Quote:
Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Gotcha. BTW, at the risk of this being a trademark painfully earnest response, I feel that the destigmatization of homosexuality will come more quickly as a result of the overuse of that social reaming and desensitization to it, rather than its elimination.
You'll do more damage to the rednecks when kids start saying, "And?" when they're called "fags" or what-have-you, than when you have adults saying "Gay or not, that's not a very nice thing to say about someone, so take it back." In that way, it's a bit unlike the N-word. If the S.F. Bay Area is any kind of social bellwether in this arena, political correctness types are unintentionally preserving these words by making them taboo in the name of sensitivity, which, while laudable, is an utterly doomed project for a schoolyard. "Fag" was bandied about on my schoolyard, and over time it became a milder and milder perjorative, which I think prepared me to be very accepting by the time H.S. arrived.
But I'm not gay, so maybe it's not my place to suggest this. "Fag" probably hurts a lot more when you are questioning your sexuality.
|
Sometimes I forget that I live in a place that's much more "tolerant" than other places. But I still get pissed about the implication that one's sexuality is something that anybody else should tolerate.
We decide whether, and to what extent, we're willing to tolerate PDA's.
We have no business deciding whether to tolerate other people's sexual preferences.
It's kind of like the way women always criticize men for leaving the seat UP, yet would be quite puzzled if men criticized us for leaving the seat DOWN. I don't hear a lot of crap from the gay community about tolerating the sexual preferences of breeders.
So, yeah, de-stigmatizing language is an important step in that direction.
