Microsoft 'holocausted' a company they bought out or drove out of business? Fuck no. Don't say 'lynching' in such a casual way. It trivializes decades of horrible abuse towards an entire race of people and creates an environment where a lot of people feel subliminal racism. You might not know anyone to point out to you just how grating things like this sound to people, or perpetuates racism, so let me. 3.) Your concept of evolution is very narrow and, well, unevolved. Evolution just deals with how a system responds to it's environment. No restriction will stop evolution, it will just evolve around whatever change happens. Digg evolved to blow goats, it's still evolution. 4.) Stop identifying with your ideas so much. Who cares if people downvote your ideas. Either they are wrong, or you are. You can learn something either way. Maybe what you learn makes you think the community is wrong, or that you are wrong, or that you could just write better. It's not a really a judgement on you.

kyro 18y ago
And of course, people should also refrain from saying 'I just baked a pizza' to a Jew, 'My dad is going to whip my ass' to a black person, and 'I bombed that test' to a relative of a fallen soldier. Sure, lynch can be used offensively, but then you'd have to look at it contextually. No dictionary returned a result for 'to Holocaust,' either.
- LPTS 18y ago
  I think the word "lynching" cannot casually be used non offensively by a community of mostly white people. There is no context where a community of white people casually joking about lynching isn't going to cause minorities to feel subliminal racism. It's way different then casually saying you baked a pizza to a jewish person.
  - kyro 18y ago
    There is no context where a community of white people casually joking about lynching isn't going to cause minorities to feel subliminal racism. That's a lot of fucking context.
    - LPTS 18y ago
      The context is the experience of the minorities who come from communities hurt by this and may also be reading here. Such a person might look at it (a group of mostly white people making light of lynching here), and put it in their context (decades of experience with their culture being hurt and violently repressed by groups of white people who liked lynching) and not feel quite so safe or welcome. Remember, lynching was a mechanism of control to keep minorities well behaved. The senate only apologized for lynching in the US in 2005 (too many republicans objected before that). There was a lynching in 1998, not to mention several more recent gay bashings that meet the criteria of lynching. It still happens. The relevant context isn't mine or yours, it's the minorities. Take a damn sensitivity class. This is controversial?
  - thaumaturgy 18y ago
    | ...by a community of mostly white people. That is, by definition, a racist sentiment. I know that you won't see it that way, but it's still worth pointing out anyway. What a person does or does not take offense to is entirely up to them. I happen to think that it's reasonable to consider both the context and the intent of what's said, but some folks just like to get wound up about things.
    - LPTS 18y ago
      No. It's a sentiment about demographics that relates to race. If you don't see a difference between that and being racist, I don't really know what to say to you. There are lots and lots of people alive in their 40s and 50s who survived or had family lynched. There are lots of people in their 20s and 30s who's childhood (like what side of town they could go to and what girls or boys they could date) was deeply affected by aftershocks from this. It's not so much about taking offensive as not triggering something that is still salient in a lot of people we should want to feel comfortable here.

by LPTS 18y ago

kyro 18y ago

And of course, people should also refrain from saying 'I just baked a pizza' to a Jew, 'My dad is going to whip my ass' to a black person, and 'I bombed that test' to a relative of a fallen soldier. Sure, lynch can be used offensively, but then you'd have to look at it contextually. No dictionary returned a result for 'to Holocaust,' either.

LPTS 18y ago
I think the word "lynching" cannot casually be used non offensively by a community of mostly white people. There is no context where a community of white people casually joking about lynching isn't going to cause minorities to feel subliminal racism. It's way different then casually saying you baked a pizza to a jewish person.
- kyro 18y ago
  There is no context where a community of white people casually joking about lynching isn't going to cause minorities to feel subliminal racism. That's a lot of fucking context.
  - LPTS 18y ago
    The context is the experience of the minorities who come from communities hurt by this and may also be reading here. Such a person might look at it (a group of mostly white people making light of lynching here), and put it in their context (decades of experience with their culture being hurt and violently repressed by groups of white people who liked lynching) and not feel quite so safe or welcome. Remember, lynching was a mechanism of control to keep minorities well behaved. The senate only apologized for lynching in the US in 2005 (too many republicans objected before that). There was a lynching in 1998, not to mention several more recent gay bashings that meet the criteria of lynching. It still happens. The relevant context isn't mine or yours, it's the minorities. Take a damn sensitivity class. This is controversial?
- thaumaturgy 18y ago
  | ...by a community of mostly white people. That is, by definition, a racist sentiment. I know that you won't see it that way, but it's still worth pointing out anyway. What a person does or does not take offense to is entirely up to them. I happen to think that it's reasonable to consider both the context and the intent of what's said, but some folks just like to get wound up about things.
  - LPTS 18y ago
    No. It's a sentiment about demographics that relates to race. If you don't see a difference between that and being racist, I don't really know what to say to you. There are lots and lots of people alive in their 40s and 50s who survived or had family lynched. There are lots of people in their 20s and 30s who's childhood (like what side of town they could go to and what girls or boys they could date) was deeply affected by aftershocks from this. It's not so much about taking offensive as not triggering something that is still salient in a lot of people we should want to feel comfortable here.