Maureen Lipman: Cancel culture could wipe out comedy

[Pale Rider]

Sorry mate, too long, too many words.

Too much thinking / considering someone else pov required.

But worth a try right??

Usual patronising.

Presumably a lecture will follow shortly.

 

[BoldonLad]

This seems to have become a theme across multiple threads here of late.

Language is not symmetrical across power imbalances. Punching down is not the same as punching up. When I as a white person or as a male use a given set of terms to someone of global majority heritage or to a woman, they can carry very different implications and meaning to when that person uses the apparently equivalent terms to me.

Global majority heritage ?

 

[theclaud]

If people want to take offense then they will do, no matter how many egg shells people tread on.

Yeah Shep should stop walking on eggshells.

 

[swansonj]

Global majority heritage ?

You've put a question mark but I'm afraid I don't quite understand what the question is?

 

[icowden]

Whatever you say pal, in the 70's she would have been half cast with no racism implied so when and why did things change?

A quick look at Wikipedia suggests it fell out of favour as a term used by the British Empire, usually in a derogatory fashion:-

In the United Kingdom, the term when used primarily applies to those of mixed Black and White parentage, although can extend to those of differing heritages as well.[34]

Sociologist Peter J. Aspinall argues that the term was coined by 19th-century British colonial administrations, and eventually started to be used as a descriptor of multiracial Britons in the 20th century who had partial white ancestry. From the 1920s to 1960s, Aspniall argues it was "used in Britain as a derogatory racial category associated with the moral condemnation of 'miscegenation'".[35]

The National Union of Journalists has stated that the term half-caste is considered offensive today. The union's guidelines for race reporting instructs journalists to 'avoid words that, although common in the past, are now considered offensive'.[36] NHS Editorial guidance states documents should 'Avoid offensive and stereotyping words such as colored, half-caste and so fort

Words change. Go to any school playground in the 1980s and you would have heard kids calling each other "spastic" or "spazz" without any real understanding of what they were saying or why, other than they had heard someone else doing it. Similarly "pooftah". So we learn and we change and we try to make the world a better place for everyone.

 

[theclaud]

Do you imagine that you'd know someone's intent better than they do?

What's that got to do with it?

 

[BoldonLad]

You've put a question mark but I'm afraid I don't quite understand what the question is?

And here was me thinking you were clever.

 

[matticus]

What's that got to do with it?

You said this:

theclaud said:
... however benign they imagine their intent.

I would say your intent (or my intent) is not up for debate by someone not in your head. If you use a word with good intent when talking to me, I don't get to tell you that you IMAGINED your good intent!

Likewise if shep or David Baddiel or John Cleese says a thing; there is nothing IMAGINED about their intent, just because you view their word choice as unintentionally insulting, demeaning etc.

 

[mudsticks]

A quick look at Wikipedia suggests it fell out of favour as a term used by the British Empire, usually in a derogatory fashion:-



Words change. Go to any school playground in the 1980s and you would have heard kids calling each other "spastic" or "spazz" without any real understanding of what they were saying or why, other than they had heard someone else doing it. Similarly "pooftah". So we learn and we change and we try to make the world a better place for everyone.

If only those 'we's' really were so all encompassing

But then stubborn resistance to new learning, and disregard about the effects of our language isn't really a modern day phenomenon either, is it. ??

 

[Cirrus]

Wolverhampton is on one of the longest direct train services in the country.

Something like Edinburgh or Newcastle to Plymouth, or possibly beyond.

Felt like it and I was only coming from London

 

[Cirrus]

Yeah Shep should stop walking on eggshells.

Perhaps a bed of nails, less prickly....

 

[theclaud]

You said this:

theclaud said:
... however benign they imagine their intent.

I would say your intent (or my intent) is not up for debate by someone not in your head. If you use a word with good intent when talking to me, I don't get to tell you that you IMAGINED your good intent!

Likewise if shep or David Baddiel or John Cleese says a thing; there is nothing IMAGINED about their intent, just because you view their word choice as unintentionally insulting, demeaning etc.

OK I see what you mean. Three things. Firstly, I am not questioning the intent of any particular act or utterance here - I'm happy to take it at face value that (for example) Baddiel had no wish to denigrate or hurt Lee or any other black footballers of the time. Secondly, someone can intend something to be benign when it is not experienced as such by the individual on the receiving end or the category of people who are the object of the joke - a lot of everyday sexism is like this. Intent is irrelevant. Thirdly, whilst I have no special insight into the intent or motivation of either of the men you mentioned, neither is it true that any person has the only say about, or the definitive understanding of, their own motivation or actions. Intent is a slightly different thing, admittedly, but it has both conscious and unconscious elements. A driver overtaking and squeezing a cyclist at a pinch point has an intention to get past, but not necessarily a conscious intention to endanger or intimidate. However there is an implicit power relationship informing the intention to get past, which gives the driver permission to act in a way which endangers or intimidates. All I am saying is that we have a responsibility to make these things visible.

 

[Deleted member 28]

Yeah Shep should stop walking on eggshells.

I can't feel a thing with my 10 hole Cherry Reds on anyway.

 

[Deleted member 28]

This seems to have become a theme across multiple threads here of late.

Language is not symmetrical across power imbalances. Punching down is not the same as punching up. When I as a white person or as a male use a given set of terms to someone of global majority heritage or to a woman, they can carry very different implications and meaning to when that person uses the apparently equivalent terms to me.

Any thoughts then?

Is it ok to refer to someone as half German for example but not half Jamaican?

If the above reply is supposed to provide an answer I'm afraid I don't understand it.

 

[Deleted member 49]

I can't feel a thing with my 10 hole Cherry Reds on anyway.

With stonewashed drainpipes and a Fred Perry....