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Comment by vorpalhex | Hacker News Reader

As Greenwald points out, these journalists work at major outlets and have huge followings which they can use - and have used - to shut down speech.

Cancel culture is real and we must not allow it to be tolerated. I've been told that I'm "problematic" and should reconsider blogging... because I recommended a $40 pair of hair shears.

Greenwald is being a bit melodramatic, but his substance isn't wrong. A reporter lied and attempted to slam a public figure - and if it wasn't for that conversation being widely heard she likely would of seriously harmed his reputation with her lie.

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> “We can stay retarded longer than you can stay solvent.” ... has vast complexity?

It’s good, and better if you’re baked out of your gourd. But a tad melodramatic.

> A reporter lied and attempted to slam a public figure

That... seems kinda spun. The source material isn't so damning. Taylor Lorenz was on the call, and tweeted:

"@pmarca just openly using the r-slur on Clubhouse tonight and not one other person in the room called him on it or saying anything"

Then later when she was corrected that it wasn't Andreessen but someone else, replied:

"Thanks for clarifying that it was Felicia saying that word, rather than Marc as many in the room heard it. I hope you can understand how some people in the room felt hearing it"

I mean, as I (someone who reads and values Lorenz's work) read it, she was offended (more, it seems, at the casual use of "retarded" going unchallenged than at the specific speaker), and tweeted about it, but made a mistake in attribution which she recognized (while pointing out that her original offense was that the word wasn't challenged).

And Greenwald wrote like 1000 words to go after her. And his essay, not her tweet, is at the top of HN right now.

So... who's cancelling who here?

Retarded is not a slur. Never was. People keep picking arbitrary words and saying they're "offensive", but there's no reason why. I have heard kids call each other "mentally challenged" and "developmentally delayed", I kid you not. Younger kids have trouble pronouncing those, so maybe that's something? Anyway, I refuse to partake in the euphemism treadmill.

I found it ironic that in screenshot it says both "r-word" and "DeepFuckingValue". Zeitgeist, i guess.

Retarded can definitely be used as a slur. And, in general, you don’t need to be offended for a word to be offensive to others.

I was at some point describing a friend and used the word "gypsy". Another friend got very upset at me and went on a long rant about how the word is offensive and wrong and I should be ashamed for using it.

I used gypsy because it's the title the person I was describing used. It's how they asked to be referred to, and as it's their literal blood heritage, I'm going to refer to them however they want to be referred to.

This happens today with words like "transsexual" - there are people very offended by that phrase and there are people who self-label using that phrase and want to be called that.

If we as a species are going to continue down a path of globalization where we have a lot of different cultures and communities around us, we're going to have to understand a word is not verboten universally. There's a difference between someone not wanting to be called retarded and taking offense anytime the word itself is used - even in non-derogatory contexts.

My Midwestern upbringing was certainly peppered with people using ‘retard’ as a slur, so... mileage may vary?

I think the idea is that a slur is a much stronger insult typically aimed at one's ethnicity.

What's being said here is that the word retard is an insult, but does not rise to the level/strength of a slur.

Feels like you’re cutting that a bit thin.

In any case, my experience (and - probably - the context of my cultural upbringing) was that the word was used to both denigrate people with developmental disabilities and to degrade those who did not. This wasn’t calling someone a “loser”. This was using an immutable characteristic of someone’s personhood against them and attacking others by asserting a resemblance.

Wait I’m misunderstand you, right? Reading your comment it almost seems like yours saying that the r word isn’t a slur or isn’t that bad of one?! It’s a word that takes a whole class of people and uses them as an insult when talking about other people.

Are you seriously going to try to pull some narrow technical originalist definition to argue that in this specific edition of this specific dictionary it defines “slur” as being about ethnicity and thus that word can’t be a “slur” bc it effects a class of people that isn’t a specific ethnicity?

I think it lessons other, more hurtful, words that are used as slurs.

Look, we should be polite and not use offensive words, but be consistent. The referenced word is rude and offensive but in no way the same room as words that have resulted in lynching, genocide, systematic oppression.

If we want to go all polite and ban all “slurs” then we’ll be getting butthurt over calling someone “stupid” or “idiot.” And of course I’ve worked with people who are upset at any foul language and even blasphemy.

Are we going to get to a point that major reporters are thinking it’s attention worthy to say someone says “Goddammit?”

Arguing over whether that’s as offensive as another word just a matter of time and we are experiencing a slippery slope.

Either we’re going to get offended by everything and live in China/Disneyworld where there’s never offense, or we’re going to stop getting hysterical over unimportant things and use that attention to fight real, difficult, systematic problems.

Under your definition the word cripple would also be a slur.

When we get to that point, we've lost the forest for the trees.

You could say the same for any pejorative, imagine if xyz was a treated as a slur, we’d have lost the forest for the trees.

And yes, if you said “don’t be a cripple” to your friend and a guy physical disability overheard it, how do you think that would make them feel? Why would you want to arbitrarily hurt someone, twisting a verbal knife, just to razz your friend.

If retarded is a slur, then so is moron, idiot, imbecile, cretin and other past accepted medical terminology for the cognitively disabled that were adopted by the public as slurs. If you look up the history, "mentally retarded" was itself coined to escape the negative connotations of those previous terms. It's unfortunate but inevitable that referents to the cognitively disabled will continue to be abused, no matter what they are.

This is exactly the point I'm trying to make; thanks for articulating it well. Idiot was a clinical designation for those with IQs between 0 and 25; imbecile, 26 to 50; and moron, 51 to 70. Stupid originated to refer to retarded people, too. And yet, these words are benign enough for kids to use. Why are these somehow "less offensive" than retard? I use it the same way I would any of the former, and have ever since I was a schoolboy. It doesn't carry any more sting than those others, and is most definitely not a slur.

'mint2: I can't reply to your post, but despite the 'ThrowawayR2 account name, his account is five years old with four thousand points. Ironically, the only way in which he could pacify you is to create a new account and post from that instead.

His account is literally named throw away “r2” in a thread where people are talking about “the r word”. I made the mistake of assuming that account is a throwaway... did you notice what his account was named?

While what you say about the account is true, it’s literally called a throw away. Even with the age, it’s questionable whether it’s an alt account. But yes my bad. I was misled by the misleading name.

https://www.specialolympics.org/stories/impact/why-the-r-wor...

Because so many deny it’s a slur, before just defending how you feel about it, please read some material from the effected groups. https://www.specialolympics.org/stories/impact/why-the-r-wor...

The original context, FWIW, is that the /r/wallstreetbets community calls themselves "retards" ironically. That is absolutely a slur; calling someone "retarded" in that sense is calling them stupid by likening them to people with developmental disabilities. And that is offensive to a lot of people in the modern world. And, to be perfectly frank, that offense is exactly the reason why the WSB community adopted it in the first place. They wanted to be edgy, if it wasn't a slur they would have chosen a different term that was.

And according to Taylor Lorenz, by using the word "retard" in your reply, you are perpetuating this slander and showing yourself to be insensitive and ableist. If your defense of Ms Lorenz upthread was at all sincere, you should apologize for your use of this word and then delete your account.

I'm being obviously sarcastic, but I'm guessing the irony will be lost on you.

But they called _themselves_ retards, they're not insulting others. It's because they're aware that most of what they do is dumb gambling (with some occasional actual research thrown in) but they do it anyway.

Most definitely a slur, on the spectrum with “fag”. Special ed teachers are “tard wranglers”. Got that from one of my little ones.

I suspect “you retard” is stronger than “that’s retarded”.

Unlike various other slurs, the word has various valid uses apart from mental development so it’s not going away.

Are you kidding? 1 public figure, a freaking journalist, reads something and immediately decides they need to do a hot-take-cancel-op on a public figure they didn't like, libeling him in the process. Greenwald takes a much more measured approach, he writes a blog, like 1000 words, explaining his thoughts. There's a non-thinking person on one side and an articulate person on the other, and you want to denounce the articulate one?

Is it articulate to immediately compare your opponents to the stasi? Not really, its pretty bland and typical for internet name calling - writing more words doesn't make something high art.

It really doesn't seem accurate to characterize this blogpost as a measured approach. A few quotes that jumped out at me from just the first section:

> the Times’ tech team quickly donned their hall-monitor goggles and Stasi notebooks

> The little crew of tattletale millennials assembled by NBC — who refer to their twerpy work with the self-glorifying title of “working in the disinformation space”

> they clearly get aroused — find otherwise-elusive purpose — by destroying people’s reputations and lives

Those are clearly opinions at most, he's not claiming they're actual facts.

No one reads that and thinks "wow, these people are members of the actual Stasi? holy crap!"

You're giving way more than the benefit of the doubt here, if I had to guess I'd say you are doing it willfully. At least you acknowledge your bias so credit where credit is due I guess.

Accusing someone of saying something they didn't say is called "libel" or "slander" depending on the medium with which it is done. To call that out, publish it, and for people to enjoy that published work, that is a far cry away from having a stated mission to go after, expose and deplatform people sharing ideas you do not like. You use the word "cancelling" much more liberally than it's contemporary definition applies, I'd say you're stretching it beyond its elasticity in order to make an argument that doesn't exist to defend an indefensible act.

Her previous tweet "Try and block me now pmarca" makes it much harder to dismiss this as just an unfortunate mistake in attribution. In context it very much appears like as if she was looking for anything she could spin to portray Marc in a negative light.

She was completely wrong about who used the word (their voices aren't even similar), and left out critical details about the context in which it was used (it was not used casually - the person who said it was quoting /r/wallstreetbets).

And when confronted on it, she said 'thanks for clarifying' and doubled down on the lack of context. No 'whoops, I was wrong', no apology, no retraction.

What part of that sounds like good journalism to you?

... it's a tweet. I mean, the whole thing is screaming over detail that you wanted to hear in 280 characters when she was just being pissed off about something and talking about it in public.

Isn't exactly what you're doing -- which is to say condemning something for what in normal circumstances would be a mild transgression or simple misunderstanding, and drawing wild conclusions about the speaker that don't seem to be present in the original text -- exactly what the problem with "cancel culture" is supposed to be in the first place?

I mean, if you demand that Taylor Lorenz give Marc Andreessen the benefit of the doubt and assume good faith on his part, why are you not willing to grant the same to her?

I really think you need to read the article before you comment any further.

Mr Andreesen doesn't need anyone's benefit of doubt, because he didn't say what Ms Lorenz claimed. And even if he did, the use of the word "retard" was entirely appropriate in its descriptive context in that discussion. There is no reason to assume anything besides good faith on the part of the lady who actually did use the word.

Taylor Lorenz, on the other hand, was caught in a lie. Not a little lie, mind you, but a loud, public slander. When caught, she responded not with an apology, but rather another lie, some sanctimonious excuses, and then she ran and hid. Ms. Lorenz has given us no reason to assume good faith on her part here.

> ... it's a tweet. I mean, the whole thing is screaming over detail that you wanted to hear in 280 characters when she was just being pissed off about something and talking about it in public.

This is a lax standard that might be okay to hold for a 15-year-old child, but not for an adult Times journalist.

No, she didn't make a mistake. Taylor Lorenz lied in order to smear the guy, and her response to being caught was itself a lie, blaming another mysterious "male voice", when it was in fact a female.

As Greenwald pointed out, her recent reporting seems to indicate some sort of vendetta against Andreesen.

“ "Thanks for clarifying that it was Felicia saying that word, rather than Marc as many in the room heard it. I hope you can understand how some people in the room felt hearing it"

You do realize that this is not an acknowledgement of the mistake. It’s an attempt to deny the mistake and gaslight the person reporting it.

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