back in my day


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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 22:52

Re: back in my day

byrel wrote:In other words, historically it's a term like effeminate; it indicates that the behavior is being considered typical of a women as opposed to a man (with the exact behaviors it applies to being very culture-dependent.) ... I don't think it's a gay-specific insult, and I don't think there was any intent in this thread to use it to refer specifically to homosexuals.

fun fact: you can't actually separate the gay-bashing from the woman-demeaning here, and Lasty's rationale for censoring the word doesn't in any way depend on that being possible
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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 23:32

Re: back in my day

tedric wrote:fun fact: you can't actually separate the gay-bashing from the woman-demeaning here, and Lasty's rationale for censoring the word doesn't in any way depend on that being possible


Erm. In what way is it woman-demeaning to have or use an endearment which means 'you represent all my culture says a woman should be'? I mean, cultures are notoriously narrow-minded that way, but such a usage is clearly a compliment for a woman who happens to, or has chosen to fit the role the culture prescribes. It's not demeaning; it's uplifting a particular woman for a particular choice. I call my wife 'kitty' and 'stephylpuss' on occasion; is that demeaning her? She certainly doesn't think so! And she's a very strong woman; stronger and more 'type A' than I am by a good bit. Of course, that's entirely (or at least mostly) within the role my culture prescribes for her, so...

Furthermore, it isn't gay-bashing in any event. 'Gay' does not equal 'effeminate'. There are plenty of guys who aren't gay who are effeminate, and plenty of gays that fit the role their culture prescribes for men. Gay is a sexual orientation, not a single lifestyle. It IS effeminate man bashing; that's true. But I think we can handle ironically bashing modern crawl players for being effeminate in a humor post... in a different context it would be reportable, certainly, but the intent and context were clearly different here.

And my post clearly stated that I can't make sense out of Lasty's rationale; I'll be glad to hear it explained better. I can't comment on what it might or might not be predicated on. ;)
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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 23:49

Re: back in my day

The problem with inside jokes is that they're only funny to the people on the inside. You risk alienating the people who weren't there.

I get that the post is a parody of your grandparent complaining about how easy kids these days have it, and how he or she used to walk five miles in the snow uphill to the library to dial in to the BBS to play crawl on the 2400 bps modem. However, you can make a joke without using words that have brought and still bring *real* harm to *real* people in the *real* world, and save your off-colour version for places where the people you tell it to understand unambiguously that you are not a jerk, you just like to play one on the Internet sometimes.
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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 23:52

Re: back in my day

Dharmy wrote:people you tell it to understand unambiguously that you are not a jerk


just like this place oh my god no one thought he was serious holy shit
take it easy

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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 23:53

Re: back in my day

like every single argument so far has been predicated entirely on "well, if you just completely ignore context, then" which is, frankly, incredibly dumb
take it easy

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Post Wednesday, 2nd September 2015, 23:53

Re: back in my day

i'm mad
take it easy

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:01

Re: back in my day

Arrhythmia wrote:i'm mad

mad
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or MAD
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Or mad?
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:01

Re: back in my day

mad
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take it easy

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:10

Re: back in my day

i fear i have become too influential

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:13

Re: back in my day


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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:44

Re: back in my day

tl;dr - mansplaining feminism

Spoiler: show
byrel wrote:In what way is it woman-demeaning to have or use an endearment which means 'you represent all my culture says a woman should be'? I mean, cultures are notoriously narrow-minded that way, but such a usage is clearly a compliment for a woman who happens to, or has chosen to fit the role the culture prescribes. It's not demeaning; it's uplifting a particular woman for a particular choice. I call my wife 'kitty' and 'stephylpuss' on occasion; is that demeaning her? She certainly doesn't think so! And she's a very strong woman; stronger and more 'type A' than I am by a good bit. Of course, that's entirely (or at least mostly) within the role my culture prescribes for her, so...

Furthermore, it isn't gay-bashing in any event. 'Gay' does not equal 'effeminate'. There are plenty of guys who aren't gay who are effeminate, and plenty of gays that fit the role their culture prescribes for men. Gay is a sexual orientation, not a single lifestyle. It IS effeminate man bashing; that's true. But I think we can handle ironically bashing modern crawl players for being effeminate in a humor post... in a different context it would be reportable, certainly, but the intent and context were clearly different here.

And my post clearly stated that I can't make sense out of Lasty's rationale; I'll be glad to hear it explained better. I can't comment on what it might or might not be predicated on. ;)

What you and your wife call each other is a matter of individual preference between consenting adults that has pretty much nothing to do with the way language is used in a public context.

In the public context of contemporary English, lots of the words we use as insults derive from comparisons to femininity, to sexual organs, and to sexual acts. At the same time, our culture* has a dysfunctional relationship with sex and a long history of treating women as inferior to, or even as literal property of, men.** So whenever a term associated with femininity is used to disparage someone or something, the message is: You are like a woman, and that is a bad thing to be like.

A lot of homophobic slurs, for instance, revolve around (a) the stereotype of effeminate personalities ("gays act like women, and therefore are inferior") or (b) the implicit shaming of sex acts that make someone "like a woman" in their relationship to the penis ("gays perform fellatio and/or receive penetrative sex, which is like what women do, and is therefore inferior"). It's beside the point that many gay people don't fit the stereotype; the point is that negativity directed towards gayness is very closely interrelated with negativity directed toward women.

(And I'll also throw in a note here this explanation has so far been very binary in terms of both gender and orientation, which is another symptom of the culture's dysfunction around sex and gender. Bi-phobia, trans-phobia, slut-shaming, kink-shaming, exoticizing black/brown/asian/native bodies, etc. are also ways in which "normative" sexuality -- meaning, in this cultural context, white cis male hetero vanilla sexuality -- is systematically enforced through cultural assumptions and language, including many slang insults and "four-letter" words.)
[/quote]
So it's not really important whether the offending term was used to bash gays, or demean women, or call modern crawl players effeminate -- the word carries all of those connotations every time it is used, and is therefore an appropriate place to substitute something like 'turnips'. And that this perspective is healthy and valid, even as it bumps up against the equally health and valid perspective that says it should be OK to give voice to offensive words and ideas in order to make a point through humor.

By the way, "You represent all my culture says a woman should be" is not at all what people mean when they call someone a "pussy." But it is still a pretty terrible thing to say about someone when the culture says a woman should be: valued primarily for her looks over her personality; paid $0.72 on the dollar for the same job the man next to her is doing; blamed for "getting herself" raped; forced to carry accidental, unwanted, or unsafe pregnancies to term; etc.

* Meaning North American and European culture, which has become fairly hegemonic as the default "global" culture, and is the only heritage I can personally speak from.
** Actually, this is more or less true of almost all cultures throughout human history.
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:46

Re: back in my day


is your point that the word has not been converted into 'turnips' in the past? all it proves is that community standards can change over time (thank mod!)
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 00:57

Re: back in my day


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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 01:00

Re: back in my day

The moral of this thread is that introducing pussies where they don't belong is a great way to ruin an awesome thing.

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 01:12

Re: back in my day

if Christina Hoff Sommers is the most reliable citation you have, you should probably do some more research
tedric's phrasing does happen to be incorrect (the 70-something % figure isn't "for the same job"), but holy shit, your "sources" and their insanely mentally gymnastic conclusions. "yeah, if you look closely, sexism doesn't exist. women just choose to take worse jobs than men because they're inferior"

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 01:24

Re: back in my day

tedric wrote:tl;dr - mansplaining feminism

Spoiler: show
byrel wrote:In what way is it woman-demeaning to have or use an endearment which means 'you represent all my culture says a woman should be'? I mean, cultures are notoriously narrow-minded that way, but such a usage is clearly a compliment for a woman who happens to, or has chosen to fit the role the culture prescribes. It's not demeaning; it's uplifting a particular woman for a particular choice. I call my wife 'kitty' and 'stephylpuss' on occasion; is that demeaning her? She certainly doesn't think so! And she's a very strong woman; stronger and more 'type A' than I am by a good bit. Of course, that's entirely (or at least mostly) within the role my culture prescribes for her, so...

Furthermore, it isn't gay-bashing in any event. 'Gay' does not equal 'effeminate'. There are plenty of guys who aren't gay who are effeminate, and plenty of gays that fit the role their culture prescribes for men. Gay is a sexual orientation, not a single lifestyle. It IS effeminate man bashing; that's true. But I think we can handle ironically bashing modern crawl players for being effeminate in a humor post... in a different context it would be reportable, certainly, but the intent and context were clearly different here.

And my post clearly stated that I can't make sense out of Lasty's rationale; I'll be glad to hear it explained better. I can't comment on what it might or might not be predicated on. ;)

What you and your wife call each other is a matter of individual preference between consenting adults that has pretty much nothing to do with the way language is used in a public context.

In the public context of contemporary English, lots of the words we use as insults derive from comparisons to femininity, to sexual organs, and to sexual acts. At the same time, our culture* has a dysfunctional relationship with sex and a long history of treating women as inferior to, or even as literal property of, men.** So whenever a term associated with femininity is used to disparage someone or something, the message is: You are like a woman, and that is a bad thing to be like.

A lot of homophobic slurs, for instance, revolve around (a) the stereotype of effeminate personalities ("gays act like women, and therefore are inferior") or (b) the implicit shaming of sex acts that make someone "like a woman" in their relationship to the penis ("gays perform fellatio and/or receive penetrative sex, which is like what women do, and is therefore inferior"). It's beside the point that many gay people don't fit the stereotype; the point is that negativity directed towards gayness is very closely interrelated with negativity directed toward women.

(And I'll also throw in a note here this explanation has so far been very binary in terms of both gender and orientation, which is another symptom of the culture's dysfunction around sex and gender. Bi-phobia, trans-phobia, slut-shaming, kink-shaming, exoticizing black/brown/asian/native bodies, etc. are also ways in which "normative" sexuality -- meaning, in this cultural context, white cis male hetero vanilla sexuality -- is systematically enforced through cultural assumptions and language, including many slang insults and "four-letter" words.)

So it's not really important whether the offending term was used to bash gays, or demean women, or call modern crawl players effeminate -- the word carries all of those connotations every time it is used, and is therefore an appropriate place to substitute something like 'turnips'. And that this perspective is healthy and valid, even as it bumps up against the equally health and valid perspective that says it should be OK to give voice to offensive words and ideas in order to make a point through humor.

By the way, "You represent all my culture says a woman should be" is not at all what people mean when they call someone a "pussy." But it is still a pretty terrible thing to say about someone when the culture says a woman should be: valued primarily for her looks over her personality; paid $0.72 on the dollar for the same job the man next to her is doing; blamed for "getting herself" raped; forced to carry accidental, unwanted, or unsafe pregnancies to term; etc.

* Meaning North American and European culture, which has become fairly hegemonic as the default "global" culture, and is the only heritage I can personally speak from.
** Actually, this is more or less true of almost all cultures throughout human history.


Errr, OK I'm out. You're perceptions are so radically different from mine as to be not worth reconciling. I've rarely met a stable individual who discounted character or personality in women (seriously, even going to college for 8 years it was fairly rare. They didn't discount looks, but personality was damn important.) I work next to 3 women making more than I do, I've never actually heard someone blame a woman for getting raped. I've heard people claim men do this by and large, but the evidence in the towns I've lived in has been few and far between. And the 72 cents on the dollar figure is flat out inflated; it looks at salaries instead of compensating for hours worked. In the US, women tend to work fewer hours. This could be the product of a rampantly anti-feminist culture, but I doubt it.
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 01:36

Re: back in my day

byrel, with all due respect, tedric's summary isn't really about in-your-face misogyny, but about the ways in which society has enshrined misogynistic ideas in the very language we use. I'm not sure why you'd resist such an obvious finding; tedric isn't saying anything radical by pointing out that gendered insults are often predicated on the idea that femininity is inferior.

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 01:43

Re: back in my day

Are we arguing with anecdotes now?
byrel wrote:I've rarely met a stable individual who discounted character or personality in women (seriously, even going to college for 8 years it was fairly rare.
I saw it in my first day at college. And quite a lot of times before that.
byrel wrote:I work next to 3 women making more than I do
A few decades ago, the majority of people with my job were women. It was also considered a fairly low-level job, and paid accordingly. Today the entry-level salary in my country is about $70,000 USD a year...and it's more than 80% male (or it was a couple years ago, at least). The work hasn't changed, unless you count slightly better management.
byrel wrote:I've never actually heard someone blame a woman for getting raped.
I have had close friends that were sexually assaulted. I'm sure you have too, even if you don't know it, because it's disturbingly common. The women were treated very differently from the men, but I saw both blamed for it - flat-out told that they wanted it, in fact.


@rockygargoyle: thank you for linking actual sources

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 02:01

Re: back in my day

No duvessa, I'm not arguing with anecdotes. I'm explaining why I decline to engage in the discussion further; my culture and experiences don't match tedric's, and so I doubt my conclusions will. And I'm not inclined to argue about the representativeness of either of our experiences or our relative objectiveness. The conversation doesn't sound enjoyable to have on an internet forum. ;)

My point is entirely 'Bye thread!'
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 02:05

Re: back in my day

video games

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 02:13

Re: back in my day

journalism

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 04:07

Re: back in my day

byrel wrote:my culture and experiences don't match tedric's

respectfully, and knowing you are "disengaging from the thread": I am 100% sure this is false

it's depressingly common that, when confronted with the reality of our unwitting and usually well-meaning complicity in a culture that makes life (at least marginally) more difficult for everyone who isn't (perceived as) straight-cis-white-male, many straight-cis-white-male people choose to walk away from the conversation instead of asking why things are so mangled, and what they can do to change it

but, like, yeah: video games.

edit - re: Wage gap stats, I'm glad that recent data paints a much better picture and I'll not use 72% in the future. But quibbling over one statistic (which was certainly true in the U.S. within some of our lifetimes, anyway) doesn't really bear on the continued existence of systematic inequalities.
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 06:36

Re: back in my day

Well, this thread has been most educating (myself not being a native English speaker). I have to say that honestly, when my "hot pussies" post was deleted several months ago, I thought it was just because pussy means vagina (and that was the whole joke)...
DCSS: 97:...MfCj}SpNeBaEEGrFE{HaAKTrCK}DsFESpHu{FoArNaBe}
FeEE{HOIEMiAE}GrGlHuWrGnWrNaAKBaFi{MiDeMfDe}{DrAKTrAMGhEnGnWz}
{PaBeDjFi}OgAKPaCAGnCjOgCKMfAEAtCKSpCjDEEE{HOSu
Bloat: 17: RaRoPrPh{GuStGnCa}{ArEtZoNb}KiPaAnDrBXDBQOApDaMeAGBiOCNKAsFnFlUs{RoBoNeWi

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 10:12

Re: back in my day

tedric wrote:
byrel wrote:my culture and experiences don't match tedric's

respectfully, and knowing you are "disengaging from the thread": I am 100% sure this is false

Yeah... I'm sure you have every reason to believe my experiences match yours. Not knowing where I live, what culture I'm from, or who I choose as friends, must help your certainty immensely. I do respect your position, and your experiences, but they don't match mine. Sorry.

it's depressingly common that, when confronted with the reality of our unwitting and usually well-meaning complicity in a culture that makes life (at least marginally) more difficult for everyone who isn't (perceived as) straight-cis-white-male, many straight-cis-white-male people choose to walk away from the conversation instead of asking why things are so mangled, and what they can do to change it

Or when confronted by a zealot with a radically different viewpoint on a sensitive subject, they choose to walk away. I'm not walking away out of cowardice or something. I've had this discussion with real life friends, and it's a useful discussion. This is a terrible forum, and choosing to have that discussion with someone I barely know seems like a terrible idea. No offense intended; I really do respect your position. I just don't think it's worth discussing with you.
Last edited by byrel on Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 13:30, edited 1 time in total.
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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 13:25

Re: back in my day

You've all made some fascinating points, but how can we get more girls to play?

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 13:40

Re: back in my day

While the wide-ranging discussion on feminism was very interesting (not really), the OP was quite obviously in jest, and removing "pussy" still keeps the content that "you come home back to a wife who can't cook" etc, which is much worse in sexism than any implied insult in "pussy". It is also racist and ageist, among other things.

Obviously it is meant to be a parody, otherwise, one would simply nuke the post. This seems a well-meaning but rather silly intervention.

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 13:42

Re: back in my day

wheals: I've been proposing this since 2005: if only dancing weapons would dance!

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Post Thursday, 3rd September 2015, 13:48

Re: back in my day

And that's enough of that again.
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