2 ms·

Unspoken in all of this is that one would think that history started in 1777 and didn't happen anywhere but America. The world has a long and difficult history

by jariel 6y ago

Unspoken in all of this is that one would think that history started in 1777 and didn't happen anywhere but America. The world has a long and difficult history, and we could do this ad nauseum. Everyone has a right to feel unsettled, but that doesn't mean that everyone else doesn't have a right to use common language. Slavery has existed for thousands of years in every form, in every place on the planet, and it's touched everyone in one way or another. Confederate statues are one thing, common language is another. " The names, she says, “make visible the values and priorities and beliefs of an institution.”" This is Orwellian: "He who controls the present, controls the past, he who controls the past controls the future." Abraham Lincoln, by any reasonable definition, was a White Supremacist, and so was George Washington. Good look fighting over that. This is not a 'dangling thread', it's the entire sweater - and it will be used by totalitarian advocates to shape the future in their own image.

happytoexplain 6y ago
>that doesn't mean that everyone else doesn't have a right to use common language. Nobody is suggesting otherwise.
- jariel 6y ago
  ? They absolutely are requiring people to change their language. That's literally 1/2 the article. The term 'noosing' is perfectly reasonable language for describing how lizards are 'noosed'. Blacklist/Whitelists - again, perfectly reasonable language. People are being asked to change the use of their language for no pragmatic reason: even among possibly offended groups, nobody cares. If you were to ask 1000 random African Americans for some things they feel should change about America to make it more fair, and to combat systematic racism - 0 of them would identify the terms 'whitelist and blacklist' as problematic language. These are tropes in the minds of people who think for a living, and who have little better to do than argue over words like 'noosing'. There's legitimacy in the concept of 'micro triggers' etc. but I think it's been taken entirely out of context.
  - a1369209993 6y ago
    > They absolutely are requiring people to change their language. I think happytoexplain is making a (unjustified, but understandable) distinction between 'common' language versus technical jargon? Fucking up the latter inevitably damages the former, but that's not necessarily obvious to someone who thinks "oh we're just inconveniencing a few stubborn specialists".
    - jariel 6y ago
      It's not technical jargon. 'Noosing' the animal is not a term invented by Scientists, it's a colloquial term they've borrowed from trappers and hunters. It's just a 'regular term' and it's part of language. Why don't you check here by Googling "noosing a lizard". [1] Have a look at the myriad of results. There is not a single instance or comment anywhere on any of the videos etc. about such language being 'inappropriate' - because it isn't. Nobody but a single person is complaining about it. It's completely absurd to consider the concept of 'noosing an animal' as racially insensitive - if that is offensive - than everything is. By this logic, the 'threshold' for 'banning terms' would be effectively to condemn language that has literally a handful of people in the world who object to it. Now - the 'n-word' for example, is obviously inappropriate. What we need is common sense, and the ability to reasonably be able to draw the line somewhere. What is happening, is that a certain kind of people intellectualise the ordeal and loose sight of any material reality. Not that different from startups let by very smart people who spend a lot of money building products that nobody wants (how can that possibly happen?). [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=noosing+a+lizard&rlz=1C5CHFA_enCA869CA869&oq=noosing+a+lizard&aqs=chrome..69i57.3637j0j9&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=noosing+a+lizard&rlz=1C5CHFA...
      - a1369209993 6y ago
        > It's not technical jargon. 'Noosing' the animal is not a term invented by Scientists, it's a colloquial term they've borrowed from trappers and hunters. It's just a 'regular term' and it's part of language. > > (unjustified, but understandable) distinction [emphasis added] Natural language does not work the way it would have to for that distinction to make sense, and I did not claim otherwise; rather, I was pointing out the happytoexplain might not have realized that such a distinction makes no sense.

by jariel 6y ago

happytoexplain 6y ago

>that doesn't mean that everyone else doesn't have a right to use common language. Nobody is suggesting otherwise.

jariel 6y ago
? They absolutely are requiring people to change their language. That's literally 1/2 the article. The term 'noosing' is perfectly reasonable language for describing how lizards are 'noosed'. Blacklist/Whitelists - again, perfectly reasonable language. People are being asked to change the use of their language for no pragmatic reason: even among possibly offended groups, nobody cares. If you were to ask 1000 random African Americans for some things they feel should change about America to make it more fair, and to combat systematic racism - 0 of them would identify the terms 'whitelist and blacklist' as problematic language. These are tropes in the minds of people who think for a living, and who have little better to do than argue over words like 'noosing'. There's legitimacy in the concept of 'micro triggers' etc. but I think it's been taken entirely out of context.
- a1369209993 6y ago
  > They absolutely are requiring people to change their language. I think happytoexplain is making a (unjustified, but understandable) distinction between 'common' language versus technical jargon? Fucking up the latter inevitably damages the former, but that's not necessarily obvious to someone who thinks "oh we're just inconveniencing a few stubborn specialists".
  - jariel 6y ago
    It's not technical jargon. 'Noosing' the animal is not a term invented by Scientists, it's a colloquial term they've borrowed from trappers and hunters. It's just a 'regular term' and it's part of language. Why don't you check here by Googling "noosing a lizard". [1] Have a look at the myriad of results. There is not a single instance or comment anywhere on any of the videos etc. about such language being 'inappropriate' - because it isn't. Nobody but a single person is complaining about it. It's completely absurd to consider the concept of 'noosing an animal' as racially insensitive - if that is offensive - than everything is. By this logic, the 'threshold' for 'banning terms' would be effectively to condemn language that has literally a handful of people in the world who object to it. Now - the 'n-word' for example, is obviously inappropriate. What we need is common sense, and the ability to reasonably be able to draw the line somewhere. What is happening, is that a certain kind of people intellectualise the ordeal and loose sight of any material reality. Not that different from startups let by very smart people who spend a lot of money building products that nobody wants (how can that possibly happen?). [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=noosing+a+lizard&rlz=1C5CHFA_enCA869CA869&oq=noosing+a+lizard&aqs=chrome..69i57.3637j0j9&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=noosing+a+lizard&rlz=1C5CHFA...
    - a1369209993 6y ago
      > It's not technical jargon. 'Noosing' the animal is not a term invented by Scientists, it's a colloquial term they've borrowed from trappers and hunters. It's just a 'regular term' and it's part of language. > > (unjustified, but understandable) distinction [emphasis added] Natural language does not work the way it would have to for that distinction to make sense, and I did not claim otherwise; rather, I was pointing out the happytoexplain might not have realized that such a distinction makes no sense.