Forums > Social Discussion > Politically correct terms and words we aren't allowed to use anymore

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Help! My personality got stuck in this signature machine and I cant get it out!

I always thought the use of "retard" came from the latin "tardus" meaning slow. So I use that instead of retard when someone is being a bit slow witted, but I blame that on being forced to take latin at school.

I think using gay has fallen slightly out of vogue recently. I hardly hear it anymore I'm more likely to hear someone say
"_____ Fail" and nominate a "type" of fail be it "epic" or "walking" when someone falls over. I also think it has far too happy a connitation for it to remain a negative word.

I think medicine should stick with what it has, if people understand it wrong then maybe they should learn language correctly. Doctors have so much to learn without them having to relearn new terms because teenagers find them amusing as insults, or people find terms offensive due to their own perception. so what if people feel are offended, nothing actually happpens and what gives offense can differ between individuals.

I'd rather be called a retard than an idiot nowadays, when I'm called retard it's generally a jovial way of saying I made a silly mistake by a friend. i find being called idiot offends me more because it suggests that someone feels i'm unintelligent (which i do not feel I am )

I think we're finding a whole new range of slang at the moment, I saw something on TV on how predicitve text is causing some words to change meanings (slang) because when entered, a different word comes up to what's been meant the best example given was teenagers using "book" to describe things as "cool" because book comes up first on some predictive text memories.

Language is fluid so I think there is always a chance of reclaiming lost words afte they have been out of fashion for a while. "gay" used to be "pants" after all and that was only in the last 10 years. That's why I like numbers they stay the same, they are eternal it will always be the 3 billy goats gruff even if Billy, goats and gruff all change their meanings there will still be 3 of them

A couple of balls short of a full cascade... or maybe a few cards short of a deck... we'll see how this all fans out.

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

i would have changed ***** to phallus, and claire to petey Petey

Rougie: but that's what I'm doing here
Arnwyn: what letting me adjust myself in your room?..don't you dare quote that on HoP...

I stand by the fact that if someone is offended it's their problem not mine. everybody is offended by something and it differs so widely between people that if we weren't allowed to do things that offended someone somewhere we'd get nothing done or be able to say nothing. so what we do is we take terms that "someone" believes offends a unproven / unknown number of a group or population that crosses a make-believe threshold and we make it taboo or ban it or some other nonsense.

I'd really like to know how many people or what percentage of people have to be offended by a term before it can be considered taboo to a nation, where is the turning point from word or action to national insult. It's amazing that we can create such a fuss about words that invoke feelings. they are just words (apologies in advance for this) but to me the word "nigger" isn't offensive. If it can be used by the people it was meant to insult, to each other as a term of familiarity or respect then they aren't offended by the word. What they are offended by is the word being used by an white person therefore if anyone should be offended it should be the white person to the racism of the veiwpoint. I agree this isn't always true as the word has a long history or use in a derogatory manner and this is the way of reclaiming back an offensive word as mentioned in the first post, however the way with which is being regained has offensive connotations so does this make it right?

The above shows how offense is such a transient thing that it can be justified in any number of ways, how can you set stock by something at once both important and yet immaterial to different people. how can you tell someone what is offensive when be definition offensiveness can only be decided by the people experiencing the situation, some may be offended and some not, just because some find it offensive is that a reason to give it credance and if so how do you set the threashold for that so it becomes known to all?

I Belive context to be much more important than the actual words used. If offensive words are used in a light and jovial manner with no offense intended then it is the responsibility of the person listening to HEAR the words correctly and the manner in which they were spoken and not to take offense at mere language, it is after all only a tool to communicate information and feelings, to get the language confused is to get the emotion behind it confused. Therefore any offense can only be inferred by the listener, whether the offense was meant or not,

*hug* to anyone I offended with any of my language - it was to prove a point not to offend

or was it? see I can't stop

A couple of balls short of a full cascade... or maybe a few cards short of a deck... we'll see how this all fans out.

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

"but have you considered there is more to life than your eyelids?"

jointly owned by Fire_Spinning_Angel and Blu_Valley

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

i would have changed ***** to phallus, and claire to petey Petey

Rougie: but that's what I'm doing here
Arnwyn: what letting me adjust myself in your room?..don't you dare quote that on HoP...

Don't mind me, just passing through.

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

The existance of flamethrowers says that someone, somewhere, at sometime said "I need to set that thing on fire, but it's too far away."

A couple of balls short of a full cascade... or maybe a few cards short of a deck... we'll see how this all fans out.

i would have changed ***** to phallus, and claire to petey Petey

Rougie: but that's what I'm doing here
Arnwyn: what letting me adjust myself in your room?..don't you dare quote that on HoP...

Originally Posted By: JayKittyAmerican checking in here. I know Poje is from texas, so here's the point of view as far as east coast US. As far as US politics there's thought to be a difference in the regions as far as differences in people from east, west, and south. North is pretty fair. lol. Anyway, I'm in nursing school and when charting on patients it's an important fact in discribing someone. I had a talk with one of my classmates, she is a lovley shade of dark chocolate brown, I myself am I light olive, another girl was a nice shade of mocha. Yet I would be charted as a white adolescent male, they would be middle aged adult black adult females.

From a medical perspective it's silly to think that people are the same. It's just not true. Ethno-pharmacology is a big topic. Also back to the retarded topic. Medicine is still a safe haven for words somewhat. If something is retarding a child's growth, it doesn't mean that their growth is drooling all over itself. Fetal insult doesn't mean you're yelling at a pregnant woman's stomach.

But I digress. PC is getting out of hand. And its far beyond the white/black thing and I don't see any signs of it stopping. ::sigh::


I am SO not from Texas...stop stereo typing

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

[B]I may lack virtue, but Im penitent[/B]

Originally Posted By: This Jaded FleshAh right makes sense now lol On different note, so we agree that words in themselves can't be racist... But if someone uses a word with racist conotations in a series of verbal assaults does that make the person instantly racist? You see isn't that person just using the term to cause offend and they know using thoughs kind of terms will offend the other individual so does it make them racist?

I'm going to have to say "yes" then it becomes a racist statement/racial slur although you might not be a "racist" in terms of your everyday life and who you are as an individual. Whenever a person uses race as part of an insult (that they could have just left out and insulted the behavior or whatever undesirable factor in play) you made a choice to bring race into it and should expect to bear the consequences of displaying racist behavior or being racist in that moment. It may not be who you are on a regular basis but in that instant you became one if you think race contributes to undesirability and that's even if you don't voice it. It's quite a gray area, but just for a moment people become one when they do it.

I wish we just lived in a world where people were just people and didn't get wrapped up in the whole thing, but the more people aren't mindful when relaying a point race/gender/orientation will get all the attention and not the point or statement that was truly intended.

~Rock on!~

"As the pattern gets more intricate and subtle, being swept along is no longer enough"-Waking Life

(All you RLers this is epitome_of_lame *waves hello*)