In which she flounders verbally

[zeborah]

Warning: this post almost certainly involves Fail related to mental-health issues and, specifically, the word "crazy". I'll do my best not to be a jerk about it, but I expect it'll still be there.

Warning on the other side of things: I reserve the right to be dictatorial over comments. That is, over comments who think I'm being overly "PC" or whatever. Comments calling me on ablism will have free range.

So. In various places I've seen people point out that using "crazy", "going crazy", etc, in various figurative/non-literal ways is ablist language. (If this is hopelessly vague I can try to find examples, but I think people likely to know what I mean will know what I mean?)

And. I don't want to use ablist language. It's relatively easy to avoid derogatory language based on specific conditions - eg "retard", "schizo", and my personal un-favourite "psycho" - and it's very clear why avoiding them is a good thing. Likewise I aim to avoid casually using words like "insane" which have a clear clinical meaning.

"Crazy", to me, feels much less clinical, much less targeted, and much more vernacular. And...

Hmm, let me back out a bit. What I'm having trouble with is, I regularly need to be able to describe:

a) the way one's feelings/emotions get when one is all confused/stressy/turmoil-y/all mixed up, and

b) the way people sometimes act either:
i) apparently-from-my-POV irrationally (which may not be actually-from-their-POV irrationally), or
ii) hyper'rationally' without apparent-to-me regard to ethics, morals, empathy, etc

And "crazy" in current vernacular covers those, and I haven't been able to think of other words/terms that cover any and/or all of them. (NB: I am totally open to suggestions here!)

[Fun story time from my teens! So sixth form (aka Year <counts> 12) was super-stressful. At one point I commented to my best friend that it felt like I was going to have a nervous breakdown, and she was annoyed because I shouldn't joke about such things. (My point of view was that joking about it was one of the few things keeping it from actually happening; seriously I was super-stressed.) Not overly long later we were up on the balcony outside out maths class and she made some comment about jumping off, then was annoyed that I took her seriously and told a teacher, when it was 'obviously' just a joke. (My point of view was that, given that she was super-stressed too and various other things I knew about how she was coping with said stress, actually it wasn't anywhere near that obvious that it was a joke.) --Okay, look, I had a point when I started writing this parenthetical. I think it's that, at least for myself, I wasn't clinically depressed or clinically insane or clinically anything except a teenager dealing with stuff that was hard to cope with. But there need to be words that someone can use to express the nggh, the head-inside-outy, the argh!!! kind of feelings that just go along, sometimes, with being human. Because if you can't express what you're feeling then you just feel worse and that's not good for anyone.]

So I would like to be able to draw a dividing line and say, "Look, world! I'm using "crazy" to cover non-clinical craziness only, because the word seems appropriate for someone with good mental health who is nevertheless feeling/acting crazily/in ways that promote evil despite their good intention pavingstones; whereas it doesn't seem appropriate for someone who has schizophrenia who is being a sensible and decent human being."

At the same time I recognise that my personal definitions don't actually mitigate any hurt or harm that my use of the word may cause.

So.

??? <flounder> <flail> Thoughts, suggestions?

Comments

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I can't provide any experience, because I have exactly the same problem. I keep trying to find words that mean what I mean by 'crazy' but without the ableist implicatoins (and that aren't just a synonym, like "insane" or "nuts"), and failing.

(I also am unsure whether it's appropriate or minimizing for me to use 'crazy' to explain the way I feel when I have a panic attack. I mean, it is a mental/psychological disorder, and one that I really have been diagnosed with and am under treatment for. But I'm not sure if that's, err... bad enough, if you know what I mean.)

[zeborah]

I obviously can't speak for anyone else, but if it fits the way you feel then that would seem appropriate to me; I think that the concept of "bad enough" is... Hm, I think it comes from and reinforces the either/or dichotomy that Brooks points out I fell into. I think that if it feels bad then it's bad enough.

But then someone saying "It drives me crazy when those kids ride their bikes through my petunias" might say it feels bad too.

And then there's all the area in between.

Life Is More Complicated Than That: film at eleven.

[brooksmoses]

Some reactions, sort of jumbled.

First off, there's a difference between "you shouldn't joke about that; it's offensive" and "you shouldn't joke abou that; someone might take you seriously". If taking a joke of the sorts you mention seriously -- in the sense of checking out whether the person is serious (about jumping off a balcony, or having a nervous breakdown) and taking appropriate precautions about the possibility -- is a problem, then it's not an appropriate joke. But it sounds like it would have been fine if she'd taken you seriously about having a nervous breakdown.

A difference between using "crazy" in this sense and using "lame" in the usual, recognized-by-many-people-as-ablist sense is that "lame" in the problematic sense is a metaphor. And that, I think, is where a lot of the problematic nature of it comes from -- it's using the word to mean "something bad" for a fairly generic sort of bad, and in particular for things that are not literally lame. By doing so, it's associating a new meaning with the word, which then by association adds connotations to the original meaning. Using "crazy" to mean a lesser state of mental illogicality and non-sensibility is still using it for the original meaning, and thus isn't associating something new with it. So, while it might be problematic, I think it's a very different sort of problematic.

Beyond that, there's another entirely different problem that I see, which you seem to be stumbling over here in trying to back away from possibly misusing "crazy". And that's drawing this hard line at "clinical" and implying that if it's not clinical, it doesn't count. At least with depression, which I've got a bit of familiarity with, I've seen that idea cause damage, both from inside ("I may be a bit depressed, but I'm nowhere near clinical, so I can ignore it." [It was not, in that case, actually subclinical. --Ed.]) and from outside ("You're not really depressed, so buck up and deal with it."). It's important to recognize that there's a difference between one end of the continuum and the other, but it's also important to recognize the continuum -- and that, as someone who isn't the person in question, you have no idea if their depression or craziness or whatever is clinical or not unless they've told you.

Anyway, I've always understood the word to literally (not metaphorically) refer to the whole range of stuff. I can see the reason for concern, but (at my current level of understanding) I don't think the concern is ultimately the right answer.

[brooksmoses]

Hmm. Thinking about it a bit more, I think "lame" may be a good parallel. If you get a cramp in the arch of your foot and are limping around, you are lame. Only a little bit lame, and only temporarily, and if the need came to it, you could run just fine with some ignorable pain -- and that's very definitely different in a lot of remarkable ways from having a permanent lameness that caused you to be unable to safely run no matter the reason -- but you're still, quite literally, a little bit lame at the moment.

I would posit that, as a teenager "just dealing with stuff that was hard to cope with", you were quite likely literally a little bit crazy. In a way that was remarkably different from a permanent craziness unconnected to outside stimulus and causes, but also with the same sort of similarities that a foot cramp has to a defective hip, and still literally a little bit crazy at that moment.

[zeborah]

Thanks, that's a useful analogy. And you're right, as a teenager I probably was a bit. So that probably covers large chunks of my sense a), at least.

Just it doesn't cover the kids-riding-in-petunia problem I mentioned in response to coraa, and doesn't cover sense b). And level-of-concern is something I'm still trying to gauge. More thinking required.

[sciamanna.livejournal.com]

About "lame". Thing is, I'm sure you're right and it's often used to mean "bad" in a rather generic sense, but to me (when I read it, or when I'm tempted to use it) it's more specific. A "lame" joke or a "lame" excuse doesn't stand up, doesn't get anywhere without falling over. If you see what I mean.

It's quite possible it's just the way I tend to be aware of the literal meaning of words even when they're used figuratively (or of the "original" meaning even when they now mean something else, assuming I'm aware of it) -- something to do with the fact that I'm a bit of a language freak.

I don't think this makes it ok, but I do feel constrained when I have a metaphor that seems apposite and I can't use it... (By which I mean, "won't use it because I don't want to offend people", not "the PC police will come knocking at my door in the middle of the night").

[zeborah]

Most of the time I'm not aware of the literal meaning of "lame". --Starting to be more aware now, but it still passes me by easily; language is slippery like that.

"Lame" as generic-bad is easy for me to avoid; I can just plop in "pathetic" instead. Other words are less tractable. I think it's worth the effort because I don't want to either offend or hurt people or contribute to prejudice; and besides, it's only effort, and getting better at using language is good for me; but, well, yeah.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

if it's not clinical, it doesn't count

That struck a note with me. Depression comes in a wide range of shapes and sizes, and for many people - including myself - it has to get really bad before they recognise it's there at all. I mean, I had a job, I had fun, I had hobbies... and I also had depression.

I think it is in general incredibly difficult to convey the nuances of one's own problems to others, even to people who have broad experience with depression/anxiety. I'm in a situation where certain courses of action would seem rational on paper; but a) I have further information that I have not shared which would make them less rational, and b) they would be major triggers for me, and I think it's important for me to try and maintain my mental health and not to voluntarily descend into a situation that would trigger major mental health problems if I can avoid them.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to agree with booksmoses about the meaning of "crazy". Using it to describe wild or erratic behaviour is simply exaggerating for effect. It isn't adding a derogatory meaning onto a word that should be used for a different condition. Besides, it already has alternative meanings that are still in use, as in "crazy paving" or the surface of a glazed tile being "crazed".

There is also the added factor that US and UK English speakers don't seem to use the word in quite the same way. To me "crazy" would be a very offensive term to use of someone who is genuinely suffering from mental health problems. This differntiates it from "lame" which is the correct term to describe someone (or more usually a horse) who has an altered gait due to pain or stiffness. (As it happens I'm currently slightly lame due to walking too far on Sunday!)

In fact to me (as a British English speaker), you seem to have the problem the wrong way around. "Crazy" is a pretty mild word and would be absolutely fine to use in a colloquial way for example the chaos of the first day of a big sale, eg "Heavens! People are going crazy out there grabbing bargains!" or "There are some crazy drivers on the roads today!" However, it would be totally unacceptable to use "crazy" of someone showing serious signs of stress and phrases like "displaying erratic behaviour" would be the acceptable way of putting it.

[zeborah]

<nods> Your usage seems to fit with mine, then. At the same time, I live on the Internet, so I'm not just speaking to New Zealanders or to UKers, I'm also speaking to USans, so I think I should avoid saying things that would be predictably offensive to USans just like I think they should avoid saying things that would be predictably offensive to UKers. (And to NZers, but most of the time NZers are happy if someone just remembers we exist... :-) )

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

I'm also speaking to USans, so I think I should avoid saying things that would be predictably offensive to USans

Indeed. That is the courteous thing to do, though it's not easy to draw the line between the point where courtesy ends and bowing to cultural imperialism begins.

just like I think they should avoid saying things that would be predictably offensive to UKers.

Yes, well. If only they would! We had that fight on rasfc. :(

I think a lot of the problems come about due to register. We have formal Englishes that are used for international conferences, academic papers etc, and the sort of terms that give inadvertent offence wouldn't be appropriate when using that language, but the Net throws the colloquial Englishes together and the result is sometimes uncomfortable.

[painoarvokas.livejournal.com]

First, I should freely admit that I do not know what "ablist" language is, apart from what I can infer from the label, and I don't particularly want to find out. That said...

I have cerebral palsy (CP). It's a mild form, so it's not visible to most people at all in the way I move, but it affects my life every day. It is a part of my identity – I. Have. CP. The same way that I. Have. A. Master's. Degree. The same way that I. Am. Male. I have had this condition all my life – it was probably caused by problems in my birth.

When I was in my teens, a new word appeared for the concept that "lame" denotes in its non-literal meaning. Suddenly, if you previously were lame, you were "CP". If you did something others didn't thin was cool, it was "CP".

So yeah, I can certainly understand the problem with "insane", "schitzo" and similar words. And like you, I don't see a similar problem with "crazy". Someone's self-identity[*] might include insanity or schitzophrenia. I could be wrong, of course, but I don't see anybody having "crazy" as their self-identity, except in the ironic sense (which I share).

[*] I might just as well include in "self-identity" the identity of the person as perceived by people whose own identity includes their identity. Spouses, children, parents.

[zeborah]

<nods> Useful thoughts, thank you.

[painoarvokas.livejournal.com]

And siblings. Mustn't forget siblings, though I often do, not having any.

Anyway...

There's another side of the coin that I missed earlier, that I was reminded of when reading the other discussion.

My comment, above, deals with the problem of (unintentionally) insulting someone who has CP by using CP as a derogatory label. The flip side is applying a derogatory label like CP to someone who isn't. "You're CP" is making an assertion that the "you" has a neurological disorder that often makes them, literally, lame, and often puts them into the wheelchair. When the "you" is actually an able-bodied youth... But there's still a difference – the former insults the disabled, the latter doesn't (except by referring to the former).

I think I had a point here, but I can't remember what it was.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Trying not to trigger your "PC" response here . . .

I think there's a level where, as writers, we are obligated to use words the way our characters would use them. If I have a racist character, he/she/it is liable to use racist language. I know that "gook" is an offensive term, but it *is* the term likely to be used by a soldier just back from Vietnam in the 1970s.

So yes, "crazy" is a vernacular term and would be appropriate for the speech and thoughts of particular characters. Characters are not their authors, and character speech and actions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Management.

[zeborah]

Well, yes. But even so, there's still two things:

a) The writer needs to know what language *is* racist/ablist and what language isn't, so that he/she can put it in the mouth of racist/ablist characters but not in the mouth of non-racist/ablist characters.

b) Sometimes the writer is writing in his/her/my own character, and would like to use language that won't cause other people to think I'm racist/ablist. So it'd be useful to know what language I can use for the meanings I'm likely to need it for which won't cause them to think that.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

For your own use, rather than a character's, I'd suggest that you need to define the difference between "crazy" and "insane." To me, the former has more of the flavor of irrational rather than of mental illness.

[elorie.livejournal.com]

I've had this exact conversation with people. The thing is, "crazy" actually means irrational, and pre-dates the recognition of mental disorders. I use the word to mean what it means, wild or irrational behavior.

I don't use it to mean mental health problems. If I know or suspect someone has them, I say that. If I must, since I don't generally discuss other people's personal business anyway. But sometimes...you have to figure out whether someone has a serious problem that is causing them to behave a certain way, or they are just an asshole. (And if it's hard to tell the difference, how you feel about that.) I also don't use clinical terms to mean merely wild or irrational. Making a sharp distinction between those two things does seem important to me, but putting "crazy" over with the actual mental health problems strikes me as a bad idea. For one, it leaves you without an appropriate word to describe certain human states, as you mentioned. It also muddles things a different way. Not everyone who *has* a mental disorder acts "crazy." Depressives, for example, are often pretty calm. But you wouldn't want to miss or misapprehend the signs that your friend was genuinely depressed.

[zeborah]

<nods thoughtfully> Thanks. The thing is that I have heard various different people in various different contexts express personal discomfort with the word, so. Ng. Feels like something I don't want to ignore, even though I can't figure out what to do about it yet. Anyway, I'll keep pondering, and the various aspects you bring up are useful fodder for that pondering.

[annafdd.livejournal.com]

I'll just note that it's generally not wise to "rat out" somebody who might have suicidal ideation. At least, it is really the extrema ratio. This is because they might well not trust you enough to confide further, possibly more serious ideation later on if it turns out to be a false alarm.

I've heard professional helpline personnel even say that you should not disclose an attempted suicide without the involved person's consent even if this means not being able to avoid it. This is partly because they recognize that anybody has a right to take their own life, no matter how misguides a decision, and partly because in the long run, they want to preserve the trust of the people who call for help, and this means preserving confidentiality at all costs.

Of course when it's a friend the issue is vastly different.

[zeborah]

That's... advice I could probably cope with following as an adult even if worst came to worst. I don't know if I necessarily would, but I probably could. I certainly see the value of it for helplines.

As a teenager, when a large chunk of my stress was already coming from feeling that I had to preserve friends' confidentiality so strictly that I couldn't even tell my parents why I was so stressed, it would have been really bad advice for me to hear. (Even leaving aside the worst case scenario, if I had followed it and a friend had killed herself as what-I'd-have-perceived-as a result, which would have had a disastrous effect on me.) So I couldn't ever recommend that advice for kids or teenagers. "Don't go blabbing all over school," sure, and maybe "Be careful about which teacher you tell." But not in a thousand years "Preserve confidentiality at all costs". People may have the right to take their own life, but that right doesn't abrogate their friends' right to -- and here I use the word advisedly -- their sanity.

--Sorry. Obviously I still have strong feelings on the matter. :-/

[annafdd.livejournal.com]

And that is why killing yourself is a shitty thing to do to your friends. Something often teenagers don't appreciate, but it remains true.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I *like* the word crazy, it's such a succinct word that adds a distinct flavor to whatever you're trying to describe with it: "it was crazy busy", "it had a crazy pattern", "I was running around like crazy", etc. I think about my own use of it and usually I mean it mostly in the sense of something that defies anticipation of behavior in a way that doesn't have apparent logic to it, with connotation of a sort of frenetic activity attached.

And yes, sometimes that includes people. I guess when I apply the word to people it's more out of a sense of "I totally can't follow where they're coming" as opposed to "there is something wrong with them that makes them less worthy than I" -- ie, it's a subjective qualitative valuation based on the extent to which the logic that drives their world apparently overlaps that which drives my own. By that definition, fundamentalist religious types are all crazy, and that works for me. Conversely, someone who is depressed, suicidal, etc., isn't crazy because, dammit, I've walked those paths myself and I understand how someone can be there.

I think there's a big gray area between clearly-offensive language and clearly-non-offensive language*, and "crazy" is right in there. As writers I think we have to assume that each and every one of our readers will interpret our words in a slightly different way, including potentially reading offense into something where the intent was otherwise, and either avoid words we know are loaded or use them with very deliberate care with that in mind. As readers, I think we also have to recognize that our own interpretation does not necessarily map precisely to the writer's intent, and that, lacking any further evidence to either clear or damn them, give them the benefit of the doubt.

(*if there is such a thing anymore.)

[zeborah]

<nods> It's just that sometimes it's not a matter of choosing to be offended vs choosing to give the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps even "mostly". Sometimes you see a word and it just kicks you in the gut before analysis has a chance to step in and put up a shield.

I've certainly never seen anyone damn anyone over the use of the word. They've just said things that convey a general "I *know* your intent was good, but despite your intent the word is still hurtful and/or fosters attitudes that tend to increase prejudice."

There's definitely a large area of fuzziness, and "crazy" isn't clear-cut offensive in the way that some words are. But it's also not clear-cut in the way that "purple" and "happy" and "extroverted" are. So. Dunno. I'm not going to say it *is* clearly offensive and to be avoided; but I don't feel comfortable deciding that it's clearly non-hurtful and that I can use it freely. I feel it's still somewhere in the fuzzy area.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

Yeah. On some level, though, as a human being living in an interactive society not made of like-thinking clones, you have to own your own reactions to things. I think there's huge good that comes from unmasking and making more people consciously aware of clear-cut hurtful language -- "retard" was an earlier example given -- and challenging people to think about how their biases consciously or unconsciously manifest themselves in our language and behavior, but I think there's also a point where we can undermine that genuine effort by getting too silly about it all. I don't think anyone can live up to an ideal where nothing they say is offensive to anyone at all short of never speaking, and then they'll just offend someone for being too quiet. You do the best you can, you listen with an open mind when someone is bothered (if they approach you about it respectfully) and you go forward from each of those learning moments again trying to do the best you can, which may or may not be substantively different from how you behaved/spoke before that interchange. If you're not entirely comfortable with a word's potential subtext, use it judiciously when you're certain the context clarifies as best as able the intent of its use. I don't know that anyone can ask more than that of us and expect satisfaction.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

For example, recently, someone got totally up in arms pissed off at me on a forum I was participating in (this forum was all US native english speakers) because I used a couple of words she didn't know, which she interpreted as an intentional slam on her intelligence.

So which is the greater offense: using my normal speaking vocabulary on the assumption that other people's vocabularies are similar enough to make me understandable, or assuming that other people are stupid and only using words of 3 or fewer syllables to suit the lowest common denominator? I know that when I come across a word I don't know, I see it as an opportunity, not a threat, but I am assured by a coworker that even that assumption of a general interest in learning new things is an Intellectual Bias and not, in fact, a reasonable assumption you can make about people in general.

There's just no winning sometimes.

[zeborah]

I've been slammed for using Clever Words too, sometimes, and I don't think the situations are at all parallel. I also don't think it's about winning. If it was about winning then I could use whatever language I felt like because, face it, I'm white, decently middle-class, of majority religion, healthy, most likely employed for the foreseeable future, and so forth; if someone takes offense at a few words, what's that to me? I can surround myself without any trouble at all with people who won't care in the slightest, and bam, I win.

I don't want to win like that. I want to avoid hurting people by doing things that could predictably hurt them.

I'm still going to hurt people by doing things that I didn't predict would hurt them. And I'm going to offend people by doing things that *no-one* could have predicted. And sometimes, yes, there are people who will take offense at things that, really, one can only roll one's eyes at. I don't lose sleep about having regularly offended a certain poster on rasfc who was eg a) offended when I assumed a certain level of scientific knowledge and b) offended when I didn't assume a certain level of scientific knowledge. There simply *was* no way to please her except maybe to catch her on a good day.

But when I've seen enough data about people's reactions to things that I *can* start to predict "This word may well cause some hurt to some people" and especially when that includes people who have given me reason to respect their opinions and feelings -- when I can predict potential problems, I also want to think ahead about potential solutions.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

Well, by "winning" I meant "being able to consistently express yourself in such a way that absolutely nobody can find reason for offense." In that sense, my analogy was apt: there are people just looking for reasons to take offense for its own sake. There were, I believe, several rasfc posters who seemed to fall regularly into that category.

[I'd also argue that surrounding oneself with insensitive, uncaring people automatically falls into the category of "lose", unless one's goal is to be one of those sorts of people -- in which case this sort of discussion would not be taking place at all.]

I'm just saying you do the best you can, learn to be better when the opportunity presents itself, assume you'll make the occasional complete gaffe that horrifies you for months or years afterwards (because we all do, even when we're trying very hard not to) and when you hit a gray area where you're not sure which is the right way to go, trust your instincts. Sure, you could be wrong, but then you get another chance to learn.

As humans the one thing we all have in common is that none of us are perfect. I'd like to hope that being the sort of person who wants to do and be better than we are should lend us a certain camaraderie with others of the same inclination, and that with that comes a certain benefit-of-the-doubt and willingness to exchange ideas and viewpoints, with the assumption that we all have something to learn from each other.

[zeborah]

I definitely agree that none of us are perfect and it's all a big learning process. But I'm in a stage of my learning process where I want to learn more about when/where "crazy" may be particularly likely to hurt and about possible linguistic alternatives so that in those situations I can still express myself rather than risk hurting people. So it makes no sense for me to decide not to worry about "crazy" because we're all just learning; this is *part* of my learning process, so not thinking about it would be to *not* learn.

Note all the first-person pronouns! I'm not aiming to foist linguistic worries on anyone else; this is something I personally want to work on.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

Fair 'nuff.

I think I've just had a few too many run-ins with people for whom the dialogue about any potential subtext of a given word/phrase consists of "I told you it's bad, you can't possibly understand why it's bad because you're not me so you're not entitled to any sort of explanation or discussion, just apologize and admit you're an evil *ist and never, ever do it again, full stop." While some terms are Very Obviously Bad to anyone who hasn't had their head stuck in an ant-hill for the last fifty years, I think I've become a bit defensive of my right to try to find (and adjust as necessary) my own footing in the gray areas as a result.

So anyway, I may be looking at this at a different level of specificity than intended. It's also fair to say that I've been drinking NyQuil by the gallon the last two days so my brain (and my ability to express myself with clarity) is a bit wonkier than usual. (-:

[zeborah]

We've had different experiences:

<side-track follows, intended for informational here's-another-perspective purposes only; feel free to ignore and skip to the bottom of my comment for what I really intended with my original post>

Most of my run-ins are with people who say "I don't care what you think X means. It means what I say it means regardless of decades/centuries of cultural baggage, and you're just being oversensitive and need to touchen up, because I'm going to be brave and strong against the relentless tide of political correctness oppressing me!"

I have seen people refuse to explain, mostly in exasperation: because even if everyone who asked for an explanation listened to it, if 10,000 are asking for explanations and only 10 are available to give them, then those 10 people are going to get pretty darn sick of giving explanations pretty darn quickly.

In another field: the best discussion of rape I've ever been in drew thousands of comments. But even so, dozens-hundreds of those were men asking for an explanation, even though the explanation was already there earlier on in the comment thread. And okay, it was a long comment thread, so why should they waste their time searching? But then, why should they waste *our* time by asking us questions that we'd already answered?

When our culture systematically disadvantages a group of people, one of the ways that disadvantage manifests is that the advantaged group can say to the disadvantaged group "I don't have time to educate myself; if you want me to treat you better, you have to take the time to educate me."

This is not to say that the conversations you were in involved people explicitly or even implicitly saying such a thing. Just that the people who were refusing to explain have probably had their time wasted a lot in the past by that kind of thing, so now they're tired and cranky and wish people would just google it.

And maybe if they were *nicer* then people would listen to them -- but a) why should someone have to be nice about the fact that they're being systematically hurt and disadvantaged by a culture? and b) actually it turns out that being nicer doesn't make people listen to you more. Trufax. Because other people will ask you to be nicer yet, and other people will ask you to be nicer yet, and so forth until you're so nice you're silent.

<end side-track>

Anyway, what my original post was about was: So this word, right, I'm getting less comfortable about my personal usage of it, so I'm looking for a) more ideas about how it's used/understood and any potential problems; b) ideas about how, if I decide I want to stop using it, I could use other language to fill in the gaps.

"driving me crazy" -> "driving me up the wall" kind of thing. Think about it as a language game, if that helps, like writing a novel without the letter e. The reasons are quite different but, y'know. Still should be feasible.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

one of the ways that disadvantage manifests is that the advantaged group can say to the disadvantaged group "I don't have time to educate myself; if you want me to treat you better, you have to take the time to educate me."

This made me realise why we probably have different attitudes to this issue. As a teen, even though my friends at school had taunted me for "talking posh", I had to change the way I spoke, I had to lose my native Manchester accent and a whole swathe of vocabulary to fit in at university.

In Britain in the 60s/early 70s, it wasn't a case of "you have to take the time to educate me" it was "you have to change or you'll get nowhere."

So now, to put it bluntly, I'm not prepared to change again to fit in with how a dominant culture thinks I should speak. Of course I'll monitor my speech and writing for language that might cause offence here in my native culture. I will also listen to people from other non-US cultures and consider carefully what they say about the words I use, but I'm not going to change because a couple of people in the US say that a word I'm using has upset them. After explaining my viewpoint, I would rather withdraw from the discussion and, if possible, ensure that they don't see anything I write, if necessary by defriending.

The thing is, if I don't defend British English it will be swallowed up by US English. Excessive courtesy is why Welsh is so fragile as a language. Sometimes you have to remind people that their attitudes and opinions are not the only thing that matter and that right and wrong is, sometimes, relative.

[zeborah]

I think British English is a lot more robust than that. Even New Zealand English isn't going to be swallowed up by US English. Of course it (and no doubt UK English) borrow things from US English, but it (and I strongly suspect UK English) is still diverging from US English a lot faster than it's borrowing.

That said, I do agree that US dominance of the anglophone internet is a problem. As a New Zealander, you can be pretty sure I've noticed that!

And I definitely see where you're coming from with having already changed the way you speak.

Only. The kinds of language I'm talking about, no *dominant* culture is saying we should change it. The dominant USan culture wants to keep on using "crazy" and "lame" and "gay" as derogatives without regard to anyone's feelings, just like the dominant UKan culture does and the dominant Kiwi culture does. The people who would like us to change are from communities that are, in their area of interest, very much non-dominant. Yes, some of the individuals are USans -- and in fact the ones we're most likely to hear from are USans, because of the USan dominance of the anglophone internet. But I hear similar sentiments from UKans and Australians and New Zealanders as well. So it's more complicated than just resisting a dominant culture.

This doesn't mean you must therefore change. Again, I do absolutely see that you've already been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.

Which is even on top of what I said earlier about not aiming to tell anyone that they should be engaging in these particular linguistic worries. This post is and always has been about me-me-me and how *I* want to change *my* language. [Argh, this is getting long, but it's past 11pm and there's stuff I want to communicate and I don't have time to tweak it so it's clear it's all friendly and stuff. So: this is all friendly and stuff, okay?] So when people [which I'm not using as a code for you-singular, it's people-in-general, and even then I'm not wanting anyone to feel bad; this is a very minor agravation in the scheme of things] --So, when people argue with my post, it feels like they're arguing with my personal decision, like they're telling me that they don't want to change and therefore I'm not allowed to change. Which is like...

...analogies are dangerous so please understand that I mean this with all respect and with absolute understanding that the analogy (like all analogies) is imperfect and that in a tremendous number of ways the situations are vastly not alike. But...

You once decided to change the way you spoke, and your friends evidently made a different decision and taunted your decision. Now I'm working to change the way I speak, other people are drawing their lines in different places, and obviously no-one's taunting me! but there is some pressure coming at me not to change.

(Which is counterproductive! My warning about PCness should have been more specific: when people tell me I'm being Too Careful I just become all the more certain I'm on the right track. :-) Now, when someone tells me my Too-Carefulness is in itself offensive and shows I've fundamentally missed a point, that's different. But I digress.)

My point being: I've made a decision. Other people have made other decisions. I respect those other decisions, and all I'm asking for is for my friends to respect my decision too, and to help me with it if they can (eg by suggesting alternative phrasings) or if, for whatever great or trivial reason they can't, to at least not, by arguing with it, hinder me.

[zanzjan.livejournal.com]

I != my culture, however. There are some ways in which I can check off "dominant culture" boxes -- I'm white, I'm middle-class, etc. -- and ways in which I can check off "other" boxes -- I'm female, I'm not of a majority religion or sexual orientation, etc. I don't think it should be a contest about who is most disenfranchised, because almost everybody is in some way or another and trying to find common ground to understand one another and meet each other's needs in a way that improves ALL our lives and futures is something that only benefits our culture as a whole. It may very well be that I have an unrealistically idealized view of how we as a civilization should function and self-heal.

actually it turns out that being nicer doesn't make people listen to you more

It does with me.

And yes, I've run into people like you describe above as well -- too many. What IMHO works best is the middle ground between the two extremes, with dialogue, which is what I've tried to advocate in my comments thus far. I'd interpreted your original post as "here's this word, I think of it as being benign, but someone told me otherwise and now I'm not sure what to do" -- and it goes back to comfort level as dictated by the information and feedback you have at hand. If you're not comfortable with it, then you're right to seek out more information and/or alternatives.

Anyhow, I don't think we disagree, just have a mismatch in approaches to this particular conversation. Which, since it's yours, means I missed the intent, so I'll shut up now.

[painoarvokas.livejournal.com]

someone got totally up in arms pissed off at me on a forum I was participating in (this forum was all US native english speakers) because I used a couple of words she didn't know, which she interpreted as an intentional slam on her intelligence

Some years back I was dating a woman who took my normal manner of speaking as an insult to her. According to her, my use of complex vocabulary was my way of asserting my superiority over her. Needless to say – and there were other problems in that relationship – we went our separate ways.

My perspective, as I tried to explain to her, was that I honored her by assuming that she knows the words I used and, if she didn't know one, was capable of learning it. To me, the use of my normal speech, was my way of *rejecting* any superiority I might have over her. She was not convinced. And that experience has made me more wary of becoming too friendly with non-academic people, which probably is a shame.

(I should note that I did not do it deliberately. My explanation above was a result of self-reflection after she made an issue out of it.)

[zeborah]

Hmm. I would react badly to the explanation you used. It reminds me too much of A Certain Rasfcian who showed his respect for fellow rasfcians by engaging in non-consensual debates with them against their express wishes. And it's not strictly true: if you were *honouring* her, it would require a special mode of speaking, not just your normal mode.

So I'd much prefer a simple "This is how I speak to everyone, it's got nothing to do with superiority." But then I wouldn't have objected to your way of speaking in the first pace. And also I'm not your girlfriend. :-)

[painoarvokas.livejournal.com]

I don't recall the specifics very well any more, but I think I tried "this is how I speak to everyone" first. Didn't work. And it didn't matter in the end – it was doomed, anyway.

Thank you for sharing your reaction, though. I might quibble a bit about the details, but it wouldn't change the main point. It's good to hear once in a while that one is an ass, especially if it's in a way not previously self-realized. :)

[zeborah]

Oh, it's not really that you're an ass(1), just that I'd react badly to it. :-) I'm aware that That Certain Rasfcian has made me more sensitive than I'd otherwise be to certain things, so -- while I'd still let my resulting sensitivity be a guide in being warier to trust strangers who say such things -- I'd avoid letting it interfere with my relationship with someone I already trust.

(1) In fact the primary way I know you're not an ass is because you don't get defensive about being told of other interpretations of things like this.

[painoarvokas.livejournal.com]

I will gladly accept your judgment that one can be a non-ass by realizing one's assitude. *ducks* *runs*

More seriously, I believe I was an ass in that relationship in more than one way, and in particular in other ways than here described.

And, finally, thanks :)