My belief is that businesses don't like controversy unless it brings profit. Free speech at a university rarely brings profit. So people who want to run a university like a business are not likely to fight against calls to reduce free speech on campus.
And there have always been calls to reduce free speech on campus.
Or to repurpose your phrase, "When business and profits are your religion, anyone with moral conviction is your enemy and must be silenced."
"How many good men have put down"
See, that's the sort of sexist language that encourages knee-jerk reactions, and gets people like me labeled "PC". My wife deployed twice to Iraq. Don't you dare leave out all those women who have died for the US, including nearly 200 in Iraq and Afghanistan.
You actually went there. In this thread. Unreal.
Instead, I am using my speech to criticize someone else's speech, which is what "free speech" is supposed to encourage.
Why shouldn't I go there in this thread?
>Or to repurpose your phrase, "When business and profits are your religion, anyone with moral conviction is your enemy and must be silenced."
It's not the businessmen who are trying to shut down free speech and debate on college campuses.
>See, that's the sort of sexist language that encourages knee-jerk reactions, and gets people like me labeled "PC". My wife deployed twice to Iraq. Don't you dare leave out all those women who have died for the US, including nearly 200 in Iraq and Afghanistan.
You're totally right, so while we're at it, I've gone back and fixed an old quote: "One small step for a man or a womyn, one giant leap for man- and womyn-kind". I think I could get that one through even toughest SJW language police. What do you think?
Seriously though, I didn't mean to refer to only men. (edit: Perhaps "good people", as suggested below, would have worked too.) I used the term in the broad sense, referring to human beings in general. The modern trend is toward politically correct phrasing that makes a butchery of the English language. I don't see how the phrasing is any more sexist than "mailman", "fireman", or "salesman", which are commonly used in the gender-generic sense. Interestingly, there are many female chairman who insist on being called "chairman", not "chairwoman" or "chair".
If you mean to include the members of the Merchant Marine or the CIA who have died to support US military policies, then "soldiers" doesn't work.
If you mean to include the members of the Peace Corp who have died to support US non-military policies, then "soldiers" also doesn't work.
If you mean to include the American solders who are not US citizens, then neither "citizen" nor "American" would work.
If you mean to include the many female soldiers who have died in American conflicts, then "good men" doesn't work. While "man" can include all people (reflecting its Germanic roots), a phrase like "The show is especially popular with middle-aged men" is almost universally understood to be different than "The show is especially popular with middle-aged people", nor does the door marked "Men" indicate the gender neutral bathroom. We are also not long from the time when women were excluded from organizations on the justification the bylaws specify men, or from the time when "research men" and "typist girls" worked together as "he" and "she" respectively.
As to your Armstrong quote, your term "fix" confuses me. The past simply is. We can change our understanding of the past, and understand it's context in different ways. We can change how we do things in the future. But we cannot "fix" the past.
Still, I will consider an alternative history where the first moon landing were to occur this summer, with a male pilot named Armstrong2. You already saw that I am not against using the gendered term "wife" (derived, by the way, from 'wif', meaning a female man. When "man" was a gender neutral term, she would have been a wifman and I a werman, meaning a male man). I see no reason for Armstrong2 say 'small step for a man or a womyn' when "man" is a better fit and non-exclusionary. (If Armstrong2 were a woman, would you not think 'that's one small step for a woman, one giant leap for mankind' to be somewhat odd?)
You brought up 'womyn'. I believe you did it as a debate technique to polarize to topic and make a false association by assuming that a small group of feminists is representative of the whole of "SJW". Still, I will consider that possibility.
If Armstrong2 were to say "one giant leap for man- and womyn-kind" then that would be an expression of Armstrong2's views of gender identity. Is that what you think Armstrong2 believes? If so, then what's wrong with that statement?
I can answer that. The Armstrong in our timeline wanted an inclusive term. 1969 was the time of upheaval in race relations, gender relations, and international relations. He wanted a term that could encompass everyone, and do so in a poetic, memorable statement. If Armstrong2 were to say 'man- and womyn-kind' in the alternative timeline similar to our modern one, it would be a divisive phrase. If "man-kind" really meant everyone then there's no need to say "womyn-kind". If "man-kind" is limited to just males, then those woman who do not accept the aspirational goals behind "womyn" would feel excluded. This would be most of the women on the planet. Therefore, "man- and womyn-kind" would not be an encompassing phrase.
Hence why I think your objection has no merit, and your proposed phrase fails to capture the intent behind Armstrong's quote. I can of course think of many alternatives, but don't see the point. Nothing I write can shine against the excitement and glory that imbues that first trip to the moon. I can, however, say that "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for humanity" is a better alternative than what you proposed.
Tell me, do you still use the terms "aviatrix" and "authoress", "poetess" and "doctress", or have you embraced that butchering of the English language? Or do you somehow believe the terms you grew up with are the correct ones, and not the result of the generations of butchering the language that came before you?
>Tell me, do you still use the terms "aviatrix" and "authoress", "poetess" and "doctress", or have you embraced that butchering of the English language?
I'd only ever use the male form for all of those (poet, author, doctor etc.), but I still use "actress" and "actor". "Actor" for the gender-generic sense.
The bigger point is that chastising people over language is stupid. So what if someone uses different constructions than you? Even if it is a political statement, do you really think it's warranted to throw around the word "sexism"? That accusation is used to scare people into silence and to misdirect attention away from content of their ideas.
Why should others follow your suggestion when you don't do it yourself?
Why should others respond with thought and respect when you offer only supreme sarcasm?
And no, I will not let people like my wife stay faceless in the background of "the good men." How would you prefer that I correct usage like this in the future? Do you have a better term than "sexist"?
Revisionist history doesn't work when the history is two scrolls up. I made a joke, but I also gave you a serious response along with it.
>Saying that people butcher a language is a form of chastising people over language.
That's my opinion but I don't go around correcting people every time they drop a "he or she". I certainly don't start making insinuations about their character over it. I was responding to a completely unwarranted attack.
>And no, I will not let people like my wife stay faceless in the background of "the good men." How would you prefer that I correct usage like this in the future? Do you have a better term than "sexist"?
This isn't how you have discourse. You don't pick out two words that someone says, make it about your wife, and call them a sexist. Especially when it's abundantly clear that the role of women in the military wasn't even part of the discussion. But if your goal was to derail discussion, you were somewhat successful.
And I followed up on your serious response with the suggestion of "good souls", plus an analysis of the alternatives. I then addressed to your sarcastic response, taking it serious to show the different ways to analyze alternatives.
"You don't pick out two words that someone says, make it about your wife, and call them a sexist"
What I wrote started "See, that's the sort of sexist language that encourages knee-jerk reactions, and gets people like me labeled "PC". I did not call you a sexist. You may think that's only a technical point. I can accept that, though I disagree. It certainly wasn't meant as an attack on your character. (That said, would you prefer a safe area where you won't get your feelings hurt?)
If you can suggest a better way to object - one more likely to lead to effective change, let me know.
As it was, when my wife was demobbed and we went to the Army FRG meetings (https://www.armyfrg.org/), even a few of the external (civilian) presenters would refer to the returning soldier as a "he". They were quickly corrected, and not just be me. And when I did object, the presenter did not turn around and call me PC or accuse me of besmirching their character.
It's almost as if the way towards good discourse is to respond to an objection rather than double down on the original viewpoint despite a warning that it's a sensitive subject.
I think "the SJW language police" probably know that Neil Armstrong is not a "womyn".
There's no pleasing people who are a prior offended.
Neil Armstrong publicly identified as a man. "That's one small step for a man" is an expression of that identity, as is "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon. July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind." Everything we know about him, from his own statements about being a "schoolboy" in Ohio on up, is consistent with an expression of that identity.
He also publicly identified as an engineer: “I am, and ever will be, a white-socks, pocket-protector, nerdy engineer, born under the second law of thermodynamics, steeped in steam tables, in love with free-body diagrams, transformed by Laplace and propelled by compressible flow.” - http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2012/08/obituary
[0]http://www.space.com/17307-neil-armstrong-one-small-step-quo...
1) Keep using "he" as the gender-generic third-person singular pronoun. This was the only accepted option for a long time. I think this is the best sounding, but some crowds might give you grief for it.
2) Use "he or she" every time. This is the worst.
3) Use a mix of both "he" and "she", but obviously be consistent when referring to the same abstract person. I like this in theory, but in practice, the "she"s pops out of the page and direct attention away from what you're trying to say.
4) Use "they". This seems to be winning, though many find it to be a grammatical abomination, since "they" is supposed to be plural.
5) Always use "she". This is how you let everyone know that you have a political agenda.
What in this comment could possibly rub HN the wrong way?
> religion, anyone, conviction, enemy, must, silenced
> most, pitiful, cowardice, all, should, every last one of us, ever, surrendered, tyranny, fighting, capitulate, cower, fear
> my own country, America; disgusts, good men, put down their lives, secure, blessings, liberty, lack, confidence, courage, even, a word, defense
A few of these would be fine.
On the surface, I was the angry stampede, and he was the voice of reason. Except he didn't seem to notice that my "strong words" tended to cancel each other (some of the words he cited actually restricted the scope of the others).
It's like the tone is more important than the message. Can't people read, before they take offence to surface details? I hope this is a loud minority problem.
Lesson learned: thou shalt not use strong words, even to express a fair and balanced position. What a mess.
If your generation targets something that's actually harmful, you're ahead of the game.
Consider a space that becasue all speech is allowed, is dominated by speech that marginalizes some subset of the population. Is that 'free'?
I think that if you want a place of intellectual exploration, excluding people is as dangerous as excluding certain ideas. And there seems to be a trade-off.
Happens all the time here, unfortunately, but questioning why is a waste of time. Half the posts in this thread - ironically about free speech - are grey. The surprising thing is that your post isn't, simply for mentioning the D-word.
What's most pitiful is the cowardice displayed by all who should know better. University trustees and professors, business leaders, entertainers, and every last one of us who has ever surrendered to this tyranny in our schools, our jobs, or our communities. Instead of fighting back, we capitulate and cower in fear for our reputations and livelihoods. Seeing this in my own country, America, especially disgusts me. How many good men have put down their lives to secure for us the blessings of liberty. Today, we lack the confidence and courage to even raise a word in their defense.