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Author

OK to use?

patto

18-Jan-2011
8:28:29 AM

I voted No. Its not ok.

I am more than happy making gay jokes and laughing at stereotypes. I would do this with gay friends. But referring to something negative as gay is simply immature, dumb and totally offensive.

On 17/01/2011 climbingjac wrote:
>On 17/01/2011 nmonteith wrote:
>>Surely if almost half of the users find it offensive it shouldn't be
>allowed?
>
>Agree with you 100% Neilio.
>
>The free for all attitude is a bit naive imo... should a person be allowed
>to do whatever they please and say whatever they please?

I strongly disagree with this reasoning. Democratic decision making on freedoms can lead to the loss of many freedoms. What if there was an Australian public vote about banning outdoor climbing?

On 17/01/2011 nmonteith wrote:
>Its in my best interests of sanity to not have to moderate or send warning
>emails. I'm not suggesting an automatic removal of this material but hope
>that people understand its not what we want to see on here.
A fair enough attitude.


Miguel75

18-Jan-2011
8:39:53 AM

Thanks for the clarification rolsen1. You're right, I have singled myself out a number of times around my beliefs as they're fundamentally part of me. Looking back at my first post I should have been more clear in denouncing bigotry, along with my protect freedom of speech dialogue.

I can see the irony though don't believe it's incongrous with my beliefs. People are inherently free to act in the manner they see fit but must own their words and actions.

For the record the language I use everyday at home, on Chocky and at work is the same that I use around my gay family members, friends and colleagues. And I voted to bring back egg flip big m...

rolsen1

18-Jan-2011
10:57:54 AM

The question you are answering in this poll is:

Is it OK to use "gay", "fag" or any of their derivatives eg. faggotry to describe something negative / lame / weak or undesirable on the Chocky forum.

On 18/01/2011 Miguel75 wrote:
>snip
>And I voted to bring back egg flip big m...

Good to know where you stand on this.


pmonks

18-Jan-2011
12:20:17 PM

On 18/01/2011 rolsen1 wrote:
>For the record, I have both gay and christian friends

Ah, but how many gay AND Christian friends do you have??

[edit] And yes, for the record, I had a mate who came out and was born again at about the same time, although last I heard he was "non-practicing" at one of them.


Sabu

18-Jan-2011
1:10:10 PM

On 18/01/2011 rolsen1 wrote:
>The question you are answering in this poll is:
>
>Is it OK to use "gay", "fag" or any of their derivatives eg. faggotry
>to describe something negative / lame / weak or undesirable on the Chocky
>forum.

For the record, I don't mind being singled out, however, I trust that people understand that my views are my own and are not intended to be associated or generalized to any third parties etc. Nevertheless, I can see how such associations arise and therefore I try to be careful about the content of my posts.

If the question above had no underlying motives then my answer is no. However, in voting i read between the lines of the original post, which is to form a basis of introducing new rules about the content of posts. My response to this has been clearly presented. The current chockstone policy already specifies against posts that

>contain extremely offensive language, blatant racism, sexual harassment, or
>out right personal attacks on other forum members.

I believe this can applied when required for issues such as these, without the need to include specific regulations and therefore increase the workload of the current moderators. This rule also enables people to freely post and to self-regulate should any offense arises.

kieranl

18-Jan-2011
1:18:55 PM

Sabu, I think that you're overthinking it and hence tying yourself in logical knots over something pretty simple.


Macciza

18-Jan-2011
2:25:41 PM

On 18/01/2011 rolsen1 wrote:
>The question you are answering in this poll is:
>
>Is it OK to use "gay", "fag" or any of their derivatives eg. faggotry
>to describe something negative / lame / weak or undesirable on the Chocky
>forum.

"We're talking about words, and I don't believe that there is any word that needs to be suppressed. There is no scientific or realistic reason why you should keep people from hearing certain words" FZ
Language is a virus. Communication mutates it. Etymologies are misappropriated. The geneology of moralities are misinterpreted.
You may think I know what I thought you understood, but I can never be sure that what you understand is not what I meant. Interpretation is in the mind of the interpretor . . . .

I certainly do not accept any mutually exclusive ownership of the word gay and its derivatives by the homosexual community. Nor do I believe they have the right to ascribe particular interpretations on use of such words in all contexts.
When I skip gayly down a path, I do not believe sexually comes into it - I am simply expressing a cheerful and lighthearted approach; my gaily coloured clothes (I was hippy) were simply that, quite bright and colourful. In no way am I attempting to vilify or ridicule homosexuals. In fact it is arguable that the the term 'gay' to describe a homosexual was appropriated from this meaning by its association to identified behaviours,

If I thought my attempt at a climb was a bit 'gay', I am not attempting to insult myself by inferring that I might be homosexual (and that somehow that may be something wrong with that); nor am I attempting to be derogatory to anyone other than myself for putting in a light-hearted, half-arsed, piss-poor, weak-as shit performance. ( With apologies to any people suffering pulmonary, rectal, urinal or muscular difficulties who may or may not be reading this).

I simply thought that my climbing was - not really committed, or was illogically fearful, or lacking effort. I might have been intimidated in the face of minor adversity, and felt 'unmanly' or 'effeminate' (Again I am not attempting to insult men and women though the use of these words.) Basically a whole range of things easily summed in a few letters.

If I think a climb is 'wicked', I am also not suggesting that Christians should avoid it as 'sinful' in order to maintain their 'immortal soul'; neither am I making an statement in relation to any religious belief. I simply think the climb is really really good.

I find some of the arguments for the no case to be more blatantly demeaning, bigoted and intolerant than any of the posts that recently used the word 'gay' or 'fagistocracy' in passing.

PS I hope my possible overthinking of this is not offensive to anyone (nothing personal implied here keiran) but believe it or not I have been called all sorts of names for overthinking . . .

Marssan

18-Jan-2011
2:51:31 PM

On 18/01/2011 Macciza wrote:
>On 18/01/2011 rolsen1 wrote:
>>The question you are answering in this poll is:
>>
>>Is it OK to use "gay", "fag" or any of their derivatives eg. faggotry
>>to describe something negative / lame / weak or undesirable on the Chocky
>>forum.

>If I thought my attempt at a climb was a bit 'gay', I am not attempting
>to insult myself by inferring that I might be homosexual (and that somehow
>that may be something wrong with that); nor am I attempting to be derogatory
>to anyone other than myself for putting in a light-hearted, half-arsed,
>piss-poor, weak-as shit performance. ( With apologies to any people suffering
>pulmonary, rectal, urinal or muscular difficulties who may or may not be
>reading this).
>

I've never seen someone not get it so spectacularly.
You use gay as a synonym for half arsed, piss poor and weak-as-shit. Then go on to claim that it's not derogatory!

I see you weren't joking when you said you like a toke.


Ben

18-Jan-2011
2:54:54 PM

I like your post Maccazia, but I think that the problem with the use of the word gay as a negative is that it is not being used in the original (and now somewhat less common) sense eg. "to skip gaily down the path", but the instead the negative use is directly related to the definition of gay as homosexual.

By using the word 'gay' as a strong negative people are explicitly defining homosexual as a negative.

To make up an example, let's say that that we use 'Queensland' instead of the word gay.

"Hey Brent, you're such a f**king Queenslander"
"How Queensland was that movie.." etc.

Done often enough, this is a pretty negative slant on Queensland and I'd imagine a few of them getting upset by it.

Queensland doesn't have multiple meanings like gay now does (to skip gaily vs homosexual) so you could argue that my example is pretty crap, but I'll contrast your use of the word in your post:

"When I skip gayly down a path, I do not believe sexually comes into it - I am simply expressing a cheerful and lighthearted approach; my gaily coloured clothes (I was hippy) were simply that, quite bright and colourful. In no way am I attempting to vilify or ridicule homosexuals." - Fair enough - original meaning.

but:

"If I thought my attempt at a climb was a bit 'gay', I am not attempting to insult myself by inferring that I might be homosexual (and that somehow that may be something wrong with that); nor am I attempting to be derogatory to anyone other than myself for putting in a light-hearted, half-arsed, piss-poor, weak-as shit performance. ( With apologies to any people suffering pulmonary, rectal, urinal or muscular difficulties who may or may not be reading this)."

Here you seem to be equating the second definition of gay (homosexual) directly with "light-hearted, half-arsed, piss-poor, weak-as shit"

I'd much rather people simply describe their attempt at that climb as "piss-poor".

Chockstone has always been fairly happy for.. robust language to be used, possibly because many climbers have fairly thick skins or whatever. And I'm fine with that generally.

But I object to gay and similar being used in that context because it feels like language that insidiously attacks a minority group without being explicit.


Miguel75

18-Jan-2011
4:40:46 PM

On 18/01/2011 pmonks wrote:

>Ah, but how many gay AND Christian friends do you have??
>
And what have they done on Grit?


voodoo

18-Jan-2011
6:22:08 PM

On 17/01/2011 nmonteith wrote:
>Im intrigued to know from people who voted 'yes' on this poll if they would
>use these words in conversation with a gay person?

I voted no - yet I have gay friends/colleagues that I happily use colourful terms like fag, bummers, brown-hatting etc in conversation with them. Is this an inconsistency? Not at all...

It's all about context. I know them, and they're good friends, and I know what offends them and what doesn't. And, in return, they know whether I'm trying to cause genuine offense or am simply being lighthearted/colourful/gratuitous (or whatever else you want to call it).

The difference on Chocky (and this was what the poll referred to) is that we aren't all best buddies and we don't necessarily know each other particularly well. And conversations here aren't private - there's an audience - and others reading can easily take offense to what has been said or misinterpret something that was originally intended in jest.

And I think that is an important distinction to recognise.


The Good Dr

18-Jan-2011
7:08:26 PM

So that this is not misinterpreted, the following should be read as a neutral opinion supporting neither side.

The meanings attached to the word 'gay' have evolved significantly over time. What is in evidence here is, actually, the further evolution of the word beyond the developed definition of the homosexual community. As a matter of fact 'gay' has evolved in the latter half of last century from being inclusive of all homosexuals to solely representing homosexual men (I have actually heard 'gay' men use it demeaningly against lesbians). There was a famous case in the UK where the word 'gay' was used by a DJ regarding some music. There was a case bought against the DJ but the BBC Board of Governors ruled that:

"The word ‘gay’, in addition to being used to mean ‘homosexual’ or ‘carefree’, was often now used to mean ‘lame’ or ‘rubbish’. This is a widespread current usage of the word amongst young people... The word 'gay' ... need not be offensive... or homophobic ... The governors said, however, that Moyles was simply keeping up with developments in English usage. ... The committee... was "familiar with hearing this word in this context." The governors believed that in describing a ring tone as 'gay', the DJ was conveying that he thought it was 'rubbish', rather than 'homosexual'. ... The panel acknowledged however that this use... in a derogatory sense... could cause offence in some listeners, and counselled caution on its use."

This was of course a highly controversial decision at the time with the response from one member of parlaiment being;

"the casual use of homophobic language by mainstream radio DJs is too often seen as harmless banter instead of the offensive insult that it really represents. ... To ignore this problem is to collude in it. The blind eye to casual name-calling, looking the other way because it is the easy option, is simply intolerable."

This alternative definition has evolved since the late 70s. I am sure that at some stage we will see the definition widen in dictionaries to accommodate its current new slang usage, as the dictionary definitions were broadened to include it use as a term for homosexual. The word appears to be at another evolutionary tipping point.

As to the word 'fag', this is now used as a far more perjorative term than 'gay'. It used to be a commonly heard word in reference to cigarettes though this usage has dropped off somewhat. You do not hear people asking 'can I bum a fag' as often as they used to. Again, evolution of the language.

Language can be used as a weapon to attack people with perceived differences and is used by those people to build up defenses and to try to normalize their differences. Once the process of acceptance starts to occur, the impact of the language changes as does it general usage and place in the lexicon. Look what is happening to the language surrounding Muslims and the perceptions of Muslim culture. Call someone a terrorist these days ...

Duncan

18-Jan-2011
8:11:33 PM

On 18/01/2011 Macciza wrote:
>A massive load of horse shit.

That's like, profound, man.

martym

18-Jan-2011
8:40:05 PM

"piss-poor" makes fun of low-income earners who can't afford to go to good schools and expensive equipment.

kieranl

18-Jan-2011
10:06:29 PM

A lot of the defences being put up here remind me of how as young, arrogant uni students we'd mock non-sexist language by substituting "person" for every occurrence of "man" in words. I can still see our women friends rolling their eyes at our gauche behaviour. We hadn't got it that it was not about some artificial mangling of the language but just about being thoughtful about the impact of the language we used.


pmonks

19-Jan-2011
2:32:58 AM

On 18/01/2011 Miguel75 wrote:
>On 18/01/2011 pmonks wrote:
>
>>Ah, but how many gay AND Christian friends do you have??
>>
>And what have they done on Grit?

Don't think he's done anything on grit per se, but he's certainly had to grit his teeth a lot with that combination - let's just say that he cops it from all sides...

Wendy

19-Jan-2011
7:39:10 AM

On 18/01/2011 The Good Dr wrote:
>
>"The word ‘gay’, in addition to being used to mean ‘homosexual’ or ‘carefree’,
>was often now used to mean ‘lame’ or ‘rubbish’. This is a widespread current
>usage of the word amongst young people... The word 'gay' ... need not be
>offensive... or homophobic ... The governors said, however, that Moyles
>was simply keeping up with developments in English usage. ... The committee...
>was "familiar with hearing this word in this context." The governors believed
>that in describing a ring tone as 'gay', the DJ was conveying that he thought
>it was 'rubbish', rather than 'homosexual'. ... The panel acknowledged
>however that this use... in a derogatory sense... could cause offence in
>some listeners, and counselled caution on its use."
>
>
>This alternative definition has evolved since the late 70s. I am sure
>that at some stage we will see the definition widen in dictionaries to
>accommodate its current new slang usage, as the dictionary definitions
>were broadened to include it use as a term for homosexual. The word appears
>to be at another evolutionary tipping point.
>
>As to the word 'fag', this is now used as a far more perjorative term
>than 'gay'. It used to be a commonly heard word in reference to cigarettes
>though this usage has dropped off somewhat. You do not hear people asking
>'can I bum a fag' as often as they used to. Again, evolution of the language.
>

That ruling is rather amazing. What vacuum do they think the change in language occurred in? Someone didn't wake up one day and wonder whether so and so's actions were so "feather duster" or "socket set" only to abandon them for having too many syllables for the completely random choice of "gay". And I may be cynical, but I don't think the recent evolution came from skipping gaily down the path. I don't think it will or should be blindly included in the language with out noting it's historical development and offensive nature.

And whilst fag might be a more common pejorative when directing abuse at homosexuals than gay, which is in that context used and accepted widely, we are talking about the use of gay in a different way that relies on a common vision of what it is about being gay that is "lame or rubbish". I wouldn't actually use the word "lame" either - it's another teenagery word with its roots in disabilities.

Thanks Sabu for dragging out Chockstone conduct guidlines, i was wondering if there were any. I would actually like to see that line change to remove "blatant" - insiduous racism/sexism etc is equally wrong. I would also like to see it specifically list homophobia and sexism along with racism.


Macciza

19-Jan-2011
11:59:48 AM

On 19/01/2011 Wendy wrote:
> snip <
>"gay". And I may be cynical, but I don't think the recent evolution came
>from skipping gaily down the path. I don't think it will or should be blindly
>included in the language with out noting it's historical development and
>offensive nature.
No I think you will find they identified with the traditional meaning of gay and it became adopted and altered into many new meanings.
I think you should check the etymology of the word gay - try a search of the net with 'etymology of gay'
Maybe also a little semiotics, semantics, communication and labelling theory as well

> snip <
>I wouldn't actually use the word "lame" either - it's another teenagery
>word with its roots in disabilities.
>
Thats strange because you have requoted it throughout this discussion up till now without concern. I was going to use it as an example to make a point given that I have paraplegic friends ( who may find that offensive; but probably don't) but it was not necessary. Lame traditionally describes a physical condition of injury - a lame horse; this transfers to 'a lame excuse' ie unable to stand. It has nothing to do with being a perjorative term referring to people with disabilities.

>Thanks Sabu for dragging out Chockstone conduct guidlines, i was wondering
>if there were any. I would actually like to see that line change to remove
>"blatant" - insiduous racism/sexism etc is equally wrong. I would also
>like to see it specifically list homophobia and sexism along with racism.

I believe the 'no' case argument has shown contempt towards, and sought to denigrate, those who hold the opposite view in this debate. This has bordered closer to 'bigotry' then any recent use of the word 'gay' or 'fagistocracy' . . .

Anyway, me and me mates, Fred and Barney, are off for gay old climb, yabba-dabba-doo . . .

Wendy

19-Jan-2011
1:19:49 PM

On 19/01/2011 Macciza wrote:
>On 19/01/2011 Wendy wrote:
>> snip <
>>"gay". And I may be cynical, but I don't think the recent evolution
>came
>>from skipping gaily down the path. I don't think it will or should be
>blindly
>>included in the language with out noting it's historical development
>and
>>offensive nature.
>No I think you will find they identified with the traditional meaning
>of gay and it became adopted and altered into many new meanings.
>I think you should check the etymology of the word gay - try a search
>of the net with 'etymology of gay'
>Maybe also a little semiotics, semantics, communication and labelling
>theory as well

'fraid i can't find any connection between happy gay and gay as rubbish. In fact, many sites don't even offer that as a definition and those that do don't offer any explanation of it's development, merely noting that people using it don't see it as a gay insult. Just because people are thick as two planks and can't see the connection or think it is somehow meaningless doesn't change the fact that it exists. Most people who are being racist don't see themselves as racist. What is notable if you go searching is a lot of gay people/organisations expressing their experience of it as offensive.

>
>> snip <
>>I wouldn't actually use the word "lame" either - it's another teenagery
>>word with its roots in disabilities.
>>
>Thats strange because you have requoted it throughout this discussion
>up till now without concern. I was going to use it as an example to make
>a point given that I have paraplegic friends ( who may find that offensive;
>but probably don't) but it was not necessary. Lame traditionally describes
>a physical condition of injury - a lame horse; this transfers to 'a lame
>excuse' ie unable to stand. It has nothing to do with being a perjorative
>term referring to people with disabilities.

God forbid if I can't remember to comment on absolutely everything that occurs to me at the time ...

whether it has anything to do with people with disabilities is still irrelevant if said people are offended by it (which I haven't actually looked into), and lame refers to far more than excuses - it refers to almost anything that teenagers don't like - having to go somewhere, do something, someone or some object.
>
>>Thanks Sabu for dragging out Chockstone conduct guidlines, i was wondering
>>if there were any. I would actually like to see that line change to
>remove
>>"blatant" - insiduous racism/sexism etc is equally wrong. I would also
>>like to see it specifically list homophobia and sexism along with racism.
>
>I believe the 'no' case argument has shown contempt towards, and sought
>to denigrate, those who hold the opposite view in this debate. This has
>bordered closer to 'bigotry' then any recent use of the word 'gay' or 'fagistocracy'
>. . .
Having just skimmed through everything to see what i missed, i can see potentially one post from the no side that might be considered showing contempt and denigrating. Things look pretty polite and considered overall.

>
>Anyway, me and me mates, Fred and Barney, are off for gay old climb, yabba-dabba-doo
>. . .


evanbb

19-Jan-2011
1:49:23 PM

From pages back....

On 16/01/2011 One Day Hero wrote:
>Cool, that seems like a ton of credit! How many times can I say "Holy
>fuucking shit, fuuuck me Jesus Christ" before I run out?
>
>I'd like to thank Andrew Dice-Clay for putting that line in a movie........Ford
>Fairlane, what a terrible film, yet utterly hilarious!

My favourite is in Team America: World Police. When Michael Moore blows him self up in the base, the boss screaming 'Jeeeeesssssuuuussssssss, ttiiiittttyyyyyyy f---ing Christ!' That got a lot of airplay at the crag the following day. Might have even been Booroomba?

Back on topic. I don't think it's cool at all. But it depends on your viewpoint. If you think offending people is okay, by all means go ahead. Being the weak leftist that I am, I made the decision not to use homosexual or gender-specific terms in the derogatory a while ago. Same goes for retard too, and that was a hard one to give up. Love the phonetics of the word. And 'tard', for example Rightard, is such a terrific addition.

There are 75 messages in this topic.