I wasn’t saying that I’m going to go around personally asking people to refer to me that way, I more meant that I would prefer if that was just an open and accepted thing that allies could joke about slurs with their friends in said community instead of gatekeeping the words or taking exclusive ownership of them. I was expressing that as a personal preference though because I understand that not everyone feels that way.
And I do agree that more education and acceptance is more likely to reduce the use of those words negatively through just proximity to the affected parties. That’s totally fair. I still don’t think it will go away entirely because edgey people online see it as a vector of attacking people.
So the part I disagree with it the “people will just make new slurs” part. The way slurs are created and used kind of relies on large groups of people to use and agree on them. They’re a form of meme. And I’m sure people would attempt to recreate them but your average Joe isn’t going to search that out. Those new slurs would become much more niche I’d imagine.
Sure, and your average Joe isn’t throwing around slurs by accident, or at least they’re not doing it intentionally.
But intolerant groups will create new terms, or co-opt existing terms. Look at “black pill” (from “red pill” from The Matrix), the “ok” hand signal (co-opted by white nationalists), or “woke” (pretty old, but “anti-woke” became a rallying call for the right). It can and does happen, and that’s not including all of the terms used behind the scenes that are likely going to come out to the public over the next 10 years or whatever.
The way I see it, there are a few types of people here:
use it intentionally to hurt others for whatever reason - this group will come up with new terms
people who use it on accident - this is your average joe, the quiet majority, who probably doesn’t know what the term means/implies
people who actively avoid it/are hurt by it
Taking offense to terms benefits group 1, normalizing them benefits group 3, and in either case, group 2 is left largely confused. IMO, that doesn’t particularly help anyone, and the goal should instead be to get groups 2 and 3 to interact so it’s clear that group 2 isn’t intending to cause harm. That way it doesn’t particularly matter what group 1 does, group 3 will hopefully be able to distinguish honest mistakes from actual intended harm (i.e. distinguish between someone in groups 1 and 2).
In the case of this article, it would help for those in group 3 to understand that these kids have likely never met a black person. It would also help for those in group 2 to actually meet black people and understand the struggles they go through so they can appreciate why these terms are so hurtful. Unfortunately, a lot of people online and in person seem to jump to the conclusion that a given slur was used intentionally as hate speech, and that’s a failing IMO on both sides of that equation. Groups 2 and 3 both agree that group 1 sucks, yet groups 2 and 3 are frequently at odds with each other. That’s not particularly helpful.
I wasn’t saying that I’m going to go around personally asking people to refer to me that way, I more meant that I would prefer if that was just an open and accepted thing that allies could joke about slurs with their friends in said community instead of gatekeeping the words or taking exclusive ownership of them. I was expressing that as a personal preference though because I understand that not everyone feels that way.
And I do agree that more education and acceptance is more likely to reduce the use of those words negatively through just proximity to the affected parties. That’s totally fair. I still don’t think it will go away entirely because edgey people online see it as a vector of attacking people.
So the part I disagree with it the “people will just make new slurs” part. The way slurs are created and used kind of relies on large groups of people to use and agree on them. They’re a form of meme. And I’m sure people would attempt to recreate them but your average Joe isn’t going to search that out. Those new slurs would become much more niche I’d imagine.
Sure, and your average Joe isn’t throwing around slurs by accident, or at least they’re not doing it intentionally.
But intolerant groups will create new terms, or co-opt existing terms. Look at “black pill” (from “red pill” from The Matrix), the “ok” hand signal (co-opted by white nationalists), or “woke” (pretty old, but “anti-woke” became a rallying call for the right). It can and does happen, and that’s not including all of the terms used behind the scenes that are likely going to come out to the public over the next 10 years or whatever.
The way I see it, there are a few types of people here:
Taking offense to terms benefits group 1, normalizing them benefits group 3, and in either case, group 2 is left largely confused. IMO, that doesn’t particularly help anyone, and the goal should instead be to get groups 2 and 3 to interact so it’s clear that group 2 isn’t intending to cause harm. That way it doesn’t particularly matter what group 1 does, group 3 will hopefully be able to distinguish honest mistakes from actual intended harm (i.e. distinguish between someone in groups 1 and 2).
In the case of this article, it would help for those in group 3 to understand that these kids have likely never met a black person. It would also help for those in group 2 to actually meet black people and understand the struggles they go through so they can appreciate why these terms are so hurtful. Unfortunately, a lot of people online and in person seem to jump to the conclusion that a given slur was used intentionally as hate speech, and that’s a failing IMO on both sides of that equation. Groups 2 and 3 both agree that group 1 sucks, yet groups 2 and 3 are frequently at odds with each other. That’s not particularly helpful.