Quote:
Originally Posted by MattyC
Yes language is up to interpretation. It's also at the subjectation of what is deemed correct, acceptable or derogatory. Indian is not the correct thing to call a Native person. They are not Indian.
Shouting N- when stubbing your toe is obviously not racist. But the term is derogatory and shouldn't even be used. If you want to use derogatory terms outside of context and claim them to be not derogatory, well you're just plain wrong and your mindset needs to change.
Example: As a kid, it was pretty standard to call peope fags. If your friend was being an idiot, he was a fag. If you didn't like someone, they were a fag. As a kid I had no idea it was a derogatory term for gay people, or that people around me may have been unintentially offended by it. So, as a kid was I homophobic? No. That doesn't mean the term is less derogatory and the kid shouldn't be educated to not use it.
As an adult I'm much more concious of using words like that at all. Does it happen sometimes by accident? Yeah, its tough to remove stuff like that from automation. But if I ever do/did use the word I apologize to those around me whether any of them are gay or not. Why? Because personally I take offense to those words because they are rooted in hate. And whether you are hateful when you say them or not makes no difference.
I have friends that use N- when referring to their buddies very casually. I personally don't like it and make it known when they do. The best thing for those words to do is just disappear. Black people did something differenmt and decided to own it rather than fight it. I'm not sure it's the best way to go about it but that's up to them. I won't use the word.
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I'm glad you pointed this out, because if it isn't interpreted at large by the part of society that uses that version of English as racist, and it's clear as day by their intent (which it is very clear this is not of racist intent, and that word isn't even used by people there toward natives [whether it be anymore or ever]), that should speak for itself, but I do note that despite non-racist intent that didn't stop you from saying anyways the mindset "needs to change". Only in a PC world of too much zeal in controlling other people would someone not being racist still necessitate social engineering toward that herd's logic. And you wonder why people resist?
I would never support that team keeping it's name if it was clearly racist (as in, the name was prevalent and often used against in a racist fashion against natives) in practice, rather than theory. But it isn't.. this is much ado about nothing.