"That's so gay" - enough to get twelve-year-olds suspended

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Agathon
I understand perfectly, I disagree. It is their word, not yours. If me and my friends coin a word and you think it means something to you, then that's your problem and not ours.

I don't think it's anyones problem. Not untill you offend someone - and then it's your problem for being an inconsider *****.

That's a very childish game to play, anyways.

Are you going to stop me from swearing in the company of my friends now?

Eh? You seem to be wandering into a completely different discussion, again. But if you continously talk to your friends in a language they find offensive, I don't think they'd be your friends for long anyways.

Yes but the notion of a norm implies correctness.

Every interpretation is not correct. The criterion of correctness is what the speech community normally uses.

I have heard you and drake talk about context in this thread, maybe you should think about what it means. There are no abolutes in language. The only norm is that of the person or people you are talking to. Like I said: You don't talk **** to your grandma, even if you can talk **** to your friends.

If I start using "dog" instead of "cat" then I'm making a mistake. If I interpret "dog" to mean "cat" I'm making a mistake.

I'll take the curtesy of picking better words for the analogy.

If you start saying gay instead of lame, you are failing to convey your thoughts. If you start hearing gay instead of lame, you are failing to grasp the speaker's meaning. Like I said, language is a compromise, but interpretation is paramount. If the speaker keeps saying lame when the listener hears gay, he is either a complete idiot or an inconsiderate ***** - it is his responsibilty to convey his thoughts in a way that the listener can interpret correctly.

Same goes for the other way around; saying gay when you mean lame.

That is a totally ridiculous view - if it were true then there wouldn't be much sense in saying that people understood each other, because the speaker wouldn't be able to know the meaning of his own utterance.

Sorry? This is undeniably how it works. It is pretty obviously, and very basic. I don't understand how you can even speak and spell without understanding that you have to convey your thoughts to other people when communicating with them. You don't just spew out words and steamroll over people in a conversation, you communicte with them and phrase things in a way that would make them think in the same lines you are.

Yes you can. Teachers do it all the time. So do parents when they teach their children to speak.

Well, yes. That is the 'common interpretation' that we have talked about. But I am refering to something deeper, a personal interpretation. You can not change the images, experiences, and meanings that people associate with different things. Like I said in my previous example, you can not stop a pompous aristocrat from thinking of the "train driver" as a demeaning connotation.

No - it's about communicating thoughts to others. When I tell my friend that there is a a beer in the fridge I am not trying to get him to see it the same way as I do. I'm reporting a a fact to him.

If that's the height of your conversations, that explains alot. We haven't developed such a complicated language to simply tell our friends where the beer is.

Regardless, "it's about communicating thoughts to others." is exactly what I said. Guess I didn't do a very good job. (then again, I'm working with a very difficult listener. )

[Agathon]

Originally posted by St Leo
Do you mean to say that disabled people were once known as "lame"?

Yeah, the lame ones anyway: but I don't mean to suggest that this always had bad connotations. Let's not start another one; "gay" seems bad enough.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Agathon
(1). Cannot be made as a case because the meaning of a term is the use it is put to in a speech community. In this case it is equivalent to "lame" - that is what the people who coined it use it to mean - that's what it means. You don't own the meaning - the speech community (in this case teenagers) do - it's their coinage, whatever interpretation you put on it is your business, not theirs. The fact that the same phonemes are used homonymously is irrelevant. If you are going to provide some other criterion of meaning then go ahead - I'd like a good laugh.

I'm just curious, what do these teenagers call homosexuals?


How is the homonymous use irrelevant? It's the entire crux of the problem!

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Osweld

If you start saying gay instead of lame, you are failing to convey your thoughts. If you start hearing gay instead of lame, you are failing to grasp the speaker's meaning. Like I said, language is a compromise, but interpretation is paramount. If the speaker keeps saying lame when the listener hears gay, he is either a complete idiot or an inconsiderate ***** - it is his responsibilty to convey his thoughts in a way that the listener can interpret correctly.

If your listener is one of the teens Drake and I have been talking about, this won't happen.

Well, yes. That is the 'common interpretation' that we have talked about. But I am refering to something deeper, a personal interpretation. You can not change the images, experiences, and meanings that people associate with different things. Like I said in my previous example, you can not stop a pompous aristocrat from thinking of the "train driver" as a demeaning connotation.

Fine, like this is some new and novel discovery. The fact is that such connotations are your personal problem and not the problem of teenagers who don't have your hang ups. You can't legislate your own personal idiolect to everyone else.

And the images, experiences, etc. we associate with certain words can certainly be changed.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Osweld

I'm just curious, what do these teenagers call homosexuals?

Why don't you ask one? I'm sure that some of them call them "gays" if that's what you want to here, but I'm also sure that the same people recognise the semantic difference. Or perhaps they get offended when a fellow student in shop tells them he needs a screw.

How is the homonymous use irrelevant? It's the entire crux of the problem!

Only if you believe homonymy entails synonymy (i.e. only if you are illiterate).

[Drake Tungsten]

Only if you believe homonymy entails synonymy (i.e. only if you are illiterate).

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
No they don't. I don't know what kind of college you're at, but people here use the word "gay" all the time. It was in the campus paper today, for god's sake.

I've noticed an incredible drop in usage of the word "gay" as a slur after high school...

Maybe your college is full of immature twits?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Asher
Maybe your college is full of immature twits?

Understatement of the year...

[Drake Tungsten]

I've noticed an incredible drop in usage of the word "gay" as a slur after high school...

Maybe your college is full of immature twits?

Nice argument.

[Asher]

Go figure that people in Nebraska are still using offensive slang casually, when most people in the civilized world grow out of it after HS.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by obiwan18
Boris:

So why are you so offended by this use of gay if gay has lost it's steam as an insult?

It has no steam as an insult when used as neutral description of homosexuals. It is insulting when used as a synonym for stupid/bad.

Is it offensive to gay people if straight people use the word amongst themselves?

Of course not, provided it's the neutral descriptive, not the stupid/bad connotation.

[General Ludd]

Agathon, you have pretty much admitted it.

Using gay as a slur is rude, and can be offensive to many people. You have acknowledged it, but try to shrug off with a make believed moral authority and superiorty complex. Except the fact that you're being a inconsiderate ******* and deal with it.

You are right, if everyone felt the same way as you it wouldn't be a problem. But that is not how it works, and that is why swearing and cussing in public - and especially directly to whome it offends - is being rude and inconsiderate.

[Jaguar]

I gotta side with the gay guys on this one. "That's so gay" has got to go. So does "That's so retarded" for that matter.

BTW, heres my response to the "nigger" debate. The word is ok under any circumstances if said by a black guy. It is ok under no circumstances if said by anyone else, unless it is referring to the word, not a person. The same applies for all other slurs.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Osweld
Agathon, you have pretty much admitted it.

Using gay as a slur is rude, and can be offensive to many people. You have acknowledged it, but try to shrug off with a make believed moral authority and superiorty complex. Except the fact that you're being a inconsiderate ******* and deal with it.

I've admitted no such thing, much less a moral authority. My argument is with people who take the moral authority to censor other people's speech because they think it means something it doesn't.

You are right, if everyone felt the same way as you it wouldn't be a problem. But that is not how it works, and that is why swearing and cussing in public - and especially directly to whome it offends - is being rude and inconsiderate.

So is legislating language use because you just don't like it. In fact it is worse.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
I've admitted no such thing, much less a moral authority. My argument is with people who take the moral authority to censor other people's speech because they think it means something it doesn't.

Oh come on, you can't say it means an absolute thing.

It's offensive, and that's a simple fact you'll need to deal with.

And I do believe in public school environments, speech should be censored to the point where it doesn't foster hate, alienate people, or promote general intolerance.

It's an evil necessity of a safe environment to learn.

I won't have kids saying "That's so Jewish", and I won't have kids saying "That's so gay", and have them both go unpunished by a teacher. I think it's reprehensible to let kids say such things in public schools.

Say them all they want in private, they're inconsiderate *******s if they do, but they should be prohibited from saying such things in public schools.

[Drake Tungsten]

It's offensive, and that's a simple fact you'll need to deal with.

"Niggardly" is offensive as well, according to your definition. I guess that teacher deserved to be reprimanded for using it...

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
"Niggardly" is offensive as well, according to your definition. I guess that teacher deserved to be reprimanded for using it...

Huh?? How do you figure?

Niggardly isn't offensive in the slightest.

[Drake Tungsten]

Huh?? How do you figure?

Niggardly isn't offensive in the slightest.

You're saying that "gay" is offensive because you and other gay people think it is. It doesn't matter to you what the real meaning of the term is; it is offensive because you say it is.

Apply the same logic to "niggardly". The offended women didn't know what the word meant, which should make her opinion on the matter irrelevant. However, since interpretation determines meaning according to you and other people here, the word "niggardly" becomes offensive the moment some ill-informed person thinks it's offensive. We should punish teachers and students for saying it...

[Asher]

Oh my God, Drake...

"gay" is most commonly used as a reference to a sexual identity
"niggardly" is not used as a reference to identity

Some people could be offended by the word because they thought it would be "niggerdly", or "like a nigger", which it certainly is not.

They're fundamentally different cases. One is using someone's sexual identity as an insult, the other is a word that unfortunately can be mistaken for a racial slur adverb.

[Drake Tungsten]

One is using someone's sexual identity as an insult

They're not using gay as an insult! How many times do you have to be told this? They're using gay in a totally new way, with a totally different meaning.

You're no better than the lady who thought "niggardly" was offensive. Completely oblivious to how misinformed you really are...

[Jaguar]

Drake, I usually agree with you, but you're being really gay right now. It is unacceptable to have a group's name be a synonym for "bad" under any circumstances.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
They're not using gay as an insult!

So obviously when the kids say something is gay, they're praising it.

How many times do you have to be told this?

How many times do you need to repeat it before you believe it's true?

They're using gay in a totally new way, with a totally different meaning.

No, they're not. Only a person so incredibly naive would think that...

You're no better than the lady who thought "niggardly" was offensive. Completely oblivious to how misinformed you really are...

You're no better than Albert Speer...

Really.

You honestly expect me to believe people randomly chose "gay" and thought it'd be an insult?

It's just convenient that it's most commonly used in one of the most homophobic environments? It's just convenient that it's also used to refer to a minority that tends to get picked on and rejected by people in that environment? It's just convenient that once people get out of a homophobic environment, they're less likely to say something is "gay" as an insult?

You're so hopelessly naive, Drake...

[Drake Tungsten]

Drake, I usually agree with you, but you're being really gay right now.

See, there's nothing offensive about this sentence. He's calling me lame, not calling homosexuals bad. How hard is this to understand? Can't you people recognize contextual clues...

BTW, this whole thread has become totally gay. Agathon pretty much destroyed Asher and Boris's arguments, so they've been reduced to name-calling.

[Oerdin]

You guys are being gay.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
See, there's nothing offensive about this sentence. He's calling me lame, not calling homosexuals bad. How hard is this to understand? Can't you people recognize contextual clues...

Can't YOU realize that using a sexual identity word to equate "bad" is insulting, regardless of intent?

BTW, this whole thread has become totally gay. Agathon pretty much destroyed Asher and Boris's arguments, so they've been reduced to name-calling.

Agathon's up to his usual tricks, and he only wins the argument to people who have no clue what's going on and are impressed by his lengthy spammy posts which ignore issues, ignore logic, and generally act like a condescending, insensitive twit.

[Drake Tungsten]

You guys are being gay.

Yes we are. Frankly, I'm a little ashamed about being sucked into this gay ass discussion once again.

[GePap]

Drake:

Niggard [[ ME negarde, prob. < Scan, as in ON hnoggr, Norw dial. nogg, afraid stingy < IE base *kneu (var of *ken, to scrape) > OE hneaw, sparse, stingy]]

In short, the word niggardly comes from an old Anglo Saxon meaning of stingy, while Nigger comes from Negro, or black.

Niggardly then is in no way racsist, unless you have some problem with stingy vikings, that is.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten


Yes we are. Frankly, I'm a little ashamed about being sucked into this gay ass discussion once again.

It's standard behavior psychologically.

Get your ass kicked in a debate, try to win by clinging onto someone else's arguments. Even when everything's stacking up against you, ignore it and keep repeating what you've already said, because you know if you say it enough you can convince yourself you were right and everyone else is the one that's being stupid.

[Drake Tungsten]

If you can address the points made in this post, then we can debate. If you can't, then I'll know that your arguments are indefensible and stop wasting my time.

Originally posted by Agathon
I love this. Still going and people still want to say that it's derogatory to homosexuals by ignoring what the word in this context means. It's wonderful when people metastasize their personal desire to prohibit something, into a fact about the meaning of a word. The fact that you are offended by something is not a sufficient moral reason, on it's own, to justify prohibiting it or punishing people for doing it. This should be obvious to any thinking person.

Unless (1) the term "gay" as used by teenagers like this guy is specifically derogatory to homosexuals - in other words, that's what "gay" means in this context (which it doesn't), or (2) that this usage of the term was coined specifically to get at homosexuals (which no-one has proved) you have no case.

(1). Cannot be made as a case because the meaning of a term is the use it is put to in a speech community. In this case it is equivalent to "lame" - that is what the people who coined it use it to mean - that's what it means. You don't own the meaning - the speech community (in this case teenagers) do - it's their coinage, whatever interpretation you put on it is your business, not theirs. The fact that the same phonemes are used homonymously is irrelevant. If you are going to provide some other criterion of meaning then go ahead - I'd like a good laugh.

(2) There is no conclusive evidence presented by anyone here (including myself) that this use of the term as a mild form of general derogation either did or did not come about because of a contemptuous attitude towards homosexuals or that it was coined to get at gays. Such evidence would require a professional empirical study of the development of the use of the word and no one has presented anything other than hypotheses based on their own peculiar experiences (that's pretty much all we are capable of). In the face of such a lack of evidence the people who argue that they are offended by the term have precisely that as their case - and that's not sufficient reason for publicly sanctioned punishment.

In other words "gay" is innocent until it is proven guilty.

If someone wants to come up with genuine evidence rather than just repeatedly saying "I know it" then that's fine. Otherwise it is just a waste of time.

And you know what? If people make a big fuss about this word, then just like most of the other advice from the bosses, it will make teens want to use it more.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
If you can address the point made in this post, then we can debate. If you can't, then I'll know that your arguments are indefensible and stop wasting my time.

It's VERY simple.

Your and Agathon's entire argument sits on very thin ice about the "context" of the word being said.

It appears both you, and Agathon, are completely incapable of being sensitive and seeing things from other people's perspectives.

Your whole argument comes crashing down once you realize the FULL context of the word's use -- its origins and its implications, as well as who is saying it and why.

Whenever the word is used to equate "bad", it is insulting. It's as simple as that.

That's simply not up to debate. You'll just have to believe people when they tell you it is insulting, and be a considerate human being and think "Hey, maybe we should stop using it so carelessly?"

That point was demolished a long time ago, by the way, it just so happens that you and Agathon manage to keep ignoring that fact and asking people to demolish it again and again, hoping that we get bored and leave so you can "win".