Racist "prom-posal"

Words have different meanings depending upon context. It is remarkable that his has been totally forgotten in the last 10 years or so to the absolute absurdity that someone can lose their job for saying "chink in the armor".

When for example Kobe calls a competitor a "faggot" he is not criticizing them for having sex with men and therefore it is not homophobic in this context. He is insulting them by saying they lack the traditional athletic masculine values of courage, stoicism in the face of hardship, etc. In this context the word is synonymous with calling someone a "pussy", which obviously is not criticizing a fellow male for having a vagina but again an insult saying his behavior lacked traditional masculine values. As this insult is based on a stereotype it is understandable that gay people don't like the word used ever (except among themselves). Women interestingly don't seem to have a problem with the word pussy or bitch used towards males and they in fact often use it themselves in that context.

The most extreme example of this is the word "nigger" which when used in "rap" and casual conversation between black people means either affectionately or competitively "my fellow black person". But when Riley Cooper says "I will jump that fence and fight every nigger here" the clear meaning is that he is insulting the security guards for being an inferior "race."

None of this excuses the stupidity of people who post stupid shit on social media and the stupidity of the outrage of the stupid people who react.

 

Good lord.

 

Good thing you slipped those quote marks in there

 

Also words have some agreed upon currency and meaning
That’s the very basis of language
You don’t get to decide for yourself what a word means or doesn’t mean

 

Should they go inside or outside of the period?

 

Meh, I use quotation marks to separate the emotional subtext of a word from its literal symbolism on a message board.

 

Let's put things in the proper context. The guy ESPN fired for using "chink in the armor" in a headline put it on a story about Jeremy Lin.

 

Old man rants! I feel like I am at dinner with my father.

 

I think you meant parentheses.

CC: @YankeeFan

 

I side with @Dick Whitman in some of this, that occasionally these racist, sexist social media mistakes are meant ironically, especially as in-jokes among a group of friends or like-minded folks who share them as punchlines.

But many of them are not, and represent only ignorance or stupidity or bad character.

As a writer, I think I fairly have every word in the language at my disposal.

As a person walking around, I do not.

Some words are off limits to me, even in my own home.