BitaTruble
Posts: 9779
Joined: 1/12/2006
From: Texas
Status: offline
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quote:
I'm not making excuses. His words are wrong. I can still understand why he uses them however. I can use that understanding then to try and get him to realize it isn't right and to help him change.
You are saying he uses racist words because that's the way he was raised. That sounds like an excuse to me. ::shrugs:: Why not say he uses racist words because he's a racist? Can't you still try to help him change? That's what I mean by being politically correct. It's great you want to help him to change. Good luck with that. Maybe it will work, but I wouldn't hold out much hope that it will if it hasn't by now.
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Understanding or explaining are NOT the same as excusing something.
I call it like I see it. You are using the word 'explain'.. I use the word 'excuse'. Instead of just coming out and saying that your dad is a racist.. you are sugar coating it by 'explaining' that he just uses racist words because that's the way he was raised and that is being PC in my book.
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Let me try and use a less loaded idea other than racism.
Why? It's perfect in my opinion. If you don't want to discuss it, not a problem. I said we should agree to disagree after all. I don't feel uncomfortable discussing it, but if you do, I am more than happy to move to a new point of discussion in another thread.
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Let's say I have a student who doesn't do the homework and does poorly on exams. He comes and talks to me and tries to excuse his lack of studying by telling me he has all of his going on in his life. I can nod and listen and paraphrase back what he says, I can understand how difficult it is to balance life.
I don't excuse him, he gets the grade he earns, no exceptions.
Ok. So the kid didn't do his homework and gets a D or whatever. So, you call him a D student. You don't excuse it. You give him the D and call him what he is. And your dad uses racist language and you call him a racist, right and you don't excuse it? What are we arguing about?
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Haven't you just made an excuse like I did? You're saying his ass wasn't kicked so that's the way he is.
I'm going to answer this more fully below**, but you're saying the motivation to defend should be considered when applying the term PC. What's the defense for not calling him a racist? THAT'S the difference. I'm not defending my racist grandfather by using it as an excuse for his racism. Or do you call your Dad a racist? If so, then you are not defending him and you have no motivation to do so. You are just 'understanding' him. If that works for you, more power to you. I never understood it myself because, frankly, racism makes no sense at all to me.
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Why are you assuming that I would ever excuse racism or any other social injustice? Where did I say that above? You don't know me at all and clearly I am not writing well enough for you to understand what I am saying.
You're the one who said that one should understand the motivation behind the defense. If you meant something different, then yes, you as the author of your words, were unclear.
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How exactly does calling someone a racist or not equal being PC?
If someone is a racist and you don't call them a racist, then you are being PC in trying to call them something else which is less vile. The fact that you wanted to stop talking about racism because it's loaded pretty well shores that point up.
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Wouldn't PC be saying to people "don't do that/say that, its wrong"? How exactly is it being political correct (whatever the hell that is) to make excuses for people's behavior?
I think you should reread what you wrote. How is it not PC to make excuses for people's behavior? Why not just call the behavior what it is? Whether it's lying, bigotry whatever?
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I'm completely confused by what you are calling PC.
I know many people who would call you a rapist and a sex offender and sick and evil simply because they look at what you do (and what I do and what many of us do) and judge it by their standards of wrong and right and not by the differences in motivation.
Oh really? You know many people who would call me a rapist because............ of what? What do I do? What do I do that someone would call me a sex offender? I don't have sex with anyone other than my lawfully wed husband. I would be hard pressed to believe that even the most vanilla conservative would call me a rapist or a sex offender for having sex with my own husband. As far as being evil or sick.. I wouldn't deny those as appropriate on occasion. Just like I call a racist a racist.. I'm more than willing to call 'myself' exactly what I am. If someone else calls me that as well.. they'd be right, not wrong and calling something what it is, is not being PC.. it's just calling something what it is. If someone calls me a sick, evil, twisted fuck.. what can I do? Deny it? No, because it's true. If someone calls me a racist, that's not true. If someone calls me a rapist, that's not true either. See the difference?
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Some people are tossing around the "PC" label the same as others toss around nazi or racist or other labels. How are these different?
You'll have to answer that one for yourself because I already know the answer. There is no difference between calling someone a racist and wrapping it up in a pretty package that still means they are a racist. Why 'not' call it like you see it? What is the point of calling something other than what it is if not to protect delicate sensibilities? That's the entire thrust of the PC movement. People are so afraid of offending someone, they refuse to speak in clear and plain language and that's just so much bullshit to me. If someone wants to call a penis a 'thingy'.. hell, they can call it that but they shouldn't wonder if I get confused as to what they are speaking about. I call it a cock.. and there are some who might mistake my meaning for rooster, but the context of the rest of the sentence would probably make my meaning clear. If I say.. "Michael hurt his.. you know.. thingy." That could mean damn near anything. If I say .. "Michael slammed his cock in the toilet," there aren't too many who would think he was trying to drown his rooster.
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Since you brought up changing people, how does calling someone a racist, a pig, a whore, a nazi, or anything else change them? In my experience using terms like these tends to just make then defense and less likely to change.
In my experience, racists, nazi's and the like don't really give a shit if you call them a racist, a nazi or the like. That was one of my points. Perhaps you missed that one. These, however, are 'learned' not bred. **And now to answer the rest of your other question here.. The only way to stop it is doing what I did.. start with your own children and don't ever let it get ingrained.. that's how you 'change' things which is why I said if Grandpa had his ass kicked as a youngster, perhaps he wouldn't have brought 3 more of the ilk into the world. That doesn't change the facts as they stand. He was a racist, he's dead.. he can't spew forth any more bile and I made sure that my own children weren't exposed to it.
TammyJo, if you don't embrace the term PC, you call it like you see it.. I don't get what we're arguing about.. because I am the same. That doesn't mean I'm disrespectful or insensitive.. but I do admit to being rather blunt and people generally accept that.. or, I'm sure there are plenty who have blocked me so they don't have to read my opinions.
My opinion is that being PC is unnecessary. Simply courtesy works very well but one need not soften their speech because in so doing, one often changes the meaning of what they are actually trying to say. If you just call it like you see it, then you don't have to worry about being misunderstood. That doesn't mean you're always right.. just that you're pretty much always understood.
As I said with my first post.. calling a goat fucker an animal lover doesn't mean he's not a goat fucker and if you need to be PC and call that person an animal lover.. that can mean something else entirely different from what you meant to say.
Celeste
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"Oh, so it's just like Rock, paper, scissors." He laughed. "You are the wisest woman I know."
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