There are some things that pretty much everybody agrees on. Ice cream is delicious, war is bad, and the n-word is the worst word in the English language. So bad, in fact, that we’re only allowed to refer to it by its first letter (and in some cases, not even that). In my article, This Is The Way The N-Word Dies, I pointed out that the unique power the n-word holds in many people’s minds is a reflection of the way we think about black people. Not only the idea that it’s possible to insult a black person because of the colour of their skin, but that it’s reasonable for black people, and only black people, to fall apart at the sound of a word, regardless of intent or context.
I just find the whole thing childish. The idea that you would be emotionally scarred by the mere sound of the syllables, even in a foreign language or an unrelated English word like “niggardly.” That it is utterly forbidden to pronounce the word even in reference, to say “‘nigger’ is an ugly word,” or “I would never call anyone a nigger.” That you, Steve, cannot mention the word *in an article about the word*. To ban schoolchildren from reading “Huckleberry Finn,” a book whose very message is exactly the opposite, of Huck’s transcending the prejudices of his time and discovering the humanity in a runaway slave. (For that matter, we’re not supposed to say “slave” anymore, either: they were “enslaved people.”)
Not too long ago, it was forbidden to utter the words “shit” or “fuck” in public; now they appear in respectable print publications and no one bats an eye. But now this one other word is enough to get you fired and socially shunned. As we’ve been discussing on another thread, all this language policing is not only not helpful but actively harmful to the cause it purports to serve.
"That you, Steve, cannot mention the word *in an article about the word*."
No, I'm pretty sure I could have used it. I don't think Medium censors it. I just wouldn't have. In fact, I censor all swearing in my writing even though I'm perfectly capable of swearing like a trooper in real life.😁
I censor the n-word because I don't want to overlook the fact that, irrational as it might be, it does cause deep, genuine hurt for some people. And I don't want then to be so upset by the word that they can't hear what I'm trying to say. I want people to get to a point where this isn't the case, but we're not there yet.
There are contexts where I'd encourage its use (classroom discussions of Huckleberry Finn is a good example), because any thoughts and feelings that come up can be addressed in real-time, hopefully in an intelligent, productive manner. But on the page it's a little different.
I actually went back and forth for a few days before publishing that article about whether I should censor it or not. But I'm glad I made the choice to do so. And think I'll continue to do so.
I wrote there almost exactly what I wrote here about the sex of a transgender (to use your interpretations of the words) and the savagery of my responses was stunning. One guy who seems a tad invested in the issue said he was organizing a group to report my post to get me banned. Another wrote a savagely hateful response the core of which was attacking me for exercising.
When it comes to the "trans" thing Medium is a cesspool. would not use the N even in reference; when I do need to refer to it I use 6s for the two gs
The transnazis are brutal on Medium. Quite sure they're the reason why I *was* banned last fall, even though Medium never told me which article it was. But I kept predicting, as I wrote the last article, that this was the one that would do it, because I was critical of trans-activist misogyny.
Hate is okay on Medium as long as you're a chick with a dick (it's always the transwomen...)
It's a bit amazing how much power that group has in online spaces, to shut down even non-hateful but off-narrative discussion.
I wonder what future generations will think of this era. It's hard not to think of the (perhaps apocryphal) stories of table legs being covered up in Victorian times, where we shake our heads and wonder how far out of reasonability they got themselves.
Hey, maybe Meghan Murphy will be able to return to Twitter in the future! She got booted by the same forces.
"It's a bit amazing how much power that group has in online spaces, to shut down even non-hateful but off-narrative discussion."
I'm constantly amazed by this too. It's really difficult to keep the tin-foil hat off sometimes! I don't think I've ever seen another group wield so much influence over discourse.
One partial explanation I've heard is that the major LGB advocacy organizations, after decades of slow buildup, were at peak power when they got their major demands met (eg: in the US, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of gay marriage). They could have reduced their staff and fundraising to a more "maintenance" level, fighting smaller residual battles. Or they could quickly shift most of their efforts to a new battle (in particular concentrating on the added T), and perhaps increase the staffing, fundraising, and political influence. So the T issue pretty suddenly had front and center attention from an already geared up advocacy industry which needed a new focus to maintain its staffing and relevancy.
This dynamic could go beyond the donation supported major and minor activist organizations; for example, some celebrities and politicians also need to find the next righteous cause.
Another factor is the strong emphasis on life and death, both "Trans folks are being killed all the time" and "Trans folks kill themselves all the time unless...". While those are serious issues that nobody would dismiss, there are some rational questions about magnitudes which tend to get swept under the rug in the heat of activist rhetoric.
(This emotional tactic is also used regarding race in America; liberals tend to overestimate the frequency of police killing of unarmed Blacks by a factor of 10 to 1000, based on media emphasis and rhetoric. If such killings were 1000 times higher, I would have a very different take on the issues too, so I am more emotionally sympathetic to them when I remember their assumptions. [Just as I would have a very different take on abortion if I really believed it was murder.] However, I try to rely on facts rather than being steered by media emphasis and impressions and activist distortions, so my emotional sympathy for the motives of the duped does not mean I agree with their conclusions.)
I check in on Feminist Current from time to time, although it's not terribly right wing, it sometimes has a bit of a right-wing hysterics to it. Still, there are a lot of good articles there and I get some good book recs off it.
The trans movement has become a haven for traditional misogynist men who've figured out they can get at least some feminists to support them and do their bidding if they pretend to be women themselves. The Achilles heel of regressive feminism is its unwillingness to be exclusive in any manner or critique or challenge marginalized groups. Transfolk are genuinely marginalized, but some of the activists are clearly men in dresses with a hate-on for women, who are making life much more difficult for *genuine* transfolk.
We are truly living in an age of extreme illogic, where the insanity comes equally from both sides of the social & political divide.
Have you searched on The Word on Medium? See if other articles use it, or any *recent* articles, given Medium's hard left editorial team?
Any teacher who tried to teach Huckleberry Finn today would likely lose their job. I personally wouldn't touch it with a 10-foot pole if I was a teacher, although I'll admit I couldn't get through it when I tried to read it, too depressing and frankly the story didn't seem to be going anywhere. There it is, my second heresy of the day. I'm on a roll :)
Ooh! I just did! Yep, plenty of uncensored n-words around. By both black and white writers. Haha heretic! One more transgression and we'll burn you at the stake.
Good to know you can at least still freely use The N-Word there, even if you can't say, "Biology is real and only women can menstruate!" Medium (d)RULEZ!!! 🤤
Ethnic slurs are a method of disparagement sometimes used for differing purpose. They seem to me to say more about the speaker than the target. An attempt to make something OK that isn't; It's OK for them to be slaves, they are less than human. It's OK to go off to war and kill them, they are less than human. This one came into play as I was staging to go to Vietnam. Interestingly, many black men had no problem with the use of the word gook. They used the word for the same reasons the white guys used it.
On a smaller scale, various forms of discrimination because they aren't one of us. The woman with a complaint becomes a bitch. The same theme is in play with dehumanizing political partisanship where the bad tribe is no longer about race but opposing views. All about making some behavior that is harmful OK in the mind of the speaker. The harm is not so much in the words but the attitudes and actions of the speaker that lead to their use. People using that language are telling you more about themselves than about the target of their scorn.
When my children encountered racial slurs, I told them my story of the turd. "If someone tries to give you a turd and you don't take it, they are the one with the dirty hand, not you."
"They seem to me to say more about the speaker than the target"
100%. I've always felt this way. And you're spot on. In most if not all cases, words like theses are used to justify some cruelty or stupidity in the person using them.Absolutely love that final quote😁 I'll definitely be stealing that one at some point!
The people with questions about vaccine safety become “antivaxxers” -- even the ones who dutifully got their shots.
Some of the dehumanizing rhetoric that came out of the COVID years is terrifying; if you put a dehumanizing label on someone you can then do anything to them; fire them from their job, keep them from participating in meaningful public life, deny them healthcare, or even murder them by iatrogenic interventions such as putting them on a ventilator and blowing out their lungs (there are statistics from at least one hospital showing that unvaccinated people were disproportionately ventilated).
Having discussed this topic to death over decades I will limit my remarks to noting my pride that I have never used the word except in reference to it.
Absolutely. I think the same is true for any decent human being. My issue is the people who act as if even if you use the word in reference to it, you're guilty of hate speech.
The world is full of people who want extra attention and in all their many varieties they disgust me. In his soon-to-be-released "Clowns" (I'm one of his beta readers and you'll see my name in the credits) Peter Cawdron refers to this as the Spectacle, that so much of human behavior is the seeking of status .. and attention. The book is more about this point than it is the nominal plot.
If someone is discussing a vile slur it should be clear to even the most addled SJW that it's not the same as yelling it out a car window at someone. But that would be squandering an opportunity to get an extra ration of special attention,
I contrast the difference between the N and the Q words. In both cases much of the maligned group has adopted the slur yet in the former it's reserved for the group and as verboten as ever to others, and in the latter case it's supposed to be some sort of victory (yes, we really are defective!) and supposedly mainstream.
A few days ago I went looking for my first manager online to see if he was still alive (unlikely) or when he had died. I found someone else with the same name; his web page?
Queer Trans they/them.
In one of my smarter moves, I closed that browser tab.
"If someone is discussing a vile slur it should be clear to even the most addled SJW that it's not the same as yelling it out a car window at someone. But that would be squandering an opportunity to get an extra ration of special attention," <3
I refuse to be censored when relating the incident concerning three rednecks with tire irons who threatened my boyfriend and me for bike riding together while a mixed couple. This was in the '70s in Chicago. Fortunately, we'd just arrived at a friend's storefront. Fred knew they kept a baseball bat behind the front door for just such an occasion. He came back out with such a fury that the good ol' boys backed off laughing, like they'd just been playing. We all started yelling at them to fuck off, me likely the loudest. As he piled onto the bed of that jalopy of a truck one shouted back at me, 'Shut up, you whore, fucking with niggers . . . God!" Seriously, you think I would break that narrative to insert a mealy mouthed capital N? Did he euphemize what he was saying to me? If I had to hear it, so do you.
Then, some years later my adorable bi-racial eight-year old son, and I do mean adorable, approached me and asked me very sweetly, "Momma, are you my nigga?" It was obvious he was asking me if I was his sweetheart, for which there was only one possible reply, "Always."
THAT's how you kill a slur, you misuse it, overuse it, use it like an inanimate pronoun till it has lost all its power. Censoring it preserves and amplifies that power. I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child. Let those little children lead us. Always.
Oh, and wait till I tell you what the word 'Caucasian' originally signified -- high priced prostitutes. I kid you not. Ask Nell Painter. See, that's what you do. You flip the word. You don't censor it. You flip it.
Next thing you know, it's a hundred years later and people are mystified why anyone was ever offended at being called a sweetheart, sweetheart.
"THAT's how you kill a slur, you misuse it, overuse it, use it like an inanimate pronoun till it has lost all its power. Censoring it preserves and amplifies that power. I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child."
Hmm, I get where you're coming from, but I don't agree at all here. The problem is, this approach ignores the very real hurt the word currently causes to many black people. It's not just about how you feel about the word, disempowering the word still means considering the feelings of those who it hurts. Which is why, despite the fact that it doesn't bother me, I still censor it.
I'm perfectly able to recognise how stupid it is to treat this word like it's the black person's "Aveda Kedavra," but even I wouldn't want to have to hear it all the time. There's a difference between seeing somebody who wants to use it as an insult for who they are, and treating the word like a toy.
But we're aren't talking about my usage. I never use the word, except in the kind of context I gave at the top. It's mainly the usage of young black teens, like mine were. I don't think they're at all ignorant of how hurtful the word has been and is still. It's their rebellion against that state of affairs, and they are absolutely on track, IMO. But it really doesn't matter what we think. We are, as always, supplanted by the incoming generations who will define their own world. That IS what is becoming of that word, whether we like it, understand it or not.
Well, to be fair, we're talking about your suggestion for how the word should be treated and your "refusal to be censored" in your usage of it:
"I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child."
This is what I'm disagreeing with.
And the trend in usage of the word seems most definitely to be in the opposite direction to what you're suggesting here. In the 70s, 80s and even 90s, the n-word was used, uncensored, in primetime comedy TV shows. Reporters, including white reporters, could use it in context with no fear for their jobs. Teachers could teach Huckleberry Finn. Joe Biden used it in a Senate hearing. All of this is more or less unthinkable today.
I'm advocating for removing the taboo of the word. I think we agree there. But I still feel very strongly that that should be done sensitively. I feel like your framing misses that second part.
The time might not be right for it, but maybe...eventually. Dick Gregory actually did that as one of his comedy routines in the early '70s...I read about it in his auto bio titled...the N-word! (Wouldn't want to display THAT book in my hands on the subway today!) He said it over and over again saying the more we hear it the less powerful it would become. I think 1971 was probably still Too Soon. Maybe 2022 today, but I would argue given how little emotional/social resilience so-called SJWs display today, it might be time to readdress it...although by black comedians. Maybe Chris Rock could do it, he's got a lot of public support at the moment ;)
Hilarious, and TRUE. Indeed use it in association with positive things that are not even associated with skin color at all. maybe it can be an adjective indicating powerful, smart, or fashionably dressed. too funny!
Ah, but we can't all do that. It's for those young people of color to do that, and they already are, gangbusters. You have no idea how that word was flying high when I had a houseful of black teenagers a decade ago. Did you see that Dave Chapelle skit where the blind black KKK leader was at a stoplight next to a convertible with two young men playing rap music, loud. Of course, being blind couldn't see they were white. He gave them a huge lambast about their loud jungle music and called them that. One white kid turns to the other and says, "Did he just call us niggas?" The other returns the high five and exclaims, "Awesome!"
Linda, I agree. Still we are not yet really on our way. this word is very surprising to me. It is reviled but also OWNED by Blacks too. It is ok for a Black to use it in a way that invalidates its meaning, but a non-Black person CANNOT do this. They will be really attacked for it. It is reminiscent of the attacks one will get if one defames Mohammad. It is because the icon itself is a source of identity in both cases. (I think, but am not sure... it is quite far from my personal experience so I am like an alien trying to piece together what I am seeing :-) )
This is interesting. There have been times and places in my life when even a whispered: "Hey, Whitey" would elicit a sphincteral response, but you're right, I was not demeaned by it. I just prepared to die. Fortunately, that hasn't happened yet.
I don't think that USC prof was fired for saying the Chinese word that sounds like the n-word-- it looks like he still teaches there but not that class. I have a hard time understanding the black students' level of upset and I think the administration's response and the over-the-top apology was out of proportion. It seems to me like, if you're taking a cross-cultural biz communication class, the purpose of the class is to learn about things that might otherwise take you by surprise -- better to encounter it in the classroom than in real life. I guess I'd want to talk with the students to understand their perspective on this.
"I don't think that USC prof was fired for saying the Chinese word that sounds like the n-word-- it looks like he still teaches there but not that class"
Gah, brainfart. 😅 I meant to say suspended, not fired. Thanks. I've corrected the post.
I think the level of overreaction is a combination of learned behaviour (children are actively taught that this word should send them into hysterics, and so it does in some cases), and cowardice (it's easier for the school to issue their boilerplate apology and pledge to #dothework than to uphold their responsibility to produce smart, resilient young adults).
I'd fully understand students objecting to a culture of normalising the use of the n-word on campus, say. But if they can't hear the word at all without melting down, regardless of context, it's the duty of a university to encourage them to think more deeply and carefully. Not pander to them. The real world won't pander after all.
I have no issue with it at all. I think its a terrible mistake to "disappear" aspects of history that don't conform to our civil standards today. the n-word exists whether or not we acknowledge it.
I think children are perfectly placed to have a conversation about that, led sensitively and honestly by an adult, that will frame the way they respond to the word in a healthier way. It's true of everybody, but especially of children, that if you make something taboo, they only feel more drawn to it.
I had headaches *every day* of the first fifteen years of my life from my mother's Newports. Cigarettes keep me out of a lot of places I would like to go.
Don't expect me to be "objective" about the goddamn things.
Steve, this is a crucial insight: I’m saying that it’s very difficult to offend somebody over a trait they’re proud of.
Perhaps a slightly more accurate framing is to say it is very difficult to offend someone over something that they are not sensitive about. Because I think many AA/Blacks do have genuine pride in the skin grouping (I know you have pride, but not in that grouping) but I see many who genuinely do, but at the same time they are also very sensitive and defensive regarding it. They are defensive because they (correctly) feel it is attacked.
A more confident person would not be rattled. So I think it is correct to say such a person is not confident, but the still could have pride about their membership... they just know that others to not share that positive association, so they lack confidence.
thus I might edit your statement to say it is very difficult to offend someone over an attribute which they feel positive and confident about. Still this is a perceptive comment!
"They are defensive because they (correctly) feel it is attacked."
Yeah exactly. There's a degree to which it's always reasonable to get defensive if you're being attacked. Even if you're not insecure about the thing you're being attacked *for*. To degree, the mere existence of the attack justifies defensiveness, right? But it's the level and nature of the defensiveness that's the issue.
If somebody continually tries to make fun of my height, say, I'll eventually get annoyed about it, even though I'm over 6 feet. But not because I'm not confident about my height, because it's annoying to have somebody try to attack you over anything.
The issue with the n-word is the disproportionate level of upset it causes. About a trait that should never be a negative in the mind of the person hearing it. If somebody calls me a n****er, depending on my mood that day, I might be offended that they're trying to attack me. But my offence isn't caused by the *way* they're trying to attack me. If anything, the fact that I immediately think so little of anybody who would use that word as na attack would make whatever they had to say easier to ignore.
I want to mostly second Steve's response, in my own take.
Try: "It's hard to accidentally offend somebody by referencing a word relating to an attribute they are proud of."
You can use any words in a nasty or insulting way for disparagement, and people often react to actual disparagement, with or without a slur word (unless as you say, they have great confidence) - but intentional insults are not the issue here.
If the word is just pronounced as a reference, or read aloud from Huck Finn, and just hearing the syllables offends somebody - do you still think *that* kind of hyper-sensitivity is compatible with pride (just lack of confidence)? I think Steve has a point.
I am a little lost in the nuance of all of this.. To a first approximation I think we are all agreeing with each other. But I think it is possible to have strong identity/pride in a thing and ALSO have insecurity/sensitivity about the same thing. I think the person that sees Blackness as core to their identity will have alot of pride and identification with that label. If they also know that many view Blackness in a negative light, then the could become quite sensitive and insecure about that same label. So in this narrow sense I think I might be diverging from your thinking. e.g. it seems strong identification with a spurrned identity could yield a combination of pride and insecurity.
I interpret many (not all) cases of "being offended", in the context of contemporary neo-progressivism, as mostly unconscious tactics for obtaining "power over", more like a "ha, gotcha, I'm gonna play this for all the benefit I can get" rather than honestly expressing hurt feelings.
And that includes being offended by hearing the syllables of the word in question when used as a reference or read from a book like Huck Finn, with no offensive intention or affect. If you are offended, then you have a grievance and the moral high ground, and something is owed you.
The absurdly high taboo on it is largely performative in my view (at least originally, see below). The more offended or outraged you are, the more power you get. That kind of dynamic allows for amplification untethered to actual harm caused or the degree of hostile intent (if any), because it's not about redressing harm or damping hostility, but about gaining power. Pretend you don't realize that it was just a reference, or pretend it hurts you just as much as an intentional slur anyway, milk it any way you can.
As a side helping, you can say the word but they can't, a kind of special privilege you have that they don't. Guard this asymmetry jealously, it's another kind of power (albeit a weak one).
One downside of this, shared with other facets of the victimhood narrative, is that people don't like to think of themselves as being fake and manipulative that way. So in accord with cognitive dissonance, there is a tendency to convince oneself that one really is just as exaggeratedly harmed as one is pretending to be, and thus not faking. If you pretend to be overly psychologically fragile often enough, it becomes hard to distinguish from the real thing, or it becomes the real thing, no longer just pretense. This dynamic is not specific to race or sex or any one domain, but a general principle of seeking power through performative exaggeration of victimhood.
Of course, just as with any deception, some part of oneself does know. This behavior does not generate self respect or confidence or earned pride, like accomplishment can.
And again, I'm talking about my understanding of the dynamics in SOME cases, not all cases, of excessive reactivity to non-insulting usage - like used as a reference or hearing a similar sounding word. I am NOT talking about the word being used as a slur or insult.
In the more general case, not specifically about this word or about race, I have chosen to mostly avoid using "offended" or "offensive". I look for another framing for my feelings or judgement, rather than use the shorthand of "I'm offended".
"I’m saying that it’s very difficult to offend somebody over a trait they’re proud of."
Or at least not ashamed of being, anyway. I don't get 'skin pride'. I get 'black pride' from the 1970s when black people were beginning to feel and make their growing power known, and challenging white racism. But I think it's an idea, like the 'don't blame the victim' mantra for feminism, that's past its prime. Fact is, there's nothing to be 'proud' about with skin colour. It's an accident of birth (your soul, personality, consciousness, whatever) was born into this body or that body, and also genetics (my parents are Western European, so I lack the natural sun protection others have, but they're not 'better' than me). The 'white pride' movement struck me as equally stupid...'Pride' comes from something you've ACCOMPLISHED. I'm proud to be a good writer. I'm proud to have stopped picking so many political fights on Facebook. I'm proud of having had the labia to move to Canada, to uproot my entire life away from my family (who had nothing to do with my decision) and start a new life in a new country, albeit a next-door neighbour. I'm not 'proud' to be white, or female, or French (although I was a bit of a French nationalist in college, but it was a silly kid identity thing and I grew out of it). I am, however, proud that I've begun learning French again.
Skin colour really is a stupid thing to hierarchize, because there are *literally no significant differences* between anyone apart from a few evolutionary mutations to adapt to new environments. As opposed to say (Warning: Heretical statement alert!) males and females, between which there are demonstrable differences in body size, strength, and, to a lesser extent cognitive traits - neither gender is intellectually superior to the other, but there are brain differences that appear to partially account for the way we process information and what we're good at. Women have more developed language and emotional expression, men are better at visualizing spatial possibiltiies and math, but that doesn't mean one gender can't learn what the other is better at. Frankly, I think there'd be a much closer parity if men spent more time learning about emotions and how to communicate, and women spent more time on math and science. It's not *all* how we're socialized, and the left is positively phobic about biological differences. My feeling is let's all do what we're best at and stop applying value labels to which work is more important. That's where a lot of the prejudice comes from - males deciding that their work, and their skills, and their talents are more valuable than women's.
I'm with you on the emotion behind the 'n' word and I'd add the 'c' word for women. The c-word is the WORST POSSIBLE WORD EVER, arguably worse than the n-word because you can't even joke with it like black comedians can do with the n-word. No female comedian that I know of uses it, the only male I can think of who uses it is Ricky Gervais, whom I love, but he's cringey sometimes and I'm not keen on the c-word use.
But, for blacks and also women, you make a good point, one that I've thought about too, about how much power we grant words. I know I have more resilience than younger women when it comes to alleged misogyny....I don't lose my shit if a guy tells me I'm pretty (thank you, it's on purpose, so it would be insane of me to object) or says something rude. Ever since you wrote an article a few years ago about the Macedonian kid who called you the n-word and you chased him down, laughed, and challenged him on it, (rather than beating the snot out of him, lol) I thought, "Could I do that if someone called me the c-word? What kind of example would it set if other women, about to go nuclear, watched me laugh and ask him why he thinks that's an insult? After all, George Carlin claimed - and I agree with him! - that's it's actually a very friendly, inviting-sounding word - it's all warm and cuddly and cozy. Probably something the offender has spent a lifetime trying to get into :)
Both these words would cease to hurt if we stopped giving them, and their wielders, so much power.
I'm responding to the section about bio-psychological differences between the sexes. I'm not disagreeing, just augmenting.
The nuance I'd like to add is making explicit is that it appears today that males and females do differ somewhat psychologically ON AVERAGE, for partly innate reasons (not 100% cultural as I used to believe) - however that broad average doesn't tell us anything much about an individual's proclivities or abilities, so sex should never in itself be relevant to, say, hiring. Each person should be evaluated individually, not assumed to be typical of their population group and judged thereby. However, because of those differences at the aggregate statistical level, disparities in proportions do not *automatically* imply discrimination or an unlevel playing field (though of course those remain potential causes, partial or total). So I would not a priori assume that if 51% of Google programmers are not women, that in itself proves sex discrimination. (Nor does it excuse actual discrimination).
We can potentially create a society which is relatively equal and fair to individuals of all population groups (equal opportunity for individuals); or we could seek a society which enforces equal aggregate statistics across population groups (equal outcomes for groups). We cannot have both, tho, so long as population groups differ in the way they convert opportunities to outcomes, for various reasons. If a culture elevates chess playing or basketball or music, they will tend to have disproportionate success in those areas, given anywhere near equal opportunity. That's part of accepting diversity. And this can go for sex as well, whether the statistical level differences in ability or interest derive from biology or culture.
Evaluating individually is exactly what I'm arguing. You're doing what most people on the left do when I bring this up; react with arguments against compartmentalizing anyone based on sex. Which I'm in total agreement with. I'm simply saying let's not ignore facts and let's challenge the VALUES and assumptions behind them rather than pretend they don't exist (which is what's led us to the regressive left's denial that sex is even a thing, and that a woman is anyone who says he is). I'm arguing we acknowledge these differences with, "Well, that's interesting, but this woman does this allegedly male thing very well and these guys over here do these allegedly female things really well, so who cares in the long run." With two exceptions: Sperm donor and surrogate mother.
I NEVER argue or suggest we should pigeonhole people based on sex generalities, yet people always react to caution as if I did ;)
"used to define not just a person but an attitude, a work ethic, a lifestyle, everything that embodies being a person, all of it negative."
Yeah, I understand where you're coming from here too, I guess this is where we have to seriously consider intent (something that people in social justice seem hell-bent on ignoring lately). If somebody uses the n-word in a quote, or when reading Mark Twain, that's very different to using it as a slur. And the disproportionate power this word has comes from our failure to acknowledge the difference.
I'd never criticise somebody for being offended if it's used as a slur against them. When somebody uses it as a slur, their *intention* is to offend. It's reasonable to take that intention personally regardless of the words used. But if the word is used in a way that clearly isn't intended to offend or attack anybody, it's infantilising to pretend that it's reasonable for an adult to fall to pieces over it.
I think I've ever used the word once in conversation in my entire life. As you say, it's extremely rare that there's any need to use it. Especially if you're capable of thinking an d speaking coherently. But the word can't lose its power if it retains its *ultimate taboo* status.
Growing up in the '60s in Florida, my mother taught me the eeny meeny miney moe verse but she said 'tiger' instead of the n-word which was commonly used in the South, although I don't remember the other kids saying it. She explained how others used the n-word with the verse although by then she didn't need to explain why it was wrong...that's one of the earliest conversations I can remember having with my mother, before I was in school....black people and how they are NEVER to be called ugly names, esp not that one.
I just find the whole thing childish. The idea that you would be emotionally scarred by the mere sound of the syllables, even in a foreign language or an unrelated English word like “niggardly.” That it is utterly forbidden to pronounce the word even in reference, to say “‘nigger’ is an ugly word,” or “I would never call anyone a nigger.” That you, Steve, cannot mention the word *in an article about the word*. To ban schoolchildren from reading “Huckleberry Finn,” a book whose very message is exactly the opposite, of Huck’s transcending the prejudices of his time and discovering the humanity in a runaway slave. (For that matter, we’re not supposed to say “slave” anymore, either: they were “enslaved people.”)
Not too long ago, it was forbidden to utter the words “shit” or “fuck” in public; now they appear in respectable print publications and no one bats an eye. But now this one other word is enough to get you fired and socially shunned. As we’ve been discussing on another thread, all this language policing is not only not helpful but actively harmful to the cause it purports to serve.
"That you, Steve, cannot mention the word *in an article about the word*."
No, I'm pretty sure I could have used it. I don't think Medium censors it. I just wouldn't have. In fact, I censor all swearing in my writing even though I'm perfectly capable of swearing like a trooper in real life.😁
I censor the n-word because I don't want to overlook the fact that, irrational as it might be, it does cause deep, genuine hurt for some people. And I don't want then to be so upset by the word that they can't hear what I'm trying to say. I want people to get to a point where this isn't the case, but we're not there yet.
There are contexts where I'd encourage its use (classroom discussions of Huckleberry Finn is a good example), because any thoughts and feelings that come up can be addressed in real-time, hopefully in an intelligent, productive manner. But on the page it's a little different.
I actually went back and forth for a few days before publishing that article about whether I should censor it or not. But I'm glad I made the choice to do so. And think I'll continue to do so.
I don't trust Medium with any controversy.
I wrote there almost exactly what I wrote here about the sex of a transgender (to use your interpretations of the words) and the savagery of my responses was stunning. One guy who seems a tad invested in the issue said he was organizing a group to report my post to get me banned. Another wrote a savagely hateful response the core of which was attacking me for exercising.
When it comes to the "trans" thing Medium is a cesspool. would not use the N even in reference; when I do need to refer to it I use 6s for the two gs
The transnazis are brutal on Medium. Quite sure they're the reason why I *was* banned last fall, even though Medium never told me which article it was. But I kept predicting, as I wrote the last article, that this was the one that would do it, because I was critical of trans-activist misogyny.
Hate is okay on Medium as long as you're a chick with a dick (it's always the transwomen...)
It's a bit amazing how much power that group has in online spaces, to shut down even non-hateful but off-narrative discussion.
I wonder what future generations will think of this era. It's hard not to think of the (perhaps apocryphal) stories of table legs being covered up in Victorian times, where we shake our heads and wonder how far out of reasonability they got themselves.
Hey, maybe Meghan Murphy will be able to return to Twitter in the future! She got booted by the same forces.
"It's a bit amazing how much power that group has in online spaces, to shut down even non-hateful but off-narrative discussion."
I'm constantly amazed by this too. It's really difficult to keep the tin-foil hat off sometimes! I don't think I've ever seen another group wield so much influence over discourse.
And that power arose amazingly fast.
One partial explanation I've heard is that the major LGB advocacy organizations, after decades of slow buildup, were at peak power when they got their major demands met (eg: in the US, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of gay marriage). They could have reduced their staff and fundraising to a more "maintenance" level, fighting smaller residual battles. Or they could quickly shift most of their efforts to a new battle (in particular concentrating on the added T), and perhaps increase the staffing, fundraising, and political influence. So the T issue pretty suddenly had front and center attention from an already geared up advocacy industry which needed a new focus to maintain its staffing and relevancy.
This dynamic could go beyond the donation supported major and minor activist organizations; for example, some celebrities and politicians also need to find the next righteous cause.
Another factor is the strong emphasis on life and death, both "Trans folks are being killed all the time" and "Trans folks kill themselves all the time unless...". While those are serious issues that nobody would dismiss, there are some rational questions about magnitudes which tend to get swept under the rug in the heat of activist rhetoric.
(This emotional tactic is also used regarding race in America; liberals tend to overestimate the frequency of police killing of unarmed Blacks by a factor of 10 to 1000, based on media emphasis and rhetoric. If such killings were 1000 times higher, I would have a very different take on the issues too, so I am more emotionally sympathetic to them when I remember their assumptions. [Just as I would have a very different take on abortion if I really believed it was murder.] However, I try to rely on facts rather than being steered by media emphasis and impressions and activist distortions, so my emotional sympathy for the motives of the duped does not mean I agree with their conclusions.)
I check in on Feminist Current from time to time, although it's not terribly right wing, it sometimes has a bit of a right-wing hysterics to it. Still, there are a lot of good articles there and I get some good book recs off it.
The trans movement has become a haven for traditional misogynist men who've figured out they can get at least some feminists to support them and do their bidding if they pretend to be women themselves. The Achilles heel of regressive feminism is its unwillingness to be exclusive in any manner or critique or challenge marginalized groups. Transfolk are genuinely marginalized, but some of the activists are clearly men in dresses with a hate-on for women, who are making life much more difficult for *genuine* transfolk.
We are truly living in an age of extreme illogic, where the insanity comes equally from both sides of the social & political divide.
Have you searched on The Word on Medium? See if other articles use it, or any *recent* articles, given Medium's hard left editorial team?
Any teacher who tried to teach Huckleberry Finn today would likely lose their job. I personally wouldn't touch it with a 10-foot pole if I was a teacher, although I'll admit I couldn't get through it when I tried to read it, too depressing and frankly the story didn't seem to be going anywhere. There it is, my second heresy of the day. I'm on a roll :)
Ooh! I just did! Yep, plenty of uncensored n-words around. By both black and white writers. Haha heretic! One more transgression and we'll burn you at the stake.
Good to know you can at least still freely use The N-Word there, even if you can't say, "Biology is real and only women can menstruate!" Medium (d)RULEZ!!! 🤤
Ha ha, Medium can't burn me at the stake!!! I'm already dead to them!!! 😁
Ethnic slurs are a method of disparagement sometimes used for differing purpose. They seem to me to say more about the speaker than the target. An attempt to make something OK that isn't; It's OK for them to be slaves, they are less than human. It's OK to go off to war and kill them, they are less than human. This one came into play as I was staging to go to Vietnam. Interestingly, many black men had no problem with the use of the word gook. They used the word for the same reasons the white guys used it.
On a smaller scale, various forms of discrimination because they aren't one of us. The woman with a complaint becomes a bitch. The same theme is in play with dehumanizing political partisanship where the bad tribe is no longer about race but opposing views. All about making some behavior that is harmful OK in the mind of the speaker. The harm is not so much in the words but the attitudes and actions of the speaker that lead to their use. People using that language are telling you more about themselves than about the target of their scorn.
When my children encountered racial slurs, I told them my story of the turd. "If someone tries to give you a turd and you don't take it, they are the one with the dirty hand, not you."
"They seem to me to say more about the speaker than the target"
100%. I've always felt this way. And you're spot on. In most if not all cases, words like theses are used to justify some cruelty or stupidity in the person using them.Absolutely love that final quote😁 I'll definitely be stealing that one at some point!
The people with questions about vaccine safety become “antivaxxers” -- even the ones who dutifully got their shots.
Some of the dehumanizing rhetoric that came out of the COVID years is terrifying; if you put a dehumanizing label on someone you can then do anything to them; fire them from their job, keep them from participating in meaningful public life, deny them healthcare, or even murder them by iatrogenic interventions such as putting them on a ventilator and blowing out their lungs (there are statistics from at least one hospital showing that unvaccinated people were disproportionately ventilated).
Having discussed this topic to death over decades I will limit my remarks to noting my pride that I have never used the word except in reference to it.
Absolutely. I think the same is true for any decent human being. My issue is the people who act as if even if you use the word in reference to it, you're guilty of hate speech.
The world is full of people who want extra attention and in all their many varieties they disgust me. In his soon-to-be-released "Clowns" (I'm one of his beta readers and you'll see my name in the credits) Peter Cawdron refers to this as the Spectacle, that so much of human behavior is the seeking of status .. and attention. The book is more about this point than it is the nominal plot.
If someone is discussing a vile slur it should be clear to even the most addled SJW that it's not the same as yelling it out a car window at someone. But that would be squandering an opportunity to get an extra ration of special attention,
I contrast the difference between the N and the Q words. In both cases much of the maligned group has adopted the slur yet in the former it's reserved for the group and as verboten as ever to others, and in the latter case it's supposed to be some sort of victory (yes, we really are defective!) and supposedly mainstream.
A few days ago I went looking for my first manager online to see if he was still alive (unlikely) or when he had died. I found someone else with the same name; his web page?
Queer Trans they/them.
In one of my smarter moves, I closed that browser tab.
"If someone is discussing a vile slur it should be clear to even the most addled SJW that it's not the same as yelling it out a car window at someone. But that would be squandering an opportunity to get an extra ration of special attention," <3
I refuse to be censored when relating the incident concerning three rednecks with tire irons who threatened my boyfriend and me for bike riding together while a mixed couple. This was in the '70s in Chicago. Fortunately, we'd just arrived at a friend's storefront. Fred knew they kept a baseball bat behind the front door for just such an occasion. He came back out with such a fury that the good ol' boys backed off laughing, like they'd just been playing. We all started yelling at them to fuck off, me likely the loudest. As he piled onto the bed of that jalopy of a truck one shouted back at me, 'Shut up, you whore, fucking with niggers . . . God!" Seriously, you think I would break that narrative to insert a mealy mouthed capital N? Did he euphemize what he was saying to me? If I had to hear it, so do you.
Then, some years later my adorable bi-racial eight-year old son, and I do mean adorable, approached me and asked me very sweetly, "Momma, are you my nigga?" It was obvious he was asking me if I was his sweetheart, for which there was only one possible reply, "Always."
THAT's how you kill a slur, you misuse it, overuse it, use it like an inanimate pronoun till it has lost all its power. Censoring it preserves and amplifies that power. I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child. Let those little children lead us. Always.
Oh, and wait till I tell you what the word 'Caucasian' originally signified -- high priced prostitutes. I kid you not. Ask Nell Painter. See, that's what you do. You flip the word. You don't censor it. You flip it.
Next thing you know, it's a hundred years later and people are mystified why anyone was ever offended at being called a sweetheart, sweetheart.
"THAT's how you kill a slur, you misuse it, overuse it, use it like an inanimate pronoun till it has lost all its power. Censoring it preserves and amplifies that power. I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child."
Hmm, I get where you're coming from, but I don't agree at all here. The problem is, this approach ignores the very real hurt the word currently causes to many black people. It's not just about how you feel about the word, disempowering the word still means considering the feelings of those who it hurts. Which is why, despite the fact that it doesn't bother me, I still censor it.
I'm perfectly able to recognise how stupid it is to treat this word like it's the black person's "Aveda Kedavra," but even I wouldn't want to have to hear it all the time. There's a difference between seeing somebody who wants to use it as an insult for who they are, and treating the word like a toy.
But we're aren't talking about my usage. I never use the word, except in the kind of context I gave at the top. It's mainly the usage of young black teens, like mine were. I don't think they're at all ignorant of how hurtful the word has been and is still. It's their rebellion against that state of affairs, and they are absolutely on track, IMO. But it really doesn't matter what we think. We are, as always, supplanted by the incoming generations who will define their own world. That IS what is becoming of that word, whether we like it, understand it or not.
"But we're aren't talking about my usage."
Well, to be fair, we're talking about your suggestion for how the word should be treated and your "refusal to be censored" in your usage of it:
"I say, beat the motherfucker to death. Use it to describe your pencil. The family dog. The weather. Get creative, like my child."
This is what I'm disagreeing with.
And the trend in usage of the word seems most definitely to be in the opposite direction to what you're suggesting here. In the 70s, 80s and even 90s, the n-word was used, uncensored, in primetime comedy TV shows. Reporters, including white reporters, could use it in context with no fear for their jobs. Teachers could teach Huckleberry Finn. Joe Biden used it in a Senate hearing. All of this is more or less unthinkable today.
I'm advocating for removing the taboo of the word. I think we agree there. But I still feel very strongly that that should be done sensitively. I feel like your framing misses that second part.
The time might not be right for it, but maybe...eventually. Dick Gregory actually did that as one of his comedy routines in the early '70s...I read about it in his auto bio titled...the N-word! (Wouldn't want to display THAT book in my hands on the subway today!) He said it over and over again saying the more we hear it the less powerful it would become. I think 1971 was probably still Too Soon. Maybe 2022 today, but I would argue given how little emotional/social resilience so-called SJWs display today, it might be time to readdress it...although by black comedians. Maybe Chris Rock could do it, he's got a lot of public support at the moment ;)
Linda, this is beautiful. May you ever and always remain your son’s nigga.
LOL. Oh, believe me, I will always be at his back, and he will be at mine. We've both demonstrated that numerous times.
Hilarious, and TRUE. Indeed use it in association with positive things that are not even associated with skin color at all. maybe it can be an adjective indicating powerful, smart, or fashionably dressed. too funny!
Ah, but we can't all do that. It's for those young people of color to do that, and they already are, gangbusters. You have no idea how that word was flying high when I had a houseful of black teenagers a decade ago. Did you see that Dave Chapelle skit where the blind black KKK leader was at a stoplight next to a convertible with two young men playing rap music, loud. Of course, being blind couldn't see they were white. He gave them a huge lambast about their loud jungle music and called them that. One white kid turns to the other and says, "Did he just call us niggas?" The other returns the high five and exclaims, "Awesome!"
Dave knows what I'm talking about.
Linda, I agree. Still we are not yet really on our way. this word is very surprising to me. It is reviled but also OWNED by Blacks too. It is ok for a Black to use it in a way that invalidates its meaning, but a non-Black person CANNOT do this. They will be really attacked for it. It is reminiscent of the attacks one will get if one defames Mohammad. It is because the icon itself is a source of identity in both cases. (I think, but am not sure... it is quite far from my personal experience so I am like an alien trying to piece together what I am seeing :-) )
This is interesting. There have been times and places in my life when even a whispered: "Hey, Whitey" would elicit a sphincteral response, but you're right, I was not demeaned by it. I just prepared to die. Fortunately, that hasn't happened yet.
"even a whispered: "Hey, Whitey" would elicit a sphincteral response, but you're right, I was not demeaned by it. I just prepared to die"
😅 Glad you're still with us.
I don't think that USC prof was fired for saying the Chinese word that sounds like the n-word-- it looks like he still teaches there but not that class. I have a hard time understanding the black students' level of upset and I think the administration's response and the over-the-top apology was out of proportion. It seems to me like, if you're taking a cross-cultural biz communication class, the purpose of the class is to learn about things that might otherwise take you by surprise -- better to encounter it in the classroom than in real life. I guess I'd want to talk with the students to understand their perspective on this.
"I don't think that USC prof was fired for saying the Chinese word that sounds like the n-word-- it looks like he still teaches there but not that class"
Gah, brainfart. 😅 I meant to say suspended, not fired. Thanks. I've corrected the post.
I think the level of overreaction is a combination of learned behaviour (children are actively taught that this word should send them into hysterics, and so it does in some cases), and cowardice (it's easier for the school to issue their boilerplate apology and pledge to #dothework than to uphold their responsibility to produce smart, resilient young adults).
I'd fully understand students objecting to a culture of normalising the use of the n-word on campus, say. But if they can't hear the word at all without melting down, regardless of context, it's the duty of a university to encourage them to think more deeply and carefully. Not pander to them. The real world won't pander after all.
This article has me curious: What do you think of the conversation about Twain's books?
I have no issue with it at all. I think its a terrible mistake to "disappear" aspects of history that don't conform to our civil standards today. the n-word exists whether or not we acknowledge it.
I think children are perfectly placed to have a conversation about that, led sensitively and honestly by an adult, that will frame the way they respond to the word in a healthier way. It's true of everybody, but especially of children, that if you make something taboo, they only feel more drawn to it.
Based on your article, I thought that this might be your answer. I agree. Thank you for taking the time to respond.
I see people getting outraged at old sitcoms showing women as happy homemakers.
Imagine how they'd react to Amos and Andy.
In Vertigo Jimmy Stewart asks Kim Novak to dye her hair blond. "It can't matter to you." Audience laughs.
Those were other times. They really happened.
OTOH please do airbrush out cigarettes,
Humphrey Bogart died of lung cancer. He was 56.
I had headaches *every day* of the first fifteen years of my life from my mother's Newports. Cigarettes keep me out of a lot of places I would like to go.
Don't expect me to be "objective" about the goddamn things.
Steve, this is a crucial insight: I’m saying that it’s very difficult to offend somebody over a trait they’re proud of.
Perhaps a slightly more accurate framing is to say it is very difficult to offend someone over something that they are not sensitive about. Because I think many AA/Blacks do have genuine pride in the skin grouping (I know you have pride, but not in that grouping) but I see many who genuinely do, but at the same time they are also very sensitive and defensive regarding it. They are defensive because they (correctly) feel it is attacked.
A more confident person would not be rattled. So I think it is correct to say such a person is not confident, but the still could have pride about their membership... they just know that others to not share that positive association, so they lack confidence.
thus I might edit your statement to say it is very difficult to offend someone over an attribute which they feel positive and confident about. Still this is a perceptive comment!
"They are defensive because they (correctly) feel it is attacked."
Yeah exactly. There's a degree to which it's always reasonable to get defensive if you're being attacked. Even if you're not insecure about the thing you're being attacked *for*. To degree, the mere existence of the attack justifies defensiveness, right? But it's the level and nature of the defensiveness that's the issue.
If somebody continually tries to make fun of my height, say, I'll eventually get annoyed about it, even though I'm over 6 feet. But not because I'm not confident about my height, because it's annoying to have somebody try to attack you over anything.
The issue with the n-word is the disproportionate level of upset it causes. About a trait that should never be a negative in the mind of the person hearing it. If somebody calls me a n****er, depending on my mood that day, I might be offended that they're trying to attack me. But my offence isn't caused by the *way* they're trying to attack me. If anything, the fact that I immediately think so little of anybody who would use that word as na attack would make whatever they had to say easier to ignore.
I want to mostly second Steve's response, in my own take.
Try: "It's hard to accidentally offend somebody by referencing a word relating to an attribute they are proud of."
You can use any words in a nasty or insulting way for disparagement, and people often react to actual disparagement, with or without a slur word (unless as you say, they have great confidence) - but intentional insults are not the issue here.
If the word is just pronounced as a reference, or read aloud from Huck Finn, and just hearing the syllables offends somebody - do you still think *that* kind of hyper-sensitivity is compatible with pride (just lack of confidence)? I think Steve has a point.
I am a little lost in the nuance of all of this.. To a first approximation I think we are all agreeing with each other. But I think it is possible to have strong identity/pride in a thing and ALSO have insecurity/sensitivity about the same thing. I think the person that sees Blackness as core to their identity will have alot of pride and identification with that label. If they also know that many view Blackness in a negative light, then the could become quite sensitive and insecure about that same label. So in this narrow sense I think I might be diverging from your thinking. e.g. it seems strong identification with a spurrned identity could yield a combination of pride and insecurity.
I interpret many (not all) cases of "being offended", in the context of contemporary neo-progressivism, as mostly unconscious tactics for obtaining "power over", more like a "ha, gotcha, I'm gonna play this for all the benefit I can get" rather than honestly expressing hurt feelings.
And that includes being offended by hearing the syllables of the word in question when used as a reference or read from a book like Huck Finn, with no offensive intention or affect. If you are offended, then you have a grievance and the moral high ground, and something is owed you.
The absurdly high taboo on it is largely performative in my view (at least originally, see below). The more offended or outraged you are, the more power you get. That kind of dynamic allows for amplification untethered to actual harm caused or the degree of hostile intent (if any), because it's not about redressing harm or damping hostility, but about gaining power. Pretend you don't realize that it was just a reference, or pretend it hurts you just as much as an intentional slur anyway, milk it any way you can.
As a side helping, you can say the word but they can't, a kind of special privilege you have that they don't. Guard this asymmetry jealously, it's another kind of power (albeit a weak one).
One downside of this, shared with other facets of the victimhood narrative, is that people don't like to think of themselves as being fake and manipulative that way. So in accord with cognitive dissonance, there is a tendency to convince oneself that one really is just as exaggeratedly harmed as one is pretending to be, and thus not faking. If you pretend to be overly psychologically fragile often enough, it becomes hard to distinguish from the real thing, or it becomes the real thing, no longer just pretense. This dynamic is not specific to race or sex or any one domain, but a general principle of seeking power through performative exaggeration of victimhood.
Of course, just as with any deception, some part of oneself does know. This behavior does not generate self respect or confidence or earned pride, like accomplishment can.
And again, I'm talking about my understanding of the dynamics in SOME cases, not all cases, of excessive reactivity to non-insulting usage - like used as a reference or hearing a similar sounding word. I am NOT talking about the word being used as a slur or insult.
In the more general case, not specifically about this word or about race, I have chosen to mostly avoid using "offended" or "offensive". I look for another framing for my feelings or judgement, rather than use the shorthand of "I'm offended".
"I’m saying that it’s very difficult to offend somebody over a trait they’re proud of."
Or at least not ashamed of being, anyway. I don't get 'skin pride'. I get 'black pride' from the 1970s when black people were beginning to feel and make their growing power known, and challenging white racism. But I think it's an idea, like the 'don't blame the victim' mantra for feminism, that's past its prime. Fact is, there's nothing to be 'proud' about with skin colour. It's an accident of birth (your soul, personality, consciousness, whatever) was born into this body or that body, and also genetics (my parents are Western European, so I lack the natural sun protection others have, but they're not 'better' than me). The 'white pride' movement struck me as equally stupid...'Pride' comes from something you've ACCOMPLISHED. I'm proud to be a good writer. I'm proud to have stopped picking so many political fights on Facebook. I'm proud of having had the labia to move to Canada, to uproot my entire life away from my family (who had nothing to do with my decision) and start a new life in a new country, albeit a next-door neighbour. I'm not 'proud' to be white, or female, or French (although I was a bit of a French nationalist in college, but it was a silly kid identity thing and I grew out of it). I am, however, proud that I've begun learning French again.
Skin colour really is a stupid thing to hierarchize, because there are *literally no significant differences* between anyone apart from a few evolutionary mutations to adapt to new environments. As opposed to say (Warning: Heretical statement alert!) males and females, between which there are demonstrable differences in body size, strength, and, to a lesser extent cognitive traits - neither gender is intellectually superior to the other, but there are brain differences that appear to partially account for the way we process information and what we're good at. Women have more developed language and emotional expression, men are better at visualizing spatial possibiltiies and math, but that doesn't mean one gender can't learn what the other is better at. Frankly, I think there'd be a much closer parity if men spent more time learning about emotions and how to communicate, and women spent more time on math and science. It's not *all* how we're socialized, and the left is positively phobic about biological differences. My feeling is let's all do what we're best at and stop applying value labels to which work is more important. That's where a lot of the prejudice comes from - males deciding that their work, and their skills, and their talents are more valuable than women's.
I'm with you on the emotion behind the 'n' word and I'd add the 'c' word for women. The c-word is the WORST POSSIBLE WORD EVER, arguably worse than the n-word because you can't even joke with it like black comedians can do with the n-word. No female comedian that I know of uses it, the only male I can think of who uses it is Ricky Gervais, whom I love, but he's cringey sometimes and I'm not keen on the c-word use.
But, for blacks and also women, you make a good point, one that I've thought about too, about how much power we grant words. I know I have more resilience than younger women when it comes to alleged misogyny....I don't lose my shit if a guy tells me I'm pretty (thank you, it's on purpose, so it would be insane of me to object) or says something rude. Ever since you wrote an article a few years ago about the Macedonian kid who called you the n-word and you chased him down, laughed, and challenged him on it, (rather than beating the snot out of him, lol) I thought, "Could I do that if someone called me the c-word? What kind of example would it set if other women, about to go nuclear, watched me laugh and ask him why he thinks that's an insult? After all, George Carlin claimed - and I agree with him! - that's it's actually a very friendly, inviting-sounding word - it's all warm and cuddly and cozy. Probably something the offender has spent a lifetime trying to get into :)
Both these words would cease to hurt if we stopped giving them, and their wielders, so much power.
I'm responding to the section about bio-psychological differences between the sexes. I'm not disagreeing, just augmenting.
The nuance I'd like to add is making explicit is that it appears today that males and females do differ somewhat psychologically ON AVERAGE, for partly innate reasons (not 100% cultural as I used to believe) - however that broad average doesn't tell us anything much about an individual's proclivities or abilities, so sex should never in itself be relevant to, say, hiring. Each person should be evaluated individually, not assumed to be typical of their population group and judged thereby. However, because of those differences at the aggregate statistical level, disparities in proportions do not *automatically* imply discrimination or an unlevel playing field (though of course those remain potential causes, partial or total). So I would not a priori assume that if 51% of Google programmers are not women, that in itself proves sex discrimination. (Nor does it excuse actual discrimination).
We can potentially create a society which is relatively equal and fair to individuals of all population groups (equal opportunity for individuals); or we could seek a society which enforces equal aggregate statistics across population groups (equal outcomes for groups). We cannot have both, tho, so long as population groups differ in the way they convert opportunities to outcomes, for various reasons. If a culture elevates chess playing or basketball or music, they will tend to have disproportionate success in those areas, given anywhere near equal opportunity. That's part of accepting diversity. And this can go for sex as well, whether the statistical level differences in ability or interest derive from biology or culture.
Evaluating individually is exactly what I'm arguing. You're doing what most people on the left do when I bring this up; react with arguments against compartmentalizing anyone based on sex. Which I'm in total agreement with. I'm simply saying let's not ignore facts and let's challenge the VALUES and assumptions behind them rather than pretend they don't exist (which is what's led us to the regressive left's denial that sex is even a thing, and that a woman is anyone who says he is). I'm arguing we acknowledge these differences with, "Well, that's interesting, but this woman does this allegedly male thing very well and these guys over here do these allegedly female things really well, so who cares in the long run." With two exceptions: Sperm donor and surrogate mother.
I NEVER argue or suggest we should pigeonhole people based on sex generalities, yet people always react to caution as if I did ;)
"used to define not just a person but an attitude, a work ethic, a lifestyle, everything that embodies being a person, all of it negative."
Yeah, I understand where you're coming from here too, I guess this is where we have to seriously consider intent (something that people in social justice seem hell-bent on ignoring lately). If somebody uses the n-word in a quote, or when reading Mark Twain, that's very different to using it as a slur. And the disproportionate power this word has comes from our failure to acknowledge the difference.
I'd never criticise somebody for being offended if it's used as a slur against them. When somebody uses it as a slur, their *intention* is to offend. It's reasonable to take that intention personally regardless of the words used. But if the word is used in a way that clearly isn't intended to offend or attack anybody, it's infantilising to pretend that it's reasonable for an adult to fall to pieces over it.
I think I've ever used the word once in conversation in my entire life. As you say, it's extremely rare that there's any need to use it. Especially if you're capable of thinking an d speaking coherently. But the word can't lose its power if it retains its *ultimate taboo* status.
Growing up in the '60s in Florida, my mother taught me the eeny meeny miney moe verse but she said 'tiger' instead of the n-word which was commonly used in the South, although I don't remember the other kids saying it. She explained how others used the n-word with the verse although by then she didn't need to explain why it was wrong...that's one of the earliest conversations I can remember having with my mother, before I was in school....black people and how they are NEVER to be called ugly names, esp not that one.