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ReadyClayerOne t1_jatfas5 wrote

Reply to comment by snoman18x in Banning Words Won’t Make the World More Just - The Atlantic by vaikrunta

Someone posted an archive link below and they argue instead that so called forced inclusive language is bad because it doesn't help anyone, a prisoner suffers no matter what you call them, and people are reactionary, citing the extremely mixed acceptance of latinx and similar terms among Spanish speaking groups. Nothing really about the euphemism treadmill.

I don't know. I was skimming shortly into it, but it seemed like a lot of words to say, "I'm upset that some people get upset about language and are FORCING others to accept their language by... writing guidelines." Like, I get the whole toxic positivity argument. I agree with him on the notion that "saying X is blind to Y is insensitive to actual blind people" is one that I don't particularly care for. Not because I want to be a dick to blind people, but because the meaning isn't pointing out a deficiency in blind people. It's used in a sense of being the opposite of seeing something. I digress.

My big issue is that in order to engage with his argument I first have to accept that this is a widespread and pervasive problem in the first place and, honestly, I don't think it is. Conservatives have been complaining about PC language basically since they coined the term and probably before that as well. He seems to have an allergy to engaging with any of the actual arguments though. For example, I don't remember him mentioning this part about prisoners: The point of naming prisoners with person first language isn't to lessen their suffering, as if anyone advocating for it thought the change would do that; it's to humanize them to hopefully get others to empathize with them and support reform that would hopefully benefit people in prison and the general public. Turns out, a lot of people equate "prisoners" with "criminals" and those are loaded words. They make people more likely to view them as an other by discounting their personhood. By providing his strawman "calling them a person in an incarcerated facility doesn't lessen their suffering" argument in place of an actual advocate position, he shows that he only wants to argue with the blanket concept and not engage with why some groups advocate for these changes.

He also rewrote part of a 2012 non-fiction piece with what he imagines the inclusive version would look like and it's very clunky and uses more words you see. So in this imaginary world where he was forced to rewrite it, the prose is not as brief or elegant because he was forced to reword "...had Hindu parents" as "...whose parents were of Hindu descent..." CheckMATE, language police!

What's his evidence besides? Who's rounding up writers and speakers, throwing them into the vocabu-gulags? Style guides and guidelines. Guides that, by and large, say something about how some people are sensitive to certain language and to be mindful of that.

So he's an asshole ranting about inclusive language but doing it in a way that's slightly more intellectual than your standard 14 year old on the Internet by dressing it up with contemporary references and about 3000 words too many.¹ However he's still forgotten to include any actual opposing positions, instead substituting his own easier to counter arguments. If only there was a word for that.

¹ I'm not word counting it.

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madmari t1_jauicm1 wrote

There is close to zero acceptance of Latinx

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VitaminPb t1_jausku0 wrote

Except amongst the leftist intelligentsia who insist that it be used and if you don’t you are a racist and sexist and probably a neo-Nazi.

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EristicTrick t1_jatl9v8 wrote

"Strawman" is offensive to scarecrows

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zigfoyer t1_jav20hd wrote

I think the issue isn't language policing in itself, but more that we don't do anything but that. Black-white wealth gap hasn't improved since the 60s, but we have phased out most slurs, at least in polite conversation, and we have better representation in movies and whatnot. Language should be a stepping stone to real change, not the goal in itself.

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john_wb t1_jawo1rj wrote

Changing language is easier than changing society. It allows some people to feel better that they are "making a difference" without having to actually make any effort.

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ReadyClayerOne t1_jazbs7n wrote

To add to the other commenter's point about inclusive language itself being cheap, here's an MLK quote:

>It didn’t cost the nation anything to integrate hotels and motels. It didn’t cost the nation a penny to guarantee the right to vote. Now we are in a period where it will cost the nation billions of dollars to get rid of poverty, to get rid of slums, to make quality integrated education a reality

Change is easy when it doesn't require fundamentally restructuring our institutions or reconfiguring the way we distribute our wealth. We can't even get people to accept the cheap change, let alone the real change.

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No_Industry9653 t1_jav6n0n wrote

Yeah, this isn't exactly Orwellianism, and it's not like professional writing isn't constrained and somewhat confusing to begin with. If they want to try have codified ways to not make Twitter mad, why not.

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Meteorologie t1_javbpdh wrote

I think he’s arguing against the idea that if you are not fully on board with constant and mutually-conflicting revisions of words and phrases in everyday use, decided behind closed doors by unknown and unaccountable figures and handed down with no debate or dissent permitted, you must be an asshole, bigot, or some other type of Bad Person.

I think you sort of proved his point.

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davowankenobi t1_jaygftg wrote

You keep saying unknown and unaccountable people, which leads me to believe that you don’t know have meaningful relationships with anyone that is affected by racist, ableist, homophobic, transphobic language.

Just because you don’t know how equitable language came/comes about, does not make it what you think it is. You’re making it sound like there is some cabal that want to use language that is more equitable and inclusive.

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ReadyClayerOne t1_jazl1cq wrote

> decided behind closed doors by unknown and unaccountable figures

I'm sorry. Who is this shadowy cabal deciding inclusive language? Do they decide all the modern no-no words or are there sub-committees for different minority groups?

>and handed down with no debate or dissent permitted,

They have enforcers!? Wow. They must be pretty powerful. I can imagine it now, "Hey, Tony, we don't use the g-word anymore. Yeah, last Tuesday. You mean yous didn't get the new list? Sorry, no excuses. I have to bust ya kneecaps. Oh, I guess I gotta call you a Nazi or racist or something too. Yeah, thanks for being so understanding, Tony."

Now, I wrote a lot of words so maybe you missed the important point that he missed and one of the main issues I have with accepting his argument. So let me spell it out:

The way we describe people absolutely colors how we engage with them. Advocates for inclusive or person-first language often do so with the intention of humanizing individuals within a group.

How much they succeed and whether or not they're ignoring the people with the most skin in the game, so to speak, is up for debate, especially as more people from within these minority and marginalized groups are able to be heard. It can be hard when there are advocates outside a group trying to be mindful or helpful so they use terms that conflict with the preferred terms of people within that group, doubly so if advocates within the group aren't even completely decided. And that's not even getting into the in-group people who are not as engaged and may not accept any of the most popular terms.

For example, I used latinx in a setting with some younger people from Cuba and the Dominican Republic a few years ago, mostly because I heard it and thought maybe it was slightly more inclusive. They were upset at most and indifferent at best, but all very vocal about it. So I asked their opinions, listened, then asked, "What would you, right now, as a group prefer?" They debated latino, but then came to a consensus of either that or latin@, an alternative a few had seen that combines the -a and -o pronounced like latinay, for its inclusivity to the girls. So that's what I went with. When I was with other groups, if they had a problem when said it, I'd usually laugh a bit and apologize, explain my experience with the first group then ask the new group their preference.

We seem to have this aversion to being wrong. I don't know if I can blame people for where it comes from. I know I'm not immune to it. Part of it's natural: it hurts to be wrong. It hurts to have someone disagree with us. Research shows that our worldview is fundamentally tied to our ego. So when our opinions or beliefs are challenged, our body feels threatened. But part of this aversion is learned too. We get so full of ourselves. Look at the people I listen to, how intelligent I am, how many people I know, the success I have in work and home, the breadth and depth of my knowledge as proven by my peers, teachers, and institutions! Surely there is no fault in my logic, foundation, or reasoning! Maybe that's just as much the ego talking.

Perhaps I'm rambling. Point being that we hear a lot about scientific or mathematical reasoning. These are fields wherein answers are often clear cut. Barring rare or unusual cases that don't affect nor appear in most peoples' daily lives, 2+2=4; ice freezes; fire burns.

When it comes to people, our societies, our cultures, our languages and so on, things are not so clear cut. The language today is not the language we grew up with. There is no higher authority that can dictate nor forcefully direct the change of such. Rationality can only predict so much because not every person is rational nor are they rational in the same ways as, even with the same information, two people may come to opposite conclusions. In that way, we may write or say something and someone will disagree. It may be one person. It may be an entire group. We may be able to defend what we said and how we said it wholly and flawlessly. We may realize that what we said or how we said it was, in fact, poorly delivered. The best we can do is understand and learn. It's no good engaging with people who have good intentions if we don't even try to understand and faithfully represent why they do what they do.

If you've stuck with me this long, thanks. You didn't have to, especially after my snark at the beginning. I've been writing this comment longer than I wanted, same as my original comment honestly, partially because it's gotten more introspective than I was intending. I'm tired. Tired of a lot of things. I'm tired of endless niggling that assumes such and such is a monolith, taking advantage of our gullible brains' inability to distinguish a few examples from a genuine trend. I'm tired of endless pontificators huffing their own farts in intellectually masturbatory editorials. I'm tired of the people that continue to publish that rubbish as it's often inflammatory "hot takes" designed to attract clicks.

Anyways, here's Douglas Adams being far more concise than I'll ever care to be on the general subject:

>Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty- five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.

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davowankenobi t1_jatorg7 wrote

100% agree with this. I read it in full and I was confused by that excerpt he rewrote. It encapsulates the whole spirit of the article: "being purposively obtuse about language change".

It just reeks of right wing propaganda, because I have read several fiction books recently with topics that have content warnings and more equity language and the impact of the horrible actions is not lessened by the language use, because the authors are good writers and not relying their plot on lazy stereotypes/language.

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