From: rstevew@deeptht.armory.com (Richard Steven Walz)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc,sci.skeptic,alt.censorship,alt.sex
Subject: Re: A gender neutral pronoun, was Fundamentalist Nightmare
Date: 10 Nov 92 13:59:32 GMT
Organization: The Armory

In article <1992Nov5.101554.14585@newstand.syr.edu> greeny@top.cis.syr.edu (J. S. Greenfield) writes:
>In article <Bx7Lpp.Gw2@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> chak@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Buckshot Willie) writes:
>
>>  If someone says something that unintentionally upsets, outrages, or
>>otherwise violates what you find "right", then no insult has occured.
>>One must try to insult someone.  Offense taken from an offhand remark
>>is not the fault of the person that makes the statement.  It is the
>>person that recieves and interprets the message incorrectly that is
>>at fault.  An insult must be given, but offense can be taken from 
>>anywhere.
>
>See the dictionary definition of "insult" that I posted yesterday.  It
>does not support your conclusion.
>
>
>>  I personally find PC language to be unwieldy, tiresome, unnecessary,
>>and annoying.
>
>Why do so many of you seem insistent on wrapping the question of using
>gender-neutral pronouns in a blanket in "PC" positions?
>
>
>>For example, if I call someone in a wheelchair a cripple
>>or handicapped, then I am some sort of evil bastard that belittles those
>>that are "physically challenged".  What's the difference?  Nothing,
>>except some holier than thou organization decided that cripple and handi-
>>capped were offensive, and physically challanged is nicer.  We have 
>>become a society of euphemisms and connotations.  Take a word for what
>>it means, not for what you think it should mean.  A person that is a
>>cripple, that is handicapped, and that is physically challanged is still
>>the same person, all the terms mean the same thing.              
>
>If you can't tell the difference between calling someone a "cripple"
>as opposed to calling them "handicapped," then I doubt that you are
>mentally-equipped to take part in any discussion of language.
>
>The difference is akin to the difference between calling somebody a
>"pip-squeak" and calling somebody "short."
>
>Fine, we can agree that to become so concerned about negative connotations as
>to switch to terms like "physically challenged" or "vertically challenged"
>is to be ridiculous.  But if you can't recognize that terms like "cripple"
>and "pip-squeak" are loaded terms, then you must be "mentally challenged"
>
>-- 
------------------------
I remember giving money to the Crippled Children's Fund. It was a good
enough term and not at all pejorative. I think each generation of
school kids must misuse the words on each other until by the time they
are in college they want to make new words because they have so fucked
with the original legitimate ones. Then given a state of being
psychologically and intellectually "crippled" they turn to this PC
nonsense. A cripple is NOT a retard. The word retard was made up by
school kids as a mispronunciation of retarded. They couldn't even say
it well enough to try to insult someone with it. Crippled is a
perfectly acceptable english word meaning someone who has through no
fault of their own incurred an event or injury which has left them
less than fully mobile or coordinated in their movements. Physically
challenged is simply too damned long. A person could get run over by a
bus before you got their attention to save them. The wheelchair people
don't seem to have any trouble with "gimp". They use it to describe
themselves.
- Steve


-- 
* Richard STEVEn Walz   rstevew@deeptht.armory.com   (408) 429-1200  *
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