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Mar. 30th, 2001 07:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scottobearJust got out of a meeting, and something is on my mind.
I'm a little tired of hearing folks use certain terms as slurs for intolerant, mean, or non-thinking. especially when they themselves are doing the same disservice.
Here's a few.
A liberal to me is someone who is very accepting of other folks, live and let live. Not someone who gets outraged at someone having a different belief, but a tolerant person... a liberal to my mind is about as open minded as one can be.
Christian. woo. here's a big one for me. Using Christian for hatemonger or mean-spirited is about as backwards as you can get... Even if you don't buy into the JC sort of philosophy, you'd be hard pressed to say that the teaching of Jesus is a bad thing. Please, don't let the actions of a few zealots cloud your view of the whole. (That goes for everything, by the way... like calling all blacks criminals, or all men rapists... or all single white males serial killers.) When I hear my pagan pals malign someone by calling them Christian, or referring to the "Christian mentality", it's like me hearing someone called a "Nigger". (Which used to just refer to the color of someone's skin, before a bundle of hate was tossed behind it.) On a side note of religion, using Jew to refer to being cheap or worse, making a verb out of it... "Tried to Jew me down at the bake sale"... makes my ears just turn off. I simply don't want to even hear what the person has to say anymore.
wow, got so put out there, I can't even think of the other examples I was going to give.
I'll return to this thought later.
pardon my rant.
I'm a little tired of hearing folks use certain terms as slurs for intolerant, mean, or non-thinking. especially when they themselves are doing the same disservice.
Here's a few.
A liberal to me is someone who is very accepting of other folks, live and let live. Not someone who gets outraged at someone having a different belief, but a tolerant person... a liberal to my mind is about as open minded as one can be.
Christian. woo. here's a big one for me. Using Christian for hatemonger or mean-spirited is about as backwards as you can get... Even if you don't buy into the JC sort of philosophy, you'd be hard pressed to say that the teaching of Jesus is a bad thing. Please, don't let the actions of a few zealots cloud your view of the whole. (That goes for everything, by the way... like calling all blacks criminals, or all men rapists... or all single white males serial killers.) When I hear my pagan pals malign someone by calling them Christian, or referring to the "Christian mentality", it's like me hearing someone called a "Nigger". (Which used to just refer to the color of someone's skin, before a bundle of hate was tossed behind it.) On a side note of religion, using Jew to refer to being cheap or worse, making a verb out of it... "Tried to Jew me down at the bake sale"... makes my ears just turn off. I simply don't want to even hear what the person has to say anymore.
wow, got so put out there, I can't even think of the other examples I was going to give.
I'll return to this thought later.
pardon my rant.
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no subject
Date: 2001-03-30 04:30 pm (UTC)Good rant.
no subject
Date: 2001-03-30 04:39 pm (UTC)how about conservative? that's thrown around these days just as forcefully as liberal. back when i was a kid, a conservative wore a tie and worked in business. now it's almost a cuss-word, just like liberal.
my sister is a vegetarian, and has been for almost 20 years. whenever she and her husband are fighting, he throws out the word "vegetarian" in such a way that it makes her cry.
really, any word can have a negative connotation. heck, even the natural color of my hair (blonde) is enough to send people into giggle fits.
no subject
Date: 2001-03-30 05:20 pm (UTC)Yeah, vegetarian means "flakey" to a lot of people.
Re:
Date: 2001-03-30 05:34 pm (UTC)hmm.. I've never seen that one, really...
Re:
Date: 2001-03-30 05:43 pm (UTC)I wonder though, if people are just less likely to roll their eyes at 6'5" guy than at me?
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Date: 2001-03-30 05:48 pm (UTC)I don't doubt them commenting about it after I've left, though.
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Date: 2001-03-30 05:29 pm (UTC)Vegetarian in a mean way? *ponders
I've never really heard a mean way of saying that...
no subject
Date: 2001-03-30 04:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2001-03-30 05:00 pm (UTC)Here's another - this one slips by most people - "he gyped me" or "I was gyped" - refers to gypsies. The stereotype is that gypsies are all theives and cheaters. For some reason this one really screams at me whenever I hear it.
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Date: 2001-03-30 05:36 pm (UTC)Yup... I'm as guilty of that stereotype as anyone else....
no subject
Date: 2001-03-31 04:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2001-04-02 02:53 pm (UTC)Another to add to your list: "retarded".
Re:
Date: 2001-04-02 02:56 pm (UTC)Christians aren't the only ones...but it seems they're a big target these days....