People are offended because they allow themselves to be.No, its not a switch you just throw off.
I agree that for the great majority of the world, you're correct. I just have a different view of things. Not a better one, mind you, and not a worse one (I hope). Just different.
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Will Smith - "Fear is not real. It is a product of thoughts you create. Do not misunderstand me. Danger is very real. But Fear is a choice."
I'm more easily offended than I used to be because young people are so much more offensive nowadays.
^ (s)
In deference to ciretose...
People are offended because they allow themselves to be.No, its not a switch you just throw off.
People are always offended by something that offends them whether they allow it or not. What they DO allow is themselves to speak up about it.
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My advice would be to man up, tough it out, and don't be a baby. There is people dying of disease and famine and people crying about 1st world problems. Maybe a natural disaster should hit your city so you can manage to appreciate life more.
All I can think to actually contribute is what someone once told me: pick your battles. If, in a given scenario, you see a way to meaningfully advance equal rights by protesting and showing offense, then by all means do so! A lot of the civil rights movement was arguably that line of approach, and it can work.
On the flip side, if in a given scenario, protesting and showing offense will only get you labelled as a whiny brat, and won't actually help anything, then maybe making a big show isn't the right thing to do in that scenario. Like when someone goes through everything people say with a fine-toothed comb, looking for something he/she can use as an excuse to pull a PC Gestapo act and tell them that they're bigoted neanderthals in contrast to his/her supposed enlightened awesomeness -- that doesn't actually help anything, it just makes the "offended" person annoying to be around.
My advice would be to man up, tough it out, and don't be a baby. There is people dying of disease and famine and people crying about 1st world problems. Maybe a natural disaster should hit your city so you can manage to appreciate life more.Thank you.
And your initial emotion to something is obviously not something you can control with a switch. If your immediate reaction to something is anger, fear, annoyance etc. that's usually not within your control unless you try to condition yourself to be more positive or happy or whatever so these aren't the emotions that initially surface (or as strongly)
regardless...what you do AFTER your initial reaction is a CHOICE. My initial reaction to someone cutting me off in traffic is to get angry. I can't control that reaction that just comes out. But after that first second I can choose whether to try to control and get rid of that anger or stay angry. "Take a deep breath. Just let it go, it doesn't matter"
Same thing with being offended "WTF did he just say!?" is the initial reaction..now you can choose to say "Who cares, I'm not going to let him make me mad and there's more important things to worry about" or "WAAAAAAAH! He ruined my day! God this is the most awful thing to happen EVER!"
You can choose to be a whiny, oversensitive b***h and you can choose not to.
Everything you just said can apply to the a%&&&+%s saying offensive things. I'm not saying you're wrong, but it's as useful as walking into Jerusalem and saying "why can't we all just get along?" It sounds like a resolution to the situation, but it's too vague to actually resolve anything.
For example, when someone says something offensive and it's pointed out, they are CHOOSING to get defensive about it, instead of just accepting that the other person was offended.
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Everything you just said can apply to the a&*&&%#s saying offensive things. I'm not saying you're wrong, but it's as useful as walking into Jerusalem and saying "why can't we all just get along?" It sounds like a resolution to the situation, but it's too vague to actually resolve anything.
For example, when someone says something offensive and it's pointed out, they are CHOOSING to get defensive about it, instead of just accepting that the other person was offended.
If someone is offended by something I say, telling me they were offended and why is the correct course of action. If it bothers them THAT much.
The incorrect course of action is boycotting me, harassing me, trying to get me fired from my job, trying to censor me, starting a social media campaign to belittle or shame me, or portraying what is likely just one jerk on the internet as being the manifestation of a system skewed against you.
The world will always have asshats. Telling them they're an asshat sometimes works. Trying to eradicate all asshats makes YOU the asshat.
People's words dont generally bother me (I'm happy to let people wander around thinking they're right when they're obviously wrong). However, they often do much worse than bother the targets of offensive remarks - some people have killed themselves due to angst over their sexuality/ethnicity or as a result of general bullying.
Me telling people to shut up when they're being offensive is much more about building a community in which people dont feel bad about themselves as it is about making me feel better or to soothe my wounded feelings or something.
For example - it makes no difference to me personally if someone makes sexist remarks on this site, yet I still flag the posts.
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People's words dont generally bother me (I'm happy to let people wander around thinking they're right when they're obviously wrong). However, they often do much worse than bother the targets of offensive remarks - some people have killed themselves due to angst over their sexuality/ethnicity or as a result of general bullying.
If there is a gang of people running some kid down for being different every day, and it's relentless and merciless and no one will stop it despite cries for help, and he commits suicide, that's a terrible tragedy and those who caused it should maybe share some burden.
But where do you draw the line? Some people are stupidly sensitive. People kill themselves over petty things that only matter to them every day. Does me telling some guy on the bus that his haircut makes him look like a lunatic mean I'm at fault if he harms himself?
And that's an extreme case. Why am I responsible for other peoples' feelings?
For example - it makes no difference to me personally if someone makes sexist remarks on this site, yet I still flag the posts.
Then you, sir, are part of the problem.
You're no knight in shining armor, protecting innocents from having their poor, precious eyes assaulted by a dirty word or an uncouth thought.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
stuff
Yes. If you don't like what a politician said, call him and tell him. Really! The direct approach will yield far better results, and create less bitterness, than going around their back and trying to get them ousted.
If a company makes racist ads, don't buy their product. Also don't organize a million people to ban their product, not over advertising at least. Feel free to write a letter, telling them why you'll no longer buy their product. When you try to boycott, and start some media frenzy, you get a Chick Fil-A situation where the people on the other side of the issue will just compensate (or overcompensate) for your boycott.
As for the loudmouth jock, or any other media personality who is directly exercising their own freedom of speech, trying to get them fired isn't saying to the world "I don't like what that guy said". That's your right. What you're saying is "I don't like what that guy said and I don't think he has the right to say, let alone think or feel it" which is moronic.
The problem is that people are sheep. They like jumping on bandwagons. Signing petitions is about the most political muscle you'll get your average Joe to exercise. It's too easy to say "sure" and click your name on something, and it's too easy for those organizing said petition to pressure others into joining, even if they weren't offended themselves.
If, say, Mountain Dew, has some advertisement you find to be racist or otherwise offensive...don't buy mountain dew. Tell them you're not going to buy their product and why, and feel free to be vocal about how stupid the ad is.
If enough people do the same, they will probably change because they want your business. If they don't, it's their loss. But what if you're just an overly sensitive whiner, and people join your boycott just to be nice or to seem like they're in with the good cause?
If everyone organizes a boycott for every little thing it inflates the sense of how genuinely offensive or wrong something was. I'd rather peoples voices were precisely as loud as they are, otherwise it's no better than lobbying where a few loud, squeaky wheels get all the damn oil.
Meat, I'm not saying you're wrong, but which side of the Don Imus firing do you fall on? It looked like a Justified Termination to me.
. I'm saying something that, while not true, doesn't affect me or hurt me. I go about the rest of my day not even thinking about it. You as the offendee go around letting YOURSELF get pissed off at what I am no longer thinking about. You are letting the offender have power over you.
Oh malarky. You're just blaming someone else for getting ticked off at what is probably your egregious behavior.
Someone says something. You either are or aren't offended. Not much you can do about it. There's no "letting" involved, nor is there any power. How you should handle it depends entirely on whats said. Sometimes you're supposed to shrug it off and get over it, sometimes I think a good shot to the teeth is called for.
People's words dont generally bother me (I'm happy to let people wander around thinking they're right when they're obviously wrong). However, they often do much worse than bother the targets of offensive remarks - some people have killed themselves due to angst over their sexuality/ethnicity or as a result of general bullying.If there is a gang of people running some kid down for being different every day, and it's relentless and merciless and no one will stop it despite cries for help, and he commits suicide, that's a terrible tragedy and those who caused it should maybe share some burden.
But where do you draw the line? Some people are stupidly sensitive. People kill themselves over petty things that only matter to them every day. Does me telling some guy on the bus that his haircut makes him look like a lunatic mean I'm at fault if he harms himself?
No.
And that's an extreme case. Why am I responsible for other peoples' feelings?
You're not. You're responsible for making the world as good as you can, nothing more.
For example - it makes no difference to me personally if someone makes sexist remarks on this site, yet I still flag the posts.Then you, sir, are part of the problem.
You're no knight in shining armor, protecting innocents from having their poor, precious eyes assaulted by a dirty word or an uncouth thought.
Eh? Are you saying I shouldnt flag sexist posts or that I shouldnt do so silently?
Another aspect of this is rarely discussed. When you dish something out to someone you think is wrong on the internet, you DO IT PUBLICLY. This means that not only do you tell the person he or she is wrong, you also put them at either fighting you about it or admitting he or she is wrong before an unknown number of spectators. This is a major deal for most people.
Everything you just said can apply to the a&*&&%#s saying offensive things. I'm not saying you're wrong, but it's as useful as walking into Jerusalem and saying "why can't we all just get along?" It sounds like a resolution to the situation, but it's too vague to actually resolve anything.
For example, when someone says something offensive and it's pointed out, they are CHOOSING to get defensive about it, instead of just accepting that the other person was offended.
If someone is offended by something I say, telling me they were offended and why is the correct course of action. If it bothers them THAT much.
The incorrect course of action is boycotting me, harassing me, trying to get me fired from my job, trying to censor me, starting a social media campaign to belittle or shame me, or portraying what is likely just one jerk on the internet as being the manifestation of a system skewed against you.
The world will always have asshats. Telling them they're an asshat sometimes works. Trying to eradicate all asshats makes YOU the asshat.
Your first paragraph is a response to what I said. The second one has nothing to do with my point. The third one was back on again.
When someone makes the claim, like kmal2t did, that offended people are CHOOSING to be offended, it's just as easy to claim that those doing the offending are either CHOOSING to offend, or CHOOSING to be defensive about their words and pick a fight to defend their right to say whatever was offensive.
So, in effect, talking about how people could just choose to not be offended is a vague non-solution, disguised to look like a solution. In essence, it's saying "if this problem didn't exist, there wouldn't be a problem."
I'm not interested in getting into the other stuff in your second paragraph. If you want to talk about it, feel free, but I'm not.
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Another aspect of this is rarely discussed. When you dish something out to someone you think is wrong on the internet, you DO IT PUBLICLY. This means that not only do you tell the person he or she is wrong, you also put them at either fighting you about it or admitting he or she is wrong before an unknown number of spectators. This is a major deal for most people.
Yet most of us use a fairly inscrutable alias, which is a lot like wearing a full-body-mask.
I'm not sure what you mean by this. If I'm the "offender" and said something offensive like hm... "Asians can't drive" (cool your brakes Mods this is an example), in that scenario I'm not reacting to anything. I'm saying something that, while not true, doesn't affect me or hurt me. I go about the rest of my day not even thinking about it. You as the offendee go around letting YOURSELF get pissed off at what I am no longer thinking about. You are letting the offender have power over you. You pointing out it offends you is pointless when...Everything you just said can apply to the a**$+!$s saying offensive things.My advice would be to man up, tough it out, and don't be a baby. There is people dying of disease and famine and people crying about 1st world problems. Maybe a natural disaster should hit your city so you can manage to appreciate life more.Thank you.
And your initial emotion to something is obviously not something you can control with a switch. If your immediate reaction to something is anger, fear, annoyance etc. that's usually not within your control unless you try to condition yourself to be more positive or happy or whatever so these aren't the emotions that initially surface (or as strongly)
regardless...what you do AFTER your initial reaction is a CHOICE. My initial reaction to someone cutting me off in traffic is to get angry. I can't control that reaction that just comes out. But after that first second I can choose whether to try to control and get rid of that anger or stay angry. "Take a deep breath. Just let it go, it doesn't matter"
Same thing with being offended "WTF did he just say!?" is the initial reaction..now you can choose to say "Who cares, I'm not going to let him make me mad and there's more important things to worry about" or "WAAAAAAAH! He ruined my day! God this is the most awful thing to happen EVER!"
You can choose to be a whiny, oversensitive b***h and you can choose not to.
I posted that whole post together for a reason. When you pick one sentence in it, and remove the context of the rest of the post and then act confused about it, I get a sense you either don't actually read my posts, or you are trying to be disingenuous.
I put those sentences together in a paragraph for a reason. I then put two paragraphs together in that post, for a reason.
If you want to nitpick on one sentence or phrase, ignoring other sections of my post, which I included for a reason, why should I care what you have to say to me?
Another aspect of this is rarely discussed. When you dish something out to someone you think is wrong on the internet, you DO IT PUBLICLY. This means that not only do you tell the person he or she is wrong, you also put them at either fighting you about it or admitting he or she is wrong before an unknown number of spectators. This is a major deal for most people.Yet most of us use a fairly inscrutable alias, which is a lot like wearing a full-body-mask.
Yes... but we do get attached to our masks, don't we? Whatever I get stuck with as Sissyl stays with Sissyl, but that is a full body mask I would not gladly give up. The reputation damage still means something, and besides, if I were to dump the Sissyl alias and come back, it would be a fairly transparent little lie. My point is that it is way too easy to ignore that aliases mean something to people. And nothing in this really changes much if you do use your real name as your alias.
As for the loudmouth jock, or any other media personality who is directly exercising their own freedom of speech, trying to get them fired isn't saying to the world "I don't like what that guy said". That's your right. What you're saying is "I don't like what that guy said and I don't think he has the right to say, let alone think or feel it" which is moronic.
Its not that you think he doesn't have a right to say something. He has every right to say it. He does not have the right to be pushing said viewpoint through his employer's media to get national coverage, and his employer continuing to allow him to shows their complicity. He doesn't have a right to be shielded from the negative consequences of offending people, and nor is the company. And when these comments are out of the context of what the person is hired to do, it shows a lack of awareness that the company certainly should be concerned about.
As far as boycotts go, contacting the advertisers of certain tv/radio programs and telling them you don't like that they support certain programing can also be effective. Rush has to worry about going off the air despite having a huge fan base because many advertisers avoid his show like the plague.
There's a difference between someone saying something offensive and someone being harassed. These are separate issues to discuss.
They're actually the same as far as your argument goes. Doesn't the harasser gain power over the victim? Shouldn't the victim just go all buddist and be a better person by not having the emotions that are empowering their harasser?
I'm not trying to attack you, but dude are you 60+? I never hear the term "malarky" used when it isn't followed up with "the bees knees" the following sentence. Anywho.
No, but malarkey sums up the patently false and vacuous nature of your statements and is more tolerated by the mods than various exclamations of bovine excrement.
You're just blaming someone else for getting ticked off at what is probably your egregious behavior.
I'm not shifting blame away from the offender to the offendee. There's nothing being said here to say that the offender isn't wrong or being rude.
You have control over your own behavior and emotions. If you don't have power over your emotions then you have a problem.
Yes and no. The problem is being human.
Again, your initial knee jerk reaction to something is probably not under your control. What you tell yourself in your head after to deal with the situation is up to you.
Someone telling a fart joke at the restaurant table behind you? Let it go. Someone yelling the n-word at your best friend who's too small to stand up for himself? Worth doing something about.
ahem...
Sometimes you're supposed to shrug it off and get over it, sometimes I think a good shot to the teeth is called for.<-----
What I have to ask is why you're letting the person yelling the n word have power over you, given your previous statements...
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Everything you just said can apply to the a&*&&%#s saying offensive things. I'm not saying you're wrong, but it's as useful as walking into Jerusalem and saying "why can't we all just get along?" It sounds like a resolution to the situation, but it's too vague to actually resolve anything.
For example, when someone says something offensive and it's pointed out, they are CHOOSING to get defensive about it, instead of just accepting that the other person was offended.
If someone is offended by something I say, telling me they were offended and why is the correct course of action. If it bothers them THAT much.
The incorrect course of action is boycotting me, harassing me, trying to get me fired from my job, trying to censor me, starting a social media campaign to belittle or shame me, or portraying what is likely just one jerk on the internet as being the manifestation of a system skewed against you.
The world will always have asshats. Telling them they're an asshat sometimes works. Trying to eradicate all asshats makes YOU the asshat.
Your first paragraph is a response to what I said. The second one has nothing to do with my point. The third one was back on again.
When someone makes the claim, like kmal2t did, that offended people are CHOOSING to be offended, it's just as easy to claim that those doing the offending are either CHOOSING to offend, or CHOOSING to be defensive about their words and pick a fight to defend their right to say whatever was offensive.
So, in effect, talking about how people could just choose to not be offended is a vague non-solution, disguised to look like a solution. In essence, it's saying "if this problem didn't exist, there wouldn't be a problem."
I'm not interested in getting into the other stuff in your second paragraph. If you want to talk about it, feel free, but I'm not.
People do choose to be offended, if a lot of people think the comment was worth being offended by then perhaps the speaker should rethink the statement, but if only a few are offended or are severly out numbered by those that have the opposite feeling about then perhaps those feeling offended should rethink their stance on it while the speaker goes about their way.
This is why I am angry about they did to Derpy. A mere 150 people petitioned about Derpy being offensive and asked for her to be "fixed", while almost 50,000 people petitioned otherwise. Shouldn't this have resulted in Derpy being left alone?
It reminds of what happened to the art community when they became so afraid of offending someone they stopped painting actual things and just put random color on a canvas.
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@BigNorseWolf
Many kneejerk reactions come from a personal stance or belief about something, and either of those can change.
The brony community is a good example. A couple people I know had the kneejerk response of "bronies are gay" then once "convinced" to actually watch, became fans themselves.
Thus the mindset that causes a kneejerk response is changable and based on choice, even if the isn't always concious.
I will admit, for posterity, that I don't know what being offended feels like. It's a sensation I've never felt. People have said things that have made me roll my eyes, become angry, or sigh in exasperation and believe the speaker to be an imbecile, but never offended.
The way people talk about being offended it's as if they were physically assaulted and had to hold back from punching a person. Again, I've had things said that made me angry, but I've never "taken offense" and tried to have them silenced. It's like describing the color orange to a blind person.
Meat, I'm not saying you're wrong, but which side of the Don Imus firing do you fall on? It looked like a Justified Termination to me.
Not really. I didn't think what he said was "offensive", but then again I wasn't the target of the insult so that's not my call. Imus has a long and distinguished record of saying stupid things to get a reaction; that's his shtick. So if it was "justified termination" it would have been so the dozen or so other times he did similar things in the previous 25 years or so. The problem was that he tried to defend it instead of pretending it hadn't happened or didn't matter. Frankly I think it was just a case of ignorant old white man and he genuinely didn't know how much it bothered people. He soon did, and apologized, but not before his show was canceled.
You'll note that the boycott and uproar against Imus was so successful it kept him off the radio for just over two years.
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People are more easily offended these days because the rewards for expressing offense are much higher than they used to be.
It really is that simple.
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But it can go either way, if something offendsa superminority compared to the people who absolutly love something, then it shouldn't be changed and the offended need to learn to deal with it.
That is not the same as "always" haveing that response.
And some things, though few, really are just to petty to bother with.
It is just to complex an issue to say that one solution fits most cases.
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And by "rewards" we sometimes mean "not getting lynched".I love that this discussion seems to have come down to how bad it is to get offended and we should just all "man up" and not let the other guy have power over you, while just giving the problem behavior a pass.
If no one gets offended, if no one reacts, the behavior won't change. Any particular response might not change anything, but over time it can. And has.
No, by rewards he means positive attention. If you cry wolf about something being offensive you're lauded as some hero of decency whereas the offender is decried as, at best, a boorish lout, at worst a fascist a-hole.
I think one of the problems is that we all have these private definitions of what is offensive, maybe because offense is subjective but whatever. The point is that, when you hear us talking about people needing to just shut up, you're thinking about someone saying something genuinely hurtful or harassing or an atrocious racial slur or something. About 1% of things people "take offense" at are that clear cut.
What I think about are the things that I've said that have made people freak the crap out about my language. Which are saying words like penis, or the f-word in public. People freak the s$## out over mundane stuff every damn day, and you seem to be saying it's not okay for us to be bothered by that. We should let ourselves be meekly bullied into not saying any even slightly off-color words or phrases.
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Proof that offense is a choice and subjective,
Black person says the n-word, it is taken as a greeting,
white person says n-word, it is taken as greatly offensive.
Sometimes offensive things need to change, sometimes the offended need to change, sometimes both need to change, sometimes people need to ignore it.
It is wise to know which to apply to a particular incident.
Well then make it clear.Because you've certainly seemed to dismiss the more serious things along with the slightly off-color words. Most of the political and media uproars and boycotts have been over racism and sexism, the Imus thing that was mentioned, Limbaugh's comments about Sandra, various Republican comments about rape in the last election cycle.
More broadly, I really care about the little stuff you're talking about. I try not swear too much were it isn't appropriate. Whatever.
And... BTW, If you don't think "jigaboos" and "nappy-headed hos" don't qualify as both atrocious racist and sexist insults, you've got very different standards than I do.
I'll go back to the example I made upthread: do you think every existing copy of Mein Kampf should be destroyed? Yes, I will happily defend a company's right to publish it, regardless of how seemingly indefensible it is.
The last election cycle saw a number of scandals, as you enumerate, that I didn't find offensive. I feel bad for Sandra Fluke, but that Rush Limbaugh is a huge douchenozzle should be no surprise to anyone who has ever heard him flap his gums on anything. The Republican comments on rape were fueled by ignorance, and I think it's much more important that everyone hear what they said and then discuss how much of a dumbass they are for believing those things than silencing them.
RE: Imus. The remark was about "jigaboos vs. wannabes" which is a reference to School Daze by Spike Lee. And Imus didn't even say that, it was his executive producer. Nappy-headed hos? I suppose calling a woman a ho is pretty sexist, but it's not like Imus is some uniquely atrocious offender on that front. Didn't Chris Rock call Madonna a ho on SNL back in like 1991? Nappy-headed though? It's just an adjective. It's not even necessarily pejorative. Stop being afraid of words, people!
Proof that offense is a choice and subjective,
Black person says the n-word, it is taken as a greeting,
white person says n-word, it is taken as greatly offensive.Sometimes offensive things need to change, sometimes the offended need to change, sometimes both need to change, sometimes people need to ignore it.
It is wise to know which to apply to a particular incident.
This is worse than your idea that there's a mysterious massive tree die off because of lawnmowers and chainsaws.
It is subjective but its not a choice. You cannot make yourself be mad at something, nor can you make yourself not be mad about something. You can control your reaction, but not your feelings.
Nappy-headed though? It's just an adjective. It's not even necessarily pejorative. Stop being afraid of words, people!
Nappy-headed is a degrogetory term for black people. I've only really heard it used that way by people from Texas or Louisiana, so it is likely regonal. Some older people I have heard use it to talk about people who were "passin". So, when used in conjunction with an insult, like ho, it is completely reasonable to say it is racist. It does have other uses as an adjective, but in this context it is used because of its racists overtones.
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Actually, i can control my emotions because i understand their cause.
I can focus on certain elements of the situation to force an emotional response. If a car almost drives me off the road, i can focus on a number of things to get a different emotion,
A, focus on what it nearly cost me such as my life or at least damage to my vehicle. This is the egoist-fearful/insecure response and produces anger, and probably the most common.
B, focus on the fact that the driver has a passanger with the map held up up and open blocking the drivers view. This produces disgust with the drivers poor performance and desire to implement better drivers training classes. This is the collectivistic response
C, i can focus on my awesome driving skills for manevuering around the idiot and not getting driven off the road. This produces high spirits and excitement or pleasure. This is the egoist-secure/indifferent response.
Edit:ninjad.
Hi Spock.
Actually, i can control my emotions because i understand their cause.
I can focus on certain elements of the situation to force an emotional response. If a car almost drives me off the road, i can focus on a number of things to get a different emotion,
Is this more of that warrior culture schtick that's supposed to let you stop bullets with your hand?
You also claim to be able to reason out the deeper mysteries of the universe without time, study, or education. Having seen how that worked out, I'm not exactly going to take your word here on a less tangible subject.