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We must do something. This is something. Therefore, we must do this. or as a black friend of mine is fond of saying about such signaling acts, “the powers th
by hprotagonist 4y ago
We must do something.
This is something.
Therefore, we must do this.
or as a black friend of mine is fond of saying about such signaling acts, “the powers that be will go to great lengths to be seen to be doing something while maintaining the status quo”
- butterNaN 4y agoWould your black friend be okay with racial slurs thrown at him?
- flappyeagle 4y agono one likes to be insulted. I don't think he would be ok being called a moron either. therefore we should ban "moron".
- drxzcl 4y agoExactly that most places actually do ban ‘moron’ in official communications and have done so for ages. It’s an extremely ableist term, it’s does not simply mean “stupid”.
- Macha 4y agoI have to say, most places that go so far as to ban moron also ban stupid.
- enkid 4y agoWho's banning? None of the lists the author talks about actually bans any language. They advise.
- Avicebron 4y agoI think the point is that if someone does not comply with their advice they might have their life impacted in a negative way, can't get job, grants, ostracized, etc. Which de facto becomes a ban.
- dang 4y ago"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- butterNaN 4y agoI may have worded it better. Provocation is not the best tool. My point is that there is already a "forbidden-word" list that everyone can easily agree with - which include things such as racial/discriminatory slurs. Then why is it such a stretch to understand that some words actually do hurt people? (I mean I know why - it involves conscious mental work, and human brain is optimised for shortcuts.) One might be dissatisfied with some words in "the list", but what I see here is the rejection of the very idea that such lists have value. People who are affected by those words should ultimately be the deciders on the usage of those words, not people who have privilege. While it may feel like it's "only something", it's still better than what was before - namely, nothing.
- nonethewiser 4y agoWhy did you identify him as your black friend? Instead of your friend? The quote isn’t even about race.
- yieldcrv 4y agoI think its because its much more likely that the friend is a reluctant beneficiary of signaling, not part of the powers that be I don't have any opinion on whether it made it meaningful to add race there, that way
- hprotagonist 4y agohis point is that such signaling is annoying on its face (it’s smarmy and patronizing) and also annoying because it doesn’t benefit him: especially compared to, say, competitive job offers, recruitment efforts at HBCs, etc. Actions that aren’t primarily focused on “showing”, but are concerned more with “doing”.
- yieldcrv 4y agoHBCUs yes, agreed
- naasking 4y agoIf it meant breaking the status quo on more meaningful quality of life metrics, like being able to get better jobs or better mortgages, I'm not sure the answer is so obvious.
- nobodyandproud 4y agoIt doesn’t. The NY Times put a moratorium on anti-Asian aggression by Black Americans during the early days of COVID. Yet they made an exception for a White on Asian, but all that did was mask the actual problem in society. Growing up as an immigrant, the racism in non-White American circles is also very real but never spoken of.
- smcl 4y agoThe problem is that many of the same people who rail against guidelines that encourage more neutral language also dislike things like affirmative action, scholarships for minorities, investment/stimulus in poorer areas or other governmental support for poorer people. So I guess you just have to hope problems like inequality resolve themselves. Fingers crossed eh!
- poszlem 4y agoThe problems like "inequality" did not happen because we had equality. They arose because we had discrimination. Many of the same people who rail against guidelines that encourage more neutral language also don't agree that "the only cure to the past discrimination is present discrimination". It does not sound crazy to me.
- smcl 4y agoYes it doesn't sound crazy because you're not describing reality - you're describing the fictional world where you are being victimised because you're not a minority. This line of reasoning is a favourite with white supremacists and "actually it's racist to try to address racism" is the first step on that road.
- Levitz 4y ago>also dislike things like affirmative action, scholarships for minorities, investment/stimulus in poorer areas or other governmental support for poorer people. In my experience, the "Don't help poor people" and "Don't be racist when supporting people" are not the same group.
- StrangeATractor 4y agoA slightly different take is that it's easier to police people's language than to try to change the world.
- skidd0 4y agoPolicing language changes the world and it does so in a double-plus-ungood way.
- Macha 4y agoThis is the same take. Visibility = Number of people impacted * level of impact Getting a high level of impact is hard. A company word list stacks the other side of the equation. That visibility gives people a feeling of impact and something to point out, to convince themselves they're doing good in the world, while at the same time they're funding the politician that is gerrymandering to reduce the voting impact of black people, for example.