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Anyone

New member
Sorry, I misread the post and thought lilbunny was discussing the usage of the word fag, not using the word nigger to well, talk about the word nigger. Mea culpa and never again.

In general, yeah, I think words operate within context of a culture and are given power according to that culture. This is not simply about numerical majorities, but a question of institutional power and historical context. Racial slurs directed against a culturally empowered majority lack the significance that those directed against race that has been and is discriminated against on an institutional level.
 
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IloveJBttt

Member
Picture the scene, it's the late 70s in the suburbs of a smallish city in Canada, the 17 year old adouglasmhor is on an extended holiday staying with an aunt and uncle (and is also the only man on the entire North American continent apart from a small scene in New York who is not wearing flared trousers). He has run out of cigarettes, his auntie is at her work; His uncle is at his work; his cousins are at school. He knows roughly where there are some shops so sets of on foot for them, wearing what would have been a relatively tame outfit back in the UK, tartan bondage trousers, shiny doc martens, studded belt, t-shirt, studded biker jacket – I do feel the whole ensemble set of my bright blue hair very well.

After I had been walking for about quarter of an hour through what was a respectable looking middle class area I was surprised when an Ontario Police car stopped beside me and called me over. It went well until they asked what I was doing and I said I was just looking for some fags.
 
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Russo

New member
What about a cultural minority targeting cultural minority and a cultural majority targeting cultural majority?

Targeting or offense towards should not have distinctions

What is offensive will remain so
 
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MasterShady

New member
In my book, intention means a lot.

Every now and then, the N-word-discussion arise in Norway. It usually starts with some public figure using the word, and some other (black) public figure takes offence. Then all TV-studios are filled with 50% people who take offence and 50% people telling the other half that they should not take offence, as they don't mean any disrespect, by calling them the N-word.

If you use a word or say somthing that a culture, religion or ethnic group regards as disrespectful, but you didn't mean any harm with it, then you have done nothing wrong.

If you use a word or say somthing that a culture, religion or ethnic group regards as disrespectful, and you know that they regard it as disrespectful, but you still use the word, as you're amused with the fact that they regard it as disrespectful, then you've done something wrong IMO.

If you use a word or say somthing that a culture, religion or ethnic group regards as disrespectful, you know they regard it as so, but you mean to show disrespect, then you've allso done something wrong IMO.
 
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kee_jaz

New member
That said, those within the same culture or ethnic, say the N word to disrespect each other.

Also, as far as to use it in jocularity

Which all this, doesnt make it right either, but it is overlooked.

It is about getting offended just "because" another culture or ethnic said it.
 
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PostGrungeJunky

Member
At the same time, the "fact" that other people are stupid and/ore inconsequient doesn't excuse me for dropping to the same level. If someone asks me not to use a funny name, or a race-stereotypical-demeanoring word, that is the same for me. Intention is everything, and it's not up to me to point out that "you should not feel offended, because I can prove that you used the same word against one of your own at some point".

That would be as if I "caught" one of my soldiers using a word like "dork" on a fellow soldier; that doesn't mean it's right for me as a 2nd.lt. to adress him as dork.

The way I ended up with this point of wiew was when I dropped the N-word amongst collegues, and one of them got mad at me, using the word, as she had an adopted son with that colour and ethnic background. I defended myself that I didn't know that she had a black son, and that realizing that she did have a black son, I could understand that she felt offended on his behalf, and she was OK with that. That I feel that it was an over-reaction, and that I peronally don't see how someone can go ballistic over a word is sort of irrelevant, IMO, and to show respect, I have stopped using the word.
 
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Rosalie

Member
I'm never sure to what extent people can legitimately claim to "inherit" the grievances of their ancestors.

Is it extra-hurtful to call someone a name that implies slavery when none of their ancestors for more than four or five generations could have been anywhere near slavery?

Can a Jewish person who never met their great-grandparents that fled the concentration camps claim to feel a special hurt in response to references to the holocaust?

Is talking about the potato famine to a young Irishman a special case of insulting despite them having grown up in a modern, EU nation?

I'm not saying it's one way or the other, I'm just saying I don't quite know how it happens. Could it be that a person's family does them a disservice by raising them with a sensitivity to historic wrongs done to their ancestors?
 
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steamedsalad

New member
Whenever I ask a question like this to my wife she tells me that I'm a white male and would never understand (not that bad, but sorta). Really gets under my skin since my people come from Canada >: O
 
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megha

New member
I don't think that you have to be raised in any particular way by your family in order to become a bit sensitive about having either yourself or your forebears insulted or mocked.

Any black person is going to find being called a 'nigger' by whites (or others) insulting, regardless of how far back their ancestors were slaves. Even if none of their ancestors were slaves, it's still an insulting term, and is still used today. It's not like it's just a throwback to the olden days.

It doesn't matter how many generations removed we are from the Holocaust, people are going to remember it and grieve over it, and that is right and proper. And as long as there are as many sickos who continue to gloat about it and say they'd like to see it happen again then it will continue to remain topical. This isn't ancient history - it only ended eighteen years before I was born, and within most of our parents and grandparents lifetimes. There are still many survivors alive, and no doubt many of the perpetrators who dodged justice.

Talking about the potato famine isn't insulting. Making sick jokes about it is though, and is bound to cause offence. People always have a choice whether to try to provoke people or to try to get along with them. But while some people set out to cause offence, others seem to get annoyed by the reaction of those offended! Seems highly two-faced to me.

None of which is meant as a dig at you, because you seem to be simply asking reasonable questions. But I would say that you are naive if you don't realise how much hate speak goes on in this country. Maybe you need to be Black, or Jewish, or Irish, or whatever to be aware of just how much it goes on, I don't know.
 
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Mrhappy

New member
I don't think the ills of racism are nearly as historic as you think.

47martialman I'd agree that what is offensive is offensive, but I would say that the social context and history determines what makes a word offensive or not. Cracker does not have the same weight behind it.
 
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