5 ms·
The sort of language policing taking place in TFA is a club: a blunt-force social weapon that (predominantly white) leftists use to keep each other down, by emp
by stackghost 2y ago
The sort of language policing taking place in TFA is a club: a blunt-force social weapon that (predominantly white) leftists use to keep each other down, by emphasizing the recipient's lack of ideological purity, manifested in this context by being insufficiently sensitive to the possibility of hurting someone's feelings. It's also a great way to make oneself look like one supports causes like anti-racism or decolonialism without having to actually do anything that would require effort or material change to one's lifestyle.
For example: "spook" was allegedly used at some point as a slur against black people, so if you have ever used the term "spooky" in a Hallowe'en context you have committed the immortal sin of doing a structural racism.
To the underemployed university administrative staff who have never experienced real hardships, this sort of thing is a Big Deal(tm), except we can't call it that because it's insensitive to short people. Correction: people experiencing heightlessness.
- motorest 2y ago> The sort of language policing taking place in TFA is a club: a blunt-force social weapon that (predominantly white) leftists use to keep each other down, by emphasizing the recipient's lack of ideological purity, manifested in this context by being insufficiently sensitive to the possibility of hurting someone's feelings. To this, I call out the case of the words Spanish speakers have been using to refer to disabled persons. The word for "disabled person" was at a point in time deemed too insensitive and an outright insult, so around the 1970s the word "subnormal" started showing up even in government acts to appease the virtue signaling crowd. Except that after a few years the word "subnormal" also managed to find itself as a prime example of a gross PC violation, and therefore they coined the term "minusválido" (i.e., "less than valid", a milder form of "invalid") to appease the PC gods. But lo and behold, "minusválido" is now also looked poorly by the PC crowd as being offensive. https://languageacts.org/loaded-meanings/schools-teachers/rise-and-fall-minusv%C3%A1lido/ https://languageacts.org/loaded-meanings/schools-teachers/ri...
- stackghost 2y ago>disabled persons How à propos, because in English "disabled" is no longer acceptable and they now demand that you say "differently-abled".
- Double_a_92 2y agoIronically that feels kinda rude to me. Like if I wasn't able to walk, I would want people to aknowledge that... instead of pretending that I just move differently.
- etblg 2y agoWell.......if you weren't able to walk, you would be moving differently, not exactly pretending would it be? I mean hell it's not even a less accurate description, you're not able to walk but you're able to move around using crutches or a wheelchair or other mobility device. A person who isn't able to walk may still be able to do almost everything day to day (well aside from walking) that a non-disabled (or non-differently abled person, ok that sounds kinda weird) person would be able to, albeit in a different way.
- Double_a_92 2y agoBecause it somewhat removes that implication that that different way is harder to live with.
- Nursie 2y agoEh, I think “People with disabilities” has now taken over, the idea being to emphasise that they are people. It feels… inconsequential.
- djur 2y ago"Differently-abled" feels '90s corpo to me. The disability rights people I know pretty much all favor "disabled" or "with disability" and have for many years.
- novemp 2y agoLiterally no disabled person says "differently abled".
- toxik 2y agoPinker wrote about this process, nothing to do with political correctness. https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/euphemism_treadmill https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/euphemism_treadmill
- f1shy 2y agoHell even discapacitado (disabled) is incorrenow. Now correct is “person with different capabilities”
- smsm42 2y agoEuphemism treadmill is real and never stops.
- themaninthedark 2y agoGeorge Carlinwas calling it out in the 90's https://youtu.be/o25I2fzFGoY?si=0a6rXtCboK-suL-4 https://youtu.be/o25I2fzFGoY?si=0a6rXtCboK-suL-4
- Mountain_Skies 2y agoIt's interesting that so much of this comes from academia but they exempt themselves from so much of it. The moral panic over the use of the word "master" in any context somehow turned a blind eye to master's degrees. Academics felt their usage was ok by their own ever shifting relative criteria that everyone else is expected to constantly contort themselves to follow. Very convenient how that works for them.
- djur 2y agoPeople (mistakenly, I believe) thought that "master branch" was derived from the disk and database "master"/"slave" metaphor, which had started being eliminated years earlier. "Master branch" was also a fairly recent coinage (within my career) limited to a few specific tools, so changing it wasn't moving mountains.