LOUD NOISES!! I DON’T KNOW WHAT WE’RE YELLING ABOUT!!!
Originally posted on the 29th of November, 2007
Disclaimer: The following blog contains strong language (my words can benchpress like… 250. It’s no big deal.) and shouldn’t be read by people whose parents will be pissed off at me if they find out their children read this. Or wusses.
I was listening to a woman on the radio talk about how the term “special” in Special Olympics is offensive; she got pretty angry about this and one of the things she said was that words have power. Whenever someone tells me that words have power, I notice 2 things about them:
- They don’t have much power.
- They have a lot to say.
Now I’m not saying that words can’t be used offensively, but as George Carlin illustrated in his infamous Seven Words, words only have the power we give them. The term “special” was introduced because people were offended by the term handicapped which was introduced because people were offended by the term disabled, which was introduced because people were offended by the term crippled which was introduced because people were offended by the term lame…. which was introduced because a caveman threw a stick at a velociraptor. Now my history here might be slightly off on the details, but I think the point stands that the way we interact with euphemisms in our society is a bit… well, retarded.
Process of euphemism change
(Naturally I am an authority on language development, since my mother was getting a phD in Linguistics when I was conceived).
- Certain word is used to refer to minority group offensively.
- New word is invented so as to avoid negative connotations of previous word.
- New word is used negatively and gains negative connotations.
- Wash, rinse and repeat.
Of course some of you have already realized that the logical outcome of this will be that eventually we’ll only be allowed to use the words Laundromat and Peanut, and frankly, there are a lot of people allergic to Laundromats.
Now if someone wants me to call them the Grand Monkey-Robot-Poobah, I’ll call them that, because I don’t care. And if someone wants to introduce new words to the language, well that’s fine too because I like words and new ones give me more toys to play with, but I don’t think it’s fair for people to get angry at everyone for using certain words when the majority who use them do so with no ill-will (particularly when used in jest). Especially when there are MORE than enough douche bags to be justifiably angry at as is. And frankly, sanctioning a word off so that it’s considered “bad” just makes it that much more powerful when someone does use it with malice. That’s why the process of word reclamation is so much healthier, which has occurred with a bunch of words including “queer,” “gimp,” and “heathen.” The word “nigger” is a lot more complicated since obviously it has been reclaimed, but to me it seems to have been reclaimed in a largely negative fashion, but that’s a whole other blog.
The other issue this brings up is who can use certain words. As I said, I’ll call someone whatever they want because I’d prefer to not needlessly piss people off rather than hang myself on my principles; but I disagree with the idea that people of a minority have a special privilege to use certain words, even ones which refer to them. It seems silly for the same reasons I’ve enumerated above, i.e., it gives the word more power when someone not from that group uses it, no matter what the context. Words shouldn’t be taboo; being a prejudiced asshole should be.
If it makes anyone feel better, I’m saying all of this as the Jewish son of an immigrant. Of course if you agree with me, then it shouldn’t.
4 years ago • Notes