People offended by the instruction in birth control of thirteen and fourteen year olds believe that it will normalize risky behavior for them. They think that adults presenting sexual topics in a how-to context (such as explaining how to apply a condom or a diaphragm) is in and of itself explicit consent for those young teens to engage in sexual intercourse. Now, you might argue that puberty is a natural signal that an individual is ready for sex, but you can't argue that sex is not inherently risky, especially for inexperienced or immature participants. There argument is more objective than you're giving it credit for, but you comfortably dismiss it while promoting your own viewpoints.
How do you justify that? You don't seem to justify it at all. Instead, you go on 4 paragraph handwaving sprees. ;-)
It's sure as hell less risky than not informing the students at all about safe sex.
Those people are free to make that argument: maybe informing them about contraceptives and safe sex is harmful? It's certainly worth considering and debating. I'm not going to go into the debate here, because I believe that teaching about birth control is better for the students than not, and I dismissed them because I assumed that the rest of the forum would believe me (and it's also statistically demonstrable that places with birth-control education have fewer STDS and unplanned pregnancies than otherwise.
Whether or not speech is actually harmful is debatable insofar as a particular speech action can be demonstrated to indirectly cause harm.
People offended by the instruction in birth control of thirteen and fourteen year olds believe that it will normalize risky behavior for them. They think that adults presenting sexual topics in a how-to context (such as explaining how to apply a condom or a diaphragm) is in and of itself explicit consent for those young teens to engage in sexual intercourse. Now, you might argue that puberty is a natural signal that an individual is ready for sex, but you can't argue that sex is not inherently risky, especially for inexperienced or immature participants. There argument is more objective than you're giving it credit for, but you comfortably dismiss it while promoting your own viewpoints.
How do you justify that? You don't seem to justify it at all. Instead, you go on 4 paragraph handwaving sprees. ;-)
It's sure as hell less risky than not informing the students at all about safe sex.
Those people are free to make that argument: maybe informing them about contraceptives and safe sex is harmful? It's certainly worth considering and debating. I'm not going to go into the debate here, because I believe that teaching about birth control is better for the students than not, and I dismissed them because I assumed that the rest of the forum would believe me (and it's also statistically demonstrable that places with birth-control education have fewer STDS and unplanned pregnancies than otherwise.
Whether or not speech is actually harmful is debatable insofar as a particular speech action can be demonstrated to indirectly cause harm.
You stated pretty unequivocally that sexual education is not offensive or harmful a few exchanges ago when it suited your argument, and that is essentially my argument. There is no objective metric for what is offensive, and arguing that a reasonable goal for society is to never offend anyone is silly, childish, and unreasonble. You found Futurama offensive and declared that they have an obligation to not be offensive to you (or maybe it was the other guy, but you seemed to be tag-teaming) as if your finding offense is objectively "bad" and to be avoided by any reasonable person. My argument is and has been that it is impossible to be fully inoffensive ESPECIALLY as relates to the entertainment industry with an audience of millions. Further, that parody of bigotry is an important and effective tool in fighting bigotry, which you seemed to disagree with.
We've been off on a tangent, here. Not sure where we're going, but I sure am burning off the Mountain Dew I inadvisably drank around half an hour ago.
You stated pretty unequivocally that sexual education is not offensive or harmful a few exchanges ago when it suited your argument, and that is essentially my argument.
I stated it because I didn't want to go into the effort of proving that it was harmful. When you mentioned again I retracted and modified the statement. And of course there's no truly objective measure for offensiveness, there is no truly objective measurement for anything. But when we have already arbitrarily defined "harm" as physical, emotional, or economic damage to a person, then we sure as fuck can make a metric for harmful speech that depends on that definition, and it's not just what you consider some poorly-defined moral outrage.
My argument is and has been that it is impossible to be fully inoffensive ESPECIALLY as relates to the entertainment industry with an audience of millions. Further, that parody of bigotry is an important and effective tool in fighting bigotry, which you seemed to disagree with.
It may be impossible, but then it's still important to minimize harm. And we were arguing that while Futurama makes sexist jokes as part of parody, they also have made sexist jokes that aren't parody, just sexist. And, as an audience, we have an obligation to call Futurama out on those, not just give them a free pass for being progressive. And, when the Futurama staff gets complaints, they too have an obligation to investigate them appropriately and not to repeat mistakes.
Now, I'm off to bed. I'll probably keep arguing in the morning.
And we were arguing that while Futurama makes sexist jokes as part of parody, they also have made sexist jokes that aren't parody, just sexist.
Still waiting for examples. And I disagree that Futurama has an obligation to declare offending 3% of their audience a mistake, which is what you seem to be getting at. At least in cases where the 3% includes you.
It's never okay to say something offensive to someone. Privileged or not.
If your hurt ANYONE'S feelings, you have screwed up. Sometimes people are stupid and we think they deserve to have their feelings hurt, but that's not true. If you make a mistake or screw up, you don't want everyone beating on you for it. You want that people will simply explain to you why you screwed up and not give you a hard time.
If tomorrow I became an Atheist, I wouldn't suddenly forgive all the people who had rudely criticized my religion and me for following it in a discussion with me about it, and I wouldn't suddenly decide they were right to be assholes while arguing with me about it, just because I now agreed with them.
There is always a way to make your point calmly, rationally, and kindly. You can tell people to fuck off without offending them.
In a perfect world, this would never happen.
But humans are not perfect, so discussing such idealism is pointless. At the end of the day, you should strive to never offend. If you do, you should apologize. If you disagree with that, you must accept the role of "asshole." If you admit that you're being an asshole, then you are not excused. Just honest.
If your hurt ANYONE'S feelings, you have screwed up.
I'm sorry, but with all due respect, how old are you? Elementary school age? You can hurt someone's feelings by not returning their affection (because you like them as a friend). Have you screwed up then? What if you're gay? Screw up? What if you hurt their feelings because you don't believe in Christianity and they're a Jesus freak? Are you a screw up?
People have expectations. All sorts of expectations. Different people have different, conflicting, overlapping expectations. Any action (or inaction) you may commit to is almost inevitably going to offend someone given that they find out about it. Have you screwed up in each case?
Let's not pretend that this is black and white. It's an oversimplification and it's an impediment to a rational discussion.
I qualified everything by saying that this was all true in a perfect world.
In our non-perfect world, you will offend people inevitably. You must accept that you were an asshole and strive for better.
Even if you're offending someone for the right reasons, you're only doing it because they're doing something offensive (more than likely), which in a perfect world wouldn't matter.
My point is, offending anyone who hasn't directly offended you is pretty bad. If you offend someone who has offended you, you still did something bad, but your reasons may have been good.
Even if it sucks to think of it that way, that's how I view it. It sucks to make other people upset. It's not okay. It's inevitable, though. It will happen. Doesn't make it right. Doesn't mean you have to dwell on it, but it doesn't make it right.
I'm barely following the specifics of this conversation, because it just keeps going in circles, but personally I feel that if I get offended by something, regardless of whether I am right or wrong in feeling that way, that's more or less on me and I'm not going to deprive someone's right to say it. I still have the power to speak up against it, offer an alternative view, or remove myself from being exposed to the offensive material.
No, you don't need to accept that you're an asshole every time you offend someone. People are passively offended by all sorts of things all the time. It's not your, my, or anyone's problem.
You are oversimplifying and therefore completely wrong.
If you, for example, broadcast a comedy show and some people are offended, that's not "doing something bad."
Did you read the thread, or the replies to your comment? You don't seem to have.
I'm barely following the specifics of this conversation, because it just keeps going in circles, but personally I feel that if I get offended by something, regardless of whether I am right or wrong in feeling that way, that's more or less on me and I'm not going to deprive someone's right to say it. I still have the power to speak up against it, offer an alternative view, or remove myself from being exposed to the offensive material.
Right, and others similarly have the right to rebut you if you speak up against it and they disagree, as in the case of the baseless Futurama bashing going on in this thread.
Whatever. Arguing about this is literally impossible, because the very nature of opinions and viewpoints makes this argument moot.
Someone like Linkigi is against racism and sexism, but doesn't mind if Christians get knocked down a peg due to his Liberal leanings. Someone like myself wants everyone to be treated well, because of reasons. Others give no fucks about what other people think.
Oh, I don't care about any perceived "offensiveness" in recent Futurama episodes. I just find them stale. If your parody of early 90s gender comedy is just a point-for-point replay of said comedy, it's stale and unfunny no matter how "ironic" you're being. Futurama has lost any and all edge it ever had, and isn't ringing any better than Home Improvement at this point.
Someone like Linkigi is against racism and sexism, but doesn't mind if Christians get knocked down a peg due to his Liberal leanings. Someone like myself wants everyone to be treated well, because of reasons.
Ahh, but there is a big difference. Racism and sexism are against real, demonstrable things. But, any religious argument begs the question that the thing said religion believes is real in the first place.
I look at christian beliefs about the same way I look at any unsubstantiated claim: they are all equal. Scientology is just as valid as Christianity, Islam, Otherkin, or Wicca. They all deserve exactly equal respect. To treat any one differently from any other is arbitrary discrimination, which is exactly what we're so mad about when it comes to sexism and racism.
All unsubstantiated beliefs deserve equal treatment.
So, I guess we're ignoring my attempts to put forth a metric for what can be considered "harm?"
My point is that racist/sexist/ableist/etc statements, even jokes, cause harm to people and perpetuate a system of inequality. I have not been trying to say that everything that some person somewhere says is offensive is wrong. However, there are statements that are directly or indirectly harmful to groups of people, and you should be held accountable for those statements. Muppet, you seem to be claiming that, because any standard of harmfulness/offensiveness is arbitrary to some degree, therefore any speech can be called harmful and the definition is meaningless. I say that's fucking bullshit, because then you can't hold people accountable for encouraging racism and hurting others, and an arbitrarily-defined standard, if we can agree upon one, is still meaningful.
Muppet, I'm not calling you an asshole because you say things that offend people, I'm calling you an asshole for saying that it is always the audience member's fault for being offended and "Free Speech" gives you the right to say whatever bullshit you want.
I'm calling you an asshole for saying that it is always the audience member's fault for being offended and "Free Speech" gives you the right to say whatever bullshit you want.
Free Speech does give you the right to say whatever bullshit you want. There are extremely>/i> narrow limitations, almost all of which involve specific imminent physical danger or demonstrable commercial damage. Even in the case of the latter, there is no prior restraint.
So yes, "Free Speech" literally means the right to say whatever bullshit you want. If you dislike someone else's speech, fight it with your own speech or ignore it. But never forget that they have the right to say it. All of it. No matter how offensive it may be to anyone.
I'm not necessarily saying racist speech should be illegal. I am saying that I think you should take responsibility and apologize when you say something offensive and harmful, even if saying it wasn't illegal. Because legality aside, you still hurt somebody, and being unwilling to recognize that I find morally wrong.
I'm not necessarily saying racist speech should be illegal. I am saying that I think you should take responsibility and apologize when you say something offensive and harmful, even if saying it wasn't illegal. Because legality aside, you still hurt somebody, and being unwilling to recognize that I find morally wrong.
People should only apologize if they are sorry. What is being sorry?
Apology means regret. Pretend someone bumps into someone else by accident. They say they are sorry because they did not want that to happen. If they had the power to go back in time, they would prevent it from happening. But now it is done, and irreversible. They take responsibility for that thing happening, and I want to let the other person know their feelings on the matter.
If someone does not have those feelings, they should not say they are sorry, because that is dishonest.
If someone says something you do not like, and they do not apologize, I suggest you dealwithit.gif Sometimes people say things, people are offended by those things, and the people who said the things are not sorry. This happens often when people are extremely sensitive and get upset over everything. It also happens when some people are extremely offensive. The whole world is not going to apologize to overly sensitive people, and extremely offensive people are not going to apologize to anybody.
If you want to combat people who say things you do not like, then please go ahead and use your own powers of speech to battle the things those people say with the things you say.
In doing so you should beware of any arguments that suggest that anyone should shut up or limit their speech in any way. There's the old line about disagreeing with what people say, but defending their right to say it. Let's say you are fighting some racist speech with anti-racist speech. If you try any line of argument that veers towards any form of censorship, suddenly many of your allies against racism will switch to the other side because they are now defending the right of free speech. Stick to fighting the bad thing without trying to limit speech in any way shape or form, and you will always have many allies.
Within reason, sure. If you watch a show known for being irreverent and then get upset about the irreverence, or storm about complaining about how "harmful" it is because you don't get that it's satire (while most people do), then I think that's your own problem.
If a part of the audience can't tell something is satire, then it's the comedian's fault, either for being a bad comedian or for using a joke with the wrong audience. With mass media, it's difficult to target an audience, but it's still possible.
I like Futurama. But I'm not going to pretend that their satire never fails, that sometimes it might be hard to tell if they're joking about sexism or they're just being sexist. I haven't watched Futurama in a long time, so I'd need to rewatch it to acquire specific examples.
But I also absolutely refuse to buy the "If you're offended you shouldn't watch it" excuse when I call a show out for being offensive. For a start, if I'm watching a show closely enough to pick up on something offensive, I'm evidently interested enough in the show to be considered a legitimate part of that show's "audience."
If a part of the audience can't tell something is satire, then it's the comedian's fault, either for being a bad comedian or for using a joke with the wrong audience. With mass media, it's difficult to target an audience, but it's still possible.
I'm sorry, but there's no gentle way to respond to this assertion. This is abject, inexcusable stupidity.
If a part of the audience can't tell something is satire, then it's the comedian's fault, either for being a bad comedian or for using a joke with the wrong audience. With mass media, it's difficult to target an audience, but it's still possible.
I'm sorry, but there's no gentle way to respond to this assertion. This is abject, inexcusable stupidity.
It's not. If you're trying to tell a joke and the audience doesn't get it, it's not their fault - either you've told a bad joke or you've misjudged the audience.
It's not. If you're trying to tell a joke and the audience doesn't get it, it's your fault.
So, if I tell a calculus joke to a room full of mathematicians, and someone puts that joke on youtube, I'm now at fault as a comedian for the philistines who didn't understand it later?
Comments
Those people are free to make that argument: maybe informing them about contraceptives and safe sex is harmful? It's certainly worth considering and debating. I'm not going to go into the debate here, because I believe that teaching about birth control is better for the students than not, and I dismissed them because I assumed that the rest of the forum would believe me (and it's also statistically demonstrable that places with birth-control education have fewer STDS and unplanned pregnancies than otherwise.
Whether or not speech is actually harmful is debatable insofar as a particular speech action can be demonstrated to indirectly cause harm.
We've been off on a tangent, here. Not sure where we're going, but I sure am burning off the Mountain Dew I inadvisably drank around half an hour ago.
And of course there's no truly objective measure for offensiveness, there is no truly objective measurement for anything. But when we have already arbitrarily defined "harm" as physical, emotional, or economic damage to a person, then we sure as fuck can make a metric for harmful speech that depends on that definition, and it's not just what you consider some poorly-defined moral outrage. It may be impossible, but then it's still important to minimize harm. And we were arguing that while Futurama makes sexist jokes as part of parody, they also have made sexist jokes that aren't parody, just sexist. And, as an audience, we have an obligation to call Futurama out on those, not just give them a free pass for being progressive. And, when the Futurama staff gets complaints, they too have an obligation to investigate them appropriately and not to repeat mistakes.
Now, I'm off to bed. I'll probably keep arguing in the morning.
It's never okay to say something offensive to someone. Privileged or not.
If your hurt ANYONE'S feelings, you have screwed up. Sometimes people are stupid and we think they deserve to have their feelings hurt, but that's not true. If you make a mistake or screw up, you don't want everyone beating on you for it. You want that people will simply explain to you why you screwed up and not give you a hard time.
If tomorrow I became an Atheist, I wouldn't suddenly forgive all the people who had rudely criticized my religion and me for following it in a discussion with me about it, and I wouldn't suddenly decide they were right to be assholes while arguing with me about it, just because I now agreed with them.
There is always a way to make your point calmly, rationally, and kindly. You can tell people to fuck off without offending them.
In a perfect world, this would never happen.
But humans are not perfect, so discussing such idealism is pointless. At the end of the day, you should strive to never offend. If you do, you should apologize. If you disagree with that, you must accept the role of "asshole." If you admit that you're being an asshole, then you are not excused. Just honest.
People have expectations. All sorts of expectations. Different people have different, conflicting, overlapping expectations. Any action (or inaction) you may commit to is almost inevitably going to offend someone given that they find out about it. Have you screwed up in each case?
Let's not pretend that this is black and white. It's an oversimplification and it's an impediment to a rational discussion.
In our non-perfect world, you will offend people inevitably. You must accept that you were an asshole and strive for better.
Even if you're offending someone for the right reasons, you're only doing it because they're doing something offensive (more than likely), which in a perfect world wouldn't matter.
My point is, offending anyone who hasn't directly offended you is pretty bad. If you offend someone who has offended you, you still did something bad, but your reasons may have been good.
Even if it sucks to think of it that way, that's how I view it. It sucks to make other people upset. It's not okay. It's inevitable, though. It will happen. Doesn't make it right. Doesn't mean you have to dwell on it, but it doesn't make it right.
Bottom-line it:
Try not to offend people. Do your fucking best.
You are oversimplifying and therefore completely wrong.
If you, for example, broadcast a comedy show and some people are offended, that's not "doing something bad."
Did you read the thread, or the replies to your comment? You don't seem to have.
Someone like Linkigi is against racism and sexism, but doesn't mind if Christians get knocked down a peg due to his Liberal leanings. Someone like myself wants everyone to be treated well, because of reasons. Others give no fucks about what other people think.
It's impossible.
I look at christian beliefs about the same way I look at any unsubstantiated claim: they are all equal. Scientology is just as valid as Christianity, Islam, Otherkin, or Wicca. They all deserve exactly equal respect. To treat any one differently from any other is arbitrary discrimination, which is exactly what we're so mad about when it comes to sexism and racism.
All unsubstantiated beliefs deserve equal treatment.
My point is that racist/sexist/ableist/etc statements, even jokes, cause harm to people and perpetuate a system of inequality. I have not been trying to say that everything that some person somewhere says is offensive is wrong. However, there are statements that are directly or indirectly harmful to groups of people, and you should be held accountable for those statements. Muppet, you seem to be claiming that, because any standard of harmfulness/offensiveness is arbitrary to some degree, therefore any speech can be called harmful and the definition is meaningless. I say that's fucking bullshit, because then you can't hold people accountable for encouraging racism and hurting others, and an arbitrarily-defined standard, if we can agree upon one, is still meaningful.
Muppet, I'm not calling you an asshole because you say things that offend people, I'm calling you an asshole for saying that it is always the audience member's fault for being offended and "Free Speech" gives you the right to say whatever bullshit you want.
So yes, "Free Speech" literally means the right to say whatever bullshit you want. If you dislike someone else's speech, fight it with your own speech or ignore it. But never forget that they have the right to say it. All of it. No matter how offensive it may be to anyone.
Apology means regret. Pretend someone bumps into someone else by accident. They say they are sorry because they did not want that to happen. If they had the power to go back in time, they would prevent it from happening. But now it is done, and irreversible. They take responsibility for that thing happening, and I want to let the other person know their feelings on the matter.
If someone does not have those feelings, they should not say they are sorry, because that is dishonest.
If someone says something you do not like, and they do not apologize, I suggest you dealwithit.gif Sometimes people say things, people are offended by those things, and the people who said the things are not sorry. This happens often when people are extremely sensitive and get upset over everything. It also happens when some people are extremely offensive. The whole world is not going to apologize to overly sensitive people, and extremely offensive people are not going to apologize to anybody.
If you want to combat people who say things you do not like, then please go ahead and use your own powers of speech to battle the things those people say with the things you say.
In doing so you should beware of any arguments that suggest that anyone should shut up or limit their speech in any way. There's the old line about disagreeing with what people say, but defending their right to say it. Let's say you are fighting some racist speech with anti-racist speech. If you try any line of argument that veers towards any form of censorship, suddenly many of your allies against racism will switch to the other side because they are now defending the right of free speech. Stick to fighting the bad thing without trying to limit speech in any way shape or form, and you will always have many allies.
I like Futurama. But I'm not going to pretend that their satire never fails, that sometimes it might be hard to tell if they're joking about sexism or they're just being sexist. I haven't watched Futurama in a long time, so I'd need to rewatch it to acquire specific examples.
But I also absolutely refuse to buy the "If you're offended you shouldn't watch it" excuse when I call a show out for being offensive. For a start, if I'm watching a show closely enough to pick up on something offensive, I'm evidently interested enough in the show to be considered a legitimate part of that show's "audience."