"Using a weapon gives your enemy explicit permission to use it against you." ~Me
I'd love to live in a world where we speak to the average most reasonable person in the room instead of the most sensitive, easily offended, and brittle person in the room. But that might be my age showing.
And that's the tension between the majority and the minority, an ageless tension.
This person proposes the OPPOSITE of a weapon. A constructive tool to disarm potential issues in the workplace to redirect focus to the task at hand is not a weapon. That you view it as such might be a flag for yourself to look at how you view workplace discussions.
You want it to be ok to STEAL the effectiveness/contributions of MARJINALIZED people from the company for irrelevant purposes. These people were not placed ( placed, these are not your friends who can choose to hear your funny quips, these are co-workers just trying to do their job) to work with you to give you opportunity to offend, they were placed there for a business purpose. Why do you want to STEAL potential contributions from the place you work while at the same time reducing quality/effectiveness instead of just being, you know, professional?
Your first paragraphs seem fine. Your second reiterates my last sentence. Your last paragraph seems unhinged. There's no need to yell or put plans in my mouth, that's just poor arguing.
Most tools never stay in their original places of use, they drift.
All the I see here is you complaining about shifting social mores. Toughen up.
Maybe if you weren't so "sensitive, easily offended, and brittle" then the notion of a window of acceptable social behavior, that changes over time, wouldn't be so radical and hurtful to you.
I had nothing to respond to, hence the lack of meaning.
Cares, like will bend over backwards to prevent any possible perceived insult? No, that's not reasonable. We don't need to revamp our language. Intent, not language, should be the focus. For example master and slave are perfectly fine terms for the relationship between pieces of hardware or software. No actual slave in this world would care. No actual person descended from slaves should care. If someone is truly insulted by language and not intent they need to grow up.
Cares, like makes reasonable accommodations, sure. That's what handicap parking places are about. That's why there's ramps on sidewalks in cities. That's why there's a push for accessibility in software for colour blind people.
Spoken like someone who's never had to hear a slur about them in a joke. "But I was just joking!" - oh, then it's okay?
Maybe the person using slurs should grow up? In the article, the author specifically discusses a case when a new hire used a pejorative.
Intent doesn't matter. What you say and do matters. "Well I just wanted to get home safe and to bed" isn't a good defense when you get into an accident while drunk driving.
"Personal argumentation on the internet is the bastion of the shallow." ~ Me
I cannot prove over this medium if I had experienced that or not. You cannot verify either way. Your use of this argument saddens me. You could have just left it out and strengthened your apparent position.
> Intent doesn't matter.
Mens Rea doesn't matter? There's more than a few hundred years and dozens of generations of judges and lawyers from around the world that would like to have a word with you.
If you believed what you're saying above, then why respond? Also, you don't need to quote yourself; you can just write the sentence.
> I cannot prove over this medium if I had experienced that or not. You cannot verify either way. Your use of this argument saddens me. You could have just left it out and strengthened your apparent position.
It was rhetorical. Someone who's actually experienced this doesn't take the attitude you're taking.
> Mens Rea doesn't matter? There's more than a few hundred years and dozens of generations of judges and lawyers from around the world that would like to have a word with you.
I'm talking about racist jokes and being a decent human being, not legal precedent.
Changing the language with good intentions isn't a problem if intent should be the focus instead of language.
What is not ok is demanding that people be mind-readers and pull the "good intent" out of the people's heads who use harmful language widely identified as unacceptable. Language changes over time, except for dead languages.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
> harmful language
No such thing.
The trick is always eschewing pareidolia.