Minneapolis PD Suffocate Unarmed Black Man Who Later Dies in Hospital

[missdpuck]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

If it’s a song title or a book title I think you should say it. It’d be worse to avoid it and use some lame cop out like n-word. But maybe now isn’t the best time to fight that fight.

Yeah I was reminded of Patty Smith’s song “Rock
N Roll N######”.

I don’t recall hearing any uproar about that back then, but then again it’s the context.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by missdpuck

Yeah I was reminded of Patty Smith’s song “Rock
N Roll N######”.

I don’t recall hearing any uproar about that back then, but then again it’s the context.

What about song lyrics? One of the first times I became aware of this kind of thing was that white girl at a rapper's concert. She was invited up on stage to sing, sung the song lyrics as written...and was boo'ed soundly, with even the rapper himself scolding her.

https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-44209141

[PsYcNeT]

This just in: some words aren't okay for white people to say.

It is peak white privilege to try and argue against this. Just live with the fact that no one wants you to say it, and you're being a needlessly obtuse edgelord at best when you do.

[missdpuck]

I posted this elsewhere but I had an interesting situation at work.

The kids were always introducing me to rap artists I’d never heard of, like Young Scooter and Young Dolf.

But there was one song by Fabolous that was really catchy and we’d go down the aisle singing lines from it on the days we worked next to each other.

The song was Can’t Deny It.

So, one day my turn came and I happened to get the line with the n word in it. Because I was used to singing it with them I just said it.

The new supervisor heard it, stood up and told me to get into the office. The Black kids immediately came to my defense and said, you’re new, you don’t get it, she can say that.
She’s the only white woman we know who’s allowed. Leave her alone.

We were so open there that we had to remember to put a sock in it outside of our little bubble.

I could tell you lots of stories, like Willie insisting on me calling him both n words and it was really hard for me to do. Willie’s off the wall. He just wanted the experience of having a white person say it to his face. Odd, yes. But I’m friends with his family and invited to weddings, baby showers etc. There’s no way we could get away with some of our conversations in the “real world.”

We started coming to Florida when I was a little kid. I remember seeing a “whites only” sign lightly painted over next to a gas station bathroom.

[81MC]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

I'm trying to think of a downside to living in a world where using racist or homophobic language is utterly unacceptable, where bigots know their vile views are unacceptable and my gay and coloured friends no longer have to worry about getting beaten up by some bunch of yahoos randomly, I'm having a hard time thinking of anything right now

Don’t conflate language and assault. That’s just silly.

And no, you’re not being ‘needlessly obtuse’ to have a legitimate discussion on censorship of the arts. No one here is suggesting needlessly egregious use of offensive language is a freedom of speech issue.

[PsYcNeT]

My dude, there is a well accepted and widely utilized alternative to saying the N-word that everyone understands. There is quite literally no reason to say it.

[timun]

I read "To Kill a Mockingbird" aloud in class in Grade 10...

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by timun

I read "To Kill a Mockingbird" aloud in class in Grade 10...

How did the teacher handle it?

I would hope there would have been some discussion about its usage.

Spoiler alert, I am not black. I am not the person to say whether it is appropriate in some really rare instances. From an academic perspective, I don't think we should whitewash or sanitize history. It's important to come to terms with the past and all the ugliness that was part of it. But I am not sure 15 year olds as a whole are mature enough to understand the power of certain words and how they affect people.

It's a pretty important piece of literature IMO that everyone should read when they are a teenager, but I don't think it is fair for a teacher to put a kid in a position like that to be on display for everyone to hear and judge.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

No one left of centre is part of cancel culture. The far left is cancel culture and people who are left of centre are too afraid of the backlash that they go along like Cliff Said.

Whenever its one of the 'woke' celebrities - i.e. Jimmy Kimmel - recently. You can bet its the right who started it. Perhaps the mega left jumped on it after that.

The blaze is mega right - https://www.theblaze.com/news/jimmy-...-names-pile-on
and there is tweets in there from Donald Trump Jr and James Woods.

Also confident the left wasn't the ones all over Trudeau for his blackface.

I would say - the far left is willing to go after anyone. The far right will go after their enemies when they have a chance.

[PeteMoss]

Outside of maybe post secondary educators - is there anyone white who say the n-word in a meeting at work and get away with it?

Why is this even a discussion on cancel culture?

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by 81MC

Don’t conflate language and assault. That’s just silly.

And no, you’re not being ‘needlessly obtuse’ to have a legitimate discussion on censorship of the arts. No one here is suggesting needlessly egregious use of offensive language is a freedom of speech issue.

I'm old enough to remember when it was ok to use all of these words in public and as a consequence morons and thugs also though it was ok to jump out of their cars in the west end or in Surrey and beat the tar out of East Indian kids or natives or Gays, words have power, they can take away or give permission for violence.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

Nm

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by PeteMoss

I would say - the far left is willing to go after anyone. The far right will go after their enemies when they have a chance.

Bingo, and this is your answer to the below:

Originally Posted by PeteMoss

Outside of maybe post secondary educators - is there anyone white who say the n-word in a meeting at work and get away with it?

Why is this even a discussion on cancel culture?

It’s a discussion on cancel culture, in part, because there is perceived power outside of the norm, so like cancel culture itself, it’s a way to take something or someone down a peg.

Cancel culture isn’t just someone saying something racist and people calling for them to lose their job.

It’s people bringing up any negative details they can find about a murder victim.

It’s people trying to demonise protestors by focusing on just the worst and usually violent instances of it.

And it’s those same people who rail against “cancel culture” while using the same methods to attack people they disagree with.

Some of the people in this very thread railing against cancel culture still use it as a tool to take people they don’t like down a peg. They act like they’re not part of it, but they are. They just put a name to it and say only “the other” does it as a way of pretending moral superiority.

Its just a pointless conversation because most of the people interested in having it are the same people who have no problem leaning in to when it suits them. Same with “outrage culture.” People see something “wrong” with something and call it out as their way of convincing themselves they’re not just as guilty.

And of course you have people like Corsi who actually try to discuss it as a problem without being part of that problem themselves but that’s pretty rare.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

But including things that are going away for good reason (Live PD) and people that haven't even been "cancelled" (Fallon, Brees) just muddies the water and makes the point gutless.

I disagree. You don't actually have to lose your job for this to seriously affect you, in terms of your social standing, your work, and your psychological well-being. Lee Fang is still employed, but he was also raked over the coals for days and publicly castigated as a racist, and was allowed to continue in his employment only a) after prostrating himself before the mob and begging forgiveness, and b) on the condition that he not say anything that offends anyone again. This, for posting an interview in which someone else said something his co-worker didn't like. He didn't get out of his episode of "cancel culture", (or "callout culture", or "cultural authoritarianism" or "ctrl left" or whatever we're calling it now) unharmed.

It's not the case that there are only two options, cancellation or everything's totally fine. Cases in which peoples' careers aren't completely destroyed can still involve significant harm and don't "muddy the waters". The issue is the same. There are just different degrees to which the victim of the social media (and normal media) mob is innocent, and different degrees to which the victim is harmed. As long as those differences are acknowledged, any of these cases is worthy of discussion.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

I disagree. You don't actually have to lose your job for this to seriously affect you, in terms of your social standing, your work, and your psychological well-being. Lee Fang is still employed, but he was also raked over the coals for days and publicly castigated as a racist, and was allowed to continue in his employment only a) after prostrating himself before the mob and begging forgiveness, and b) on the condition that he not say anything that offends anyone again. This, for posting an interview in which someone else said something his co-worker didn't like. He didn't get out of his episode of "cancel culture", (or "callout culture", or "cultural authoritarianism" or "ctrl left" or whatever we're calling it now) unharmed.

It's not the case that there are only two options, cancellation or everything's totally fine. Cases in which peoples' careers aren't completely destroyed can still involve significant harm and don't "muddy the waters". The issue is the same. There are just different degrees to which the victim of the social media (and normal media) mob is innocent, and different degrees to which the victim is harmed. As long as those differences are acknowledged, any of these cases is worthy of discussion.

I’m not sure you’re disagreeing with what I’m saying, since I don’t believe there are only two options, and I fully agree with the rest of your post.

Lee Fang would be an appropriate example. Do Live PD and Jimmy Fallon fit “appropriate”? One is a show that’s been taken off the air, given it’s focus on police and it’s filming of someone dying. The other wore blackface and apologised and... seems perfectly fine.

My point is that discussing the errors of cancel culture is a worthwhile discussion, but not if the differences aren’t acknowledged and examples that don’t even fit the idea of “an overstep or cancel culture” make up half your argument.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

The idea that the vocabulary we are “allowed” to use is based on skin colour is perhaps the dumbest idea I’ve ever read. And to present yourself as woke for believing something so insanely stupid is beyond comprehension.

The reality is that a person's racial, ethnic, gender etc. group affects how uncomfortable their use of certain vocabulary will make others feel. That's not an unusual social phenomenon. It's totally ordinary.

Think of it less as “you're not allowed to use that word because of your skin colour” and more as “because of the racial group you're in and the history of that word, you using it is more likely to really hurt some people's feelings, so if you want them to not feel hurt you should avoid using it”. It hopefully doesn't seem insanely stupid and beyond comprehension when you think of it like that.

Edit: I feel I should add that it's not even just that using the word can hurt someone's feelings, but that it can, even unintentionally, contribute to the continued marginalization and associated harms done to people the word is used to identify, so if you don't want to risk that, don't use it.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

The idea that the vocabulary we are “allowed” to use is based on skin colour is perhaps the dumbest idea I’ve ever read. And to present yourself as woke for believing something so insanely stupid is beyond comprehension.

Once we eliminate all of the other issues around racism we can address White people not being allowed to say one word.

It’s ironic in a thread about systemic racism somehow we end up taking about racism against white people because they can’t use a word and a black person can.

[Derek Sutton]

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

This just in: some words aren't okay for white people to say.

It is peak white privilege to try and argue against this. Just live with the fact that no one wants you to say it, and you're being a needlessly obtuse edgelord at best when you do.

Like white people can’t say “All Lives Matter”.

[PsYcNeT]

Originally Posted by Derek Sutton

Like white people can’t say “All Lives Matter”.

Well you can, but it makes you look like a massive attention seeking tool who is more interested in making your ####ty opinion known than understanding the issue at hand.

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

The idea that the vocabulary we are “allowed” to use is based on skin colour is perhaps the dumbest idea I’ve ever read. And to present yourself as woke for believing something so insanely stupid is beyond comprehension.

Cry about it.

"Boo hoo people are judging me harshly for being an insensitive dick to an entire race because I am so entitled I assume that everything should revolve around my whims! Woe is me!"

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

I’m not sure you’re disagreeing with what I’m saying, since I don’t believe there are only two options, and I fully agree with the rest of your post.

Lee Fang would be an appropriate example. Do Live PD and Jimmy Fallon fit “appropriate”? One is a show that’s been taken off the air, given it’s focus on police and it’s filming of someone dying. The other wore blackface and apologised and... seems perfectly fine.

My point is that discussing the errors of cancel culture is a worthwhile discussion, but not if the differences aren’t acknowledged and examples that don’t even fit the idea of “an overstep or cancel culture” make up half your argument.

The Lee Fang situation goes beyond the one interview. I highly doubt that the reaction would have been the same if random reporter x without the similar history had posted it. If you straddle the line of racism for years, eventually you will get called on it and suffer consequences.