The Angry Dome

[TheMightyEthan]

Offensive to the black people I know.

 

*Edit* - And I did say it's "a little" offensive.  It's not like the worst thing you could call them.

Edited October 19, 2013 by TheMightyEthan

[Vecha]

Offensive to the black people I know.

Then I guess we are at a stalemate.

 

ETA:

 

I feel intent is more important than just using a word as innocent as "Blacks/Asians/whatever" 

 

I also wouldn't use "a blacK" feels awkward without man/woman/boy/girl right after.

 

 

ETAA: Yeah..."little" is an important keyword there that I should have paid attention to. 

Edited October 19, 2013 by Vecha

[Mr. GOH!]

I recall my black classmates in law school being quite taken aback by a student who used the terms "blacks" instead if "black people" in class. This student later caused an uproar when he essentially said that "spic" isn't a racial slur.

[Vecha]

I recall my black classmates in law school being quite taken aback by a student who used the terms "blacks" instead if "black people" in class. This student later caused an uproar when he essentially said that "spic" isn't a racial slur.

 

Well, he's a fucking asshole. 

 

Are you implying "blacks" is a racial slur.....or just slightly offensive?

 

 

I mean, 

 

"More blacks voted in the last local election than whites" is a world of difference from, "There were many spics who voted last year"

 

I mean, fuck.

[TheMightyEthan]

When you put it that way, it is possible it's a regional thing to some degree.  I do sometimes hear reporters on national news (like when talking about votes, which is why your example triggered this thought) refer to "blacks", but it's always seemed really weird that they would say that, rather than something like "black voters".

[Waldorf and Statler]

If somebody called me a spic and I knew they weren't kidding around I'd get pretty pissed.

 

As to African American vs Black, I remember reading a study where when asked what they preferred being called "Black" was largely dominant, followed by African American.

 

At the bottom of the preferred names was "you people"

 

But yeah as to what is offensive, it comes to the individual person. Let's put it this way. While in college I hang out with quite a lot of colorful people (as in not in their skin, but their personalities). For them using words like "faggot", "jew", and "nigger" is not at all meant as an insult to whomever the word is/was primarily used against but for different reasons. We don't have a "we have a [blank] friend so it's ok" excuse, well except for me and another hispanic for hispanic jokes and one black friend currently working in Disney Japan, but everybody who has heard us use the terms understands that the use is more of the internet culture's use of the word. (in fact 99% of the use of the above words are for 'you asshole' or ar related phrase). We obviously try to not say these words out loud in public as somebody is bound to get offended but thankfully when they escape our mouths in public settings, it usually is met by laughs.

 

We should of course respect each other to not say derogatory terms in a mean way or say them often, but I personally believe that getting offended for someone else more than the person him/herself is taking a bit too far. Maybe we're tired of the 'white guilt'. I hang out, as you can tell, with some of the most politcally incorrect people I know because I don't want to be treading through egg shells on every occasion.

[Mercurial]

So can we put it to bed as dialect differences and stop trying to get on the moral high ground? 

Edited October 19, 2013 by Mercurial

[Vecha]

When you put it that way, it is possible it's a regional thing to some degree.  I do sometimes hear reporters on national news (like when talking about votes, which is why your example triggered this thought) refer to "blacks", but it's always seemed really weird that they would say that, rather than something like "black voters".

Possible. I've heard blacks/black voter used interchangeably.

 

I think it all has to do with intent. 

 

[Waldorf and Statler]

^that.

[CorgiShinobi]

This reminds me of the time when a couple of freshmen from my high school were joking around. Somehow the conversation shifted to milk and one of them asked where chocolate milk came from. All the upperclassmen, myself included, just stood amazed at this turn of events. So one of the little ones says, "Uh, I dunno, a black cow?"

 

Then one of the seniors says, "Guys, you do know there's a black guy behind you."

 

The freshmen start getting scared thinking this dude is going to get all Black Panther in their face because they said "black," but he doesn't do anything. He didn't even hear them, and even if he did, the hell would he have been offended by? A retarded conversation about chocolate milk.

 

So yeah, I think there's a lot of white guilt rather than racism at times. There's that whole Redskins controversy now, but all I hear/see talking about it is a bunch of white men.

[TheMightyEthan]

Yeah, that's retarded that someone would think that chocolate milk thing would offend a black guy.  "OMG!  You said black!"

 

The most ridiculous usage of the term "Africa-American" I've ever encountered was in a documentary I saw some years ago (maybe like 10? I was in high school at the time..) that referred to black Africans, living in Africa, whose ancestors had never left Africa, as "African-Americans".  

 

Re: the Redskins thing: My wife, who's part Native American and usually fairly sensitive to negative references to Native Americans, doesn't have a problem with that one because "redskin" is a (rough translation of a) term the Native Americans themselves came up with themselves to distinguish themselves from Europeans.  Obviously the fact that one person is okay with it doesn't make it generally okay (see the "I have a black friend who doesn't mind..." type comments), but I just thought it was interesting.

 

@Wally:  I agree to some extent that it's the intent of the person using the word that should determine whether it's offensive, but when you're using racial/sexual epithets as insults, the implication is that whatever negative characteristic you're insulting is shared by the group the epithet refers to, which is insulting to that entire group.

[Vecha]

The whole brouhaha was started by my erroneous statement about UA...wasn't until 1970 when Penn State gave UA an embarrassing loss that UA finally let blacks/black people/African-Americans on their team. 

Guess no one caught it because there aren't many college football fans(I'm hardly one).

My late friend(who passed away almost a year ago) told me to tell my brother-in-law that UA was the first team to allow blacks/black people/African-Americans on their team. It took me almost two years to see he wanted me to cause them to flip out(They are from Pennsylvania).

That sly fucker.

 

[Waldorf and Statler]

Chocolate Milk comes from black cizzows yo, ya feel me homie?

[Thursday Next]

Referring to any group by a physical feature is going to be somewhat problematic, "blondes" could be considered derisory depending on context. Serious offense to "blacks" should however be avoided provided you are not telling people to "never relax around" them.

[deanb]

And this advice from a man who admits he likes to use the word "niggardly" around american company visitors?

[Thursday Next]

Hahaha. I do love that. It causes huuuuge discomfort in a room.

[Mr. GOH!]

http://kotaku.com/if-you-dont-understand-the-difference-between-import-ta-1449769259

 

This thread. So angry at the massive stupid from the original commenter and his idiot cohort.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

http://kotaku.com/if-you-dont-understand-the-difference-between-import-ta-1449769259

 

This thread. So angry at the massive stupid from the original commenter and his idiot cohort.

 

You really shouldn't let people like that get to you.

 

After this and  your status the other day I really think it's time to take a break from being socially active on the internet.

[madbassman39]

Getting worked up by idiots on the internet is infuriating. I always find myself mad at myself for getting caught up, and mad at the other person. You can't fix stupid, and sometimes you just need to walk away, even if they act like the victors (a big pet peeve of mine is when you walk away and they act like they destroyed your intellect).

 

It doesn't help that I enjoy debating and arguing in a respectable manor. Thats one of the reasons I really enjoy this atmosphere, because there seems to be a mutual respect amongst users, even if it seems like things get a bit heated.

 

I was glad when Gawker went to kinja and tried to force people to connect their facebook accounts, because it stopped me from commenting on their sites. For some reason almost all Gawker sites tend to have some of the worst commentors on the internet, which people generally agree with. I still read their sites, for better or worse, but they are the last source I go to, so most of their articles I've already read on other sites. Jalopnik seems to have quality commentors (when politics aren't too involved), but when talking about cars you love, its hard to argue with a person who loves a good car over another good car :/ . Thats the last Gawker site I still respect

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

You base how much you respect a site based on the comments they get? That... makes no sense.

[madbassman39]

No, I base it off of the articles and content. Gawker sites have started to care less about the quality of the article and posting one liner articles and click baiting.

 

I think I got a bit distracted when writing that last post. :/. I meant to say that the only site that I would want to join to comment is Jalopnik because the quality of the commentors, and I still respect the the site as well and use it for regular news.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

Have you been on Kotaku lately? As long as it's not a Patricia Hernandez article it's usually well-done enough. Totilo being in charge really made the site not shit once again. The comments... well sometimes you get lucky with something intelligent but most of the time they can be ignored.

 

What about Lifehacker and io9?

 

Gizmodo can go either way. Some of it's quality, some of it is clearly them just dicking around, but most of the time it's entertaining.

Edited October 22, 2013 by Faiblesse Des Sens

[madbassman39]

I've never gotten into Life Hacker and io9, minus the few links that went there. I dropped Gizmodo almost completely, and I havent really read too many articles on Kotaku because I started to get the same stories and articles from other sites. Maybe I'll try reading their articles even though I probably have read similar articles on other sites.

[Mister Jack]

I love my best friend like a brother but god damn he annoys the shit out of me sometimes when he stubbornly refuses to admit when he's blatantly wrong about something, and it's always something really minor and stupid.  We were talking about Vin Diesel and then the subject of Pitch Black comes up and he claims that at the end of the movie Riddick intentionally gets Fry killed by the alien to save his own hide.  I say "What?  That doesn't sound right.  I'm pretty sure her death was an accident."  He insists Riddick kills her on purpose so we go find the movie to settle the debate.  The scene in question makes it blatantly obvious that I'm right.  I rewound the fucker about 20 times just to look for any possibility that my friend is right and I found nothing whatsoever to support his claim.  I point out down to the second every instance that disproves his theory and he still won't budge. 

 

Then, I don't even know how we got on this one, he claims that Pitch Black is a coming of age story because Fry goes from a selfish person who wouldn't risk herself for others to a selfless person who does.  I tell him that isn't coming of age, it's just regular character development.  He says it IS coming of age because Fry is immature to not risk herself for the sake of others and that by changing her stance on that she "grows up." 

 

We ended up going back and forth on this for half an hour.  I know it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things and that the whole debate is trivial but god damn, is it that hard to understand how a fucking coming of age story works?!

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

I think you're both wrong for even having that discussion/argument in the first place and then dedicating so much time to talking about it.