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Yes, it's confusing, and a dictionary won't help, because it's religious jargon. Religious jargon, whether from a theistic or, currently, a non-theistic religio
by SiVal 5y ago
Yes, it's confusing, and a dictionary won't help, because it's religious jargon. Religious jargon, whether from a theistic or, currently, a non-theistic religion, is used to turn comments about nearly anything into declarations of faith.
When a single religion dominates academia, as has often been the case through the centuries, they can comment on anything, but it will always be expressed in the form of an argument for their institution's religious doctrines. Professors at Cambridge in the early 17th century were almost all puritans, so they could talk about chemistry experiments, but it would have to be presented as yet more proof of the glory of God and include some jab at popery.
In the religion of today's academies, they can choose to talk about Brontë family artifacts as being emblems of "white supremacy" that should be hidden or destroyed or public goods that need to be "decolonized" (opened and freely given to all), but either way, the jargon combines the opinion with the jab at "popery" required by their co-religionists.
- antonvs 5y agoBuried in your comment was a short, simple definition of how the term is being used here: > "decolonized" (opened and freely given to all) Given that it's a word whose meaning you apparently understood in this context, was the rest of your comment really necessary? Its frothiness makes the whole "religious" charge seem like projection.
- SiVal 5y agoThe meaning was not simply open and freely given to all. It was that plus a payload of a specific type of condemnation of historical villains that is fundamental to the current campus dogma. The meaning of "made available to the public" is not one of the dictionary senses of the term "decolonized", which caused the "confusion" mentioned by the questioner. The "open" part of the meaning as well as the full implication can only be parsed if you recognize the doctrinal jargon.
- antonvs 5y agoI've described the meaning the author used here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27889686 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27889686 The rest seems to be you just jerking your knee at a term that triggers you. Here on HN people will use computer jargon or appropriated scientific jargon to describe things. Guess what, the same happens in other circles, just with different terms. The culture war you're fighting is all in your head.