What are your views on this quote relating to homophobia and masculinity?

[pennydreadful]

"Poof" and "poofter" get used a lot here in Australia; I'd go so far as to say they're one of (if not the) main slurs for gay men here.

[Leo656]

It's funny because I just had this conversation with a friend yesterday. This is my problem with slurs in general... if someone calls you a "Poofter" or whatever, how are you even supposed to get MAD at that? I mean, yeah, the intent, okay, whatever, but seriously... even if I was gay, if someone called me THAT, I'd be too busy calling HIM a F*g for trying to use a nonsense nursery rhyme word like THAT as an insult. Or how "sissy" is supposed to be bad now. I'd be more embarrassed for the person saying it, than I'd be offended. Like, come on... "At least have the balls to call me a c***sucker, or does your Mommy not let you swear?" It's so silly.

I mean, honestly, I understand the principles involved, but I find all "hate" words to be such so much nonsense and coming from such a place of ignorance that I can't see how people still choose to be offended by such nonsense. I mean, yeah, straight white male, very little grounds for comparison, but still... words are just words and people decide what they mean and how much power they have. If people collectively decided that these gibberish words are just that, gibberish, nonsense, whatever, then I think that right there would be a huge bit of progress for society as a whole.

I'm not saying, "People should go around calling each other slurs", at least, not exactly; what I am saying, is that it's People who decide what these words mean (and even that can vary depending on region) and it's People in the end who can decide that they don't mean Anything. Words themselves are merely words.

Granted, Irish people never get to hear any GOOD slurs, what with being perfect and all. But I've been called a Mick or whatever and I just don't get it. That's an insult, I guess? Why? I never got that memo, to me you just sound like some nitwit spewing jibber-jabber.

[Jester]

So....the "Laugh at Hitler" principle? Take something offensive/hateful and just laugh in it's face?

[Davetello]

On the subject of Hitler, I haven't seen an example of Godwin's Law on this forum yet.

[Jester]

Godwin's has been referenced, but I don't think the "My enemies are Hitler" has ever actually happened.

[plastroncafe]

It's always been my understanding that it's less the words and more what tends to come with the use of those words, ie: violence, that's the problem.

I hear someone use the word f@g and I'm primed for fight/flight, and I'm lucky enough to have never been bashed. Same goes for misogynistic turns of phrase depending on the context.

[Davetello]

It should only be a matter of time anyway. Forums can't generally go more than a few months without an occurrence.

[Leo656]

I mean, I get all sides of it, but I mean... like if someone tries to bring you down, and you know you're above their station, are you gonna let 'em do it? With words? On some level, that's a Choice.

Like, when I worked in the moving business, I worked with a lot of black guys, and frankly, when you work in manual labor, you hear the word N***** thrown around like it's somebody's name. From EVERYONE. It's really uncomfortable, but partly because it's so casual. One time, this one dude was really getting hammered from another dude at work, not like "I hate f*cking n*****s" or anything, but just a lot of "joking" use of the word, coming from a self-admitted "redneck". And the dude is just laughing it off, rolling with it. So anyways, me and the guy Mike were washing up for lunch, and I couldn't help it, I'm like "Why do you just let guys do that? Like, every time I'm on the crew with you, it's the same thing. What gives?" He kind of shrugged, and was like "Well, for one thing, I know he ain't being serious because we known each other long enough. Besides that, if he WAS serious, that just proves he's stupid, so why would I give a sh*t what stupid people say if I'm not stupid?" Then he laughed and said, "If it ever came down to it, I know I could f*ck him up, so he's the one who's lucky it's just jokes."

I never really got comfortable being in that kind of work environment, but seeing people so easily deflect other people's stupidity, and keep their temper in check when it would HAVE to be difficult no matter what they said, was always something kind of inspiring to me, and I wish I could let things roll so easily. Like, I've seen white guys on a job site throw punches and get fired over being called "stupid", but I never once saw a black guy throw a punch over being called "N*****", even though you know they must have wanted to.

The lesson I took from those experiences is, you CAN choose whether or not the words people say to you have any kind of power over you as a person. Obviously when hate and harassment escalates beyond words, that's a different issue, but words themselves only mean what we want them to.

[Davetello]

It depends. Reaction to insults isn't always a choice - as said people can't always control how something affects them. People also have "trigger insults" - that one thing they're susceptible to finding hurtful and want to avoid at all costs.

Racism is sort of different because that's an issue of discrimination. It's not like being called a d!ck or "big nose", or whatever.

[Leo656]

Well, I mean I do get it. Being called a liar is MY trigger, simply because lying in my mind is a really huge sin. I was lied to and manipulated by people close to me for most of my youth, so I am very judgmental about people who lie and have cut ties with people over catching them in their dishonesty. If I can't trust you, I want nothing to do with you. So yeah, I've lost my temper over being called a liar. To me that is supremely disrespectful, especially if the person accusing ME is a proven lying scumbag themselves. So I do get it. But that's a personal hang-up.

As far as being actively discriminated against, yeah that's different and it's bad, but I still separate words from actions in that respect. A person deliberately using slurs to "hurt" someone is just exposing themselves as a moron; it's really more of an Idiot Warning than anything, and in a way they're doing you a favor by letting you know who you should avoid. When words become actions, then that's clearly different. But if a person is just saying dumb sh*t because that's how they actually feel, well, you're not going to change their mind anyway. Even if you get mad and kick their ass, you're not changing their mind, they're still going to be prejudiced. So until someone physically escalates the situation, all they're doing by making it vocal is letting everyone in the room know who the Assh*les are.

The problem is, prejudice exists and always will. You can't change what's inside people's heads, and some people just hate for no reason. Assigning words different labels like "good" or "bad" or "offensive" isn't going to change that. And you can't make words "taboo" because then people just come up with new ones. Like, nobody thought of "Poofter" as the FIRST insult they could sling at a gay person. They only came up with THAT after a hundred other slurs became verboten, but that was benign enough so that they could "slip it in" without people catching on at first. That's what's always going to happen.

So again, it becomes less about language and more about changing the way people think about each other and outwardly act towards each other. That's much, much harder, but that's the only way there's actually going to be Progress.

[Davetello]

I don't mind being called a liar, strangely. It's just not something I take offence to, mainly because it's rare that I do lie.

All of that makes sense. You're implying that the words aren't the problem, but the motive behind them and the connotations they carry are. In a way being called a nigg%r actually does a black guy a favour because he then knows what someone really feels. If the person suppressed their true feelings that guy might never find out and might interact with someone who hates him deep down solely because of his colour.

Education is the key, but I think it's a hopeless cause. There are simply way too many narrow-minded people out there who are prone to stigmatising others unfairly.

[Leo656]

Frankly, I never understood how you can actively hate someone according to circumstances of birth, things they have no control over. There's no logic in that, meaning people who are prejudiced are really, really ignorant and lacking in any kind of common sense.

I mean, people give you GOOD reasons to hate them, every single day. And instead of that, you'd rather hate them because of their skin color, or where their family is from, or who they want to lick in the bedroom? Like, the fact that most people are assh*les by choice isn't a good enough reason? You gotta hate them for stuff they're NOT doing on purpose? That to me is really f*cking stupid.

Not "you" personally, by the way. "You" as in "People".

[Davetello]

Originally Posted by Leo656

Frankly, I never understood how you can actively hate someone according to circumstances of birth, things they have no control over. There's no logic in that, meaning people who are prejudiced are really, really ignorant and lacking in any kind of common sense.

I mean, people give you GOOD reasons to hate them, every single day. And instead of that, you'd rather hate them because of their skin color, or where their family is from, or who they want to lick in the bedroom? Like, the fact that most people are assh*les by choice isn't a good enough reason? You gotta hate them for stuff they're NOT doing on purpose? That to me is really f*cking stupid.

Lol, exactly. It's a bizarre state of affairs. I never got why the colour of someone's skin was a reason to hate them. I guess white supremacists will say that there are lots of cultural things going on with black people e.g. the claim that blacks are more prone to crime (totally overlooking that this is because they are discriminated against in the first place, and that it might only appear that way because a black man or woman is more likely to be convicted than a white).

I dislike people because they are pr!cks (see sig) but not because of something they can't control.

One worrying thing is that, if you've ever browsed Stormfront, some of these people are extremely intelligent and well-read. They have a vast knowledge of things like biology, phenotypes etc. It's a total myth that prejudiced people are lacking in intelligence, which obviously makes their ignorance even more unforgivable.

[Leo656]

Well, to be fair, people can be totally brilliant in one area and totally ignorant in another. That's actually how it usually works.

Like, my Dad was kind of a thick block, but he was really good at chemistry, and he was well-versed in politics and world history. But sometimes he had no common sense at all, like the old "check your watch and forget you're holding a drink, so you spill it everywhere" kind of thing. Plus he had a ton of drug problems. So, yeah, brilliance and dumb-f*ckery in just about equal measure sums it up, and it's not a unique condition.

[Davetello]

Originally Posted by Leo656

Well, to be fair, people can be totally brilliant in one area and totally ignorant in another. That's actually how it usually works.

Like, my Dad was kind of a thick block, but he was really good at chemistry, and he was well-versed in politics and world history. But sometimes he had no common sense at all, like the old "check your watch and forget you're holding a drink, so you spill it everywhere" kind of thing. Plus he had a ton of drug problems. So, yeah, brilliance and dumb-f*ckery in just about equal measure sums it up, and it's not a unique condition.

Yes, fair point. But what i was saying is that these people had a deep historical knowledge of cultural difference, exclusion, phenotypes etc - all things you'd expect to equip someone with the knowledge and intelligence to NOT be racist. Yet they were anyway. These weirdos are probably so twisted that they'd say their weird views on racism carry more credence than our open-minded views because they're more 'educated' on all of this.

But generally you're right; genius and idiocy comes in all forms. The footballer Wayne Rooney must have some form of intellect to be able to have the reactions and ideas he has on the field. But when he speaks he doesn't come across as academically gifted, like many sports stars.

There are many different forms of intelligence, and the term itself is ambiguous.