I don't have a problem with it. It isn't really a derogatory term anymore. "Gay" is now equivalent to "Stupid". If it's used in that context I don't care. However, I do begin to have problems when people use the word to descriminate or be hateful.
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I don't have a problem with it. It isn't really a derogatory term anymore. "Gay" is now equivalent to "Stupid". If it's used in that context I don't care. However, I do begin to have problems when people use the word to descriminate or be hateful.
Dumb would be a better example.
When you're little you almost always learn that dumb=bad, rather than dumb=can't talk.
I say it's a better example because people think of it as lighter than stupid. I remember my dad telling me when I was little not to call things stupid, so I called them dumb instead. (or he might've been telling me not to call *him* stupid, either way, i quit saying it for the longest time:))
Gay is a derrogatory term. It's also a synonym for something that is distasteful.
it's all in the context.
but, since it's [rather] new, people still get easily offended by it, as shown by this thread.
But so are people from nigeria. To diferentiate you would have to call them Nigerites. Like jebuzites or wisconsinites.Quote:
Originally Posted by Doors
p.s. Is the country of niger pronounced Nigh-jeer like nigeria to the south? Or does it not matter like with Iraq. (I-Rack, I-Rock, E-rack, E-rock)
Iraq does matter, or so I've heard. I think the correct way to pronounce it is
E-Rock, but most Americans say i-rack anyway, myself included.
It's really not that big a deal. Try not to think about it so much.
Ah, I'll admit to saying it. It's just a habit---but I can't tell where it came from. But it's just like the word "gay" coming to mean homosexual---something it didn't mean before, and now it's also come around to mean stupid, or lame. No different. I don't have anything against gay people, but the word it so driven into my mind...*sigh*
:D
I agree with SomethingBig, I do not like the usage of deragatory connotation of a word. It's just as bad as faggot and fag. If you added all the derrogatory words added to homosexuality you wouldn't have a pretty definition. I was calle dgay in myu school for awhile (ie Grade 7 to Grade 10/11, because I am diferent, not quiet metrosexual, but I express myself and, I learned that I am me, not the labels I am given....) So yeah I have reasons for not liking the word, also many people who I know use the word gay as an adjective for anything but happy, think negatively or say negative comments about homosexuality. I live in a small city, therefore with this small sample I do not assume everyone who use gay in another sense than happy or homosexual, are closed minded towards different sexual oriantation, I am just stating that I had bad experience with the term. I know this is a little off topic, but lesbian, is not used in a derogatory sense, it seems that I guess they rather use the term for male homosexuality. For thos ethat don't know the word lesbian originated from the island of Lesbos. there was na all girl school there and the lady who ran it *forgets name....starts with S I think* wrote poems to her students. Some say love poems, but you get the idea. Also why is homosexuality so strongly opposed now, in ancient Greece it wasn't, Alexander the Great was gay, (but you never see that in the text books....) and his father celebrated. In Sparta only men could fight and it was believe you fought better when you fought with someone you loved. There was a whole legion of troops, and they were alll gay, and they were the strongest tropp of them all. So history shows psoitive attitude, so why now change, mind you there has been negative attitude too. But yeah, that all I got to say.
It really doesn't bother me, except when I hear little kids saying it...that just annoys me.
The N word however...or "chink" or "kracker" or anything else that's duragatory toward an ethnicity I cannot stand unless it's a person of that ethnicity saying it. Or if it's just kidding around all in good fun.
I used "gay" as an adjective for about a week in jr. high. Then I realized how idiotic it sounded.
The N word? Or other ethnic slang? Only with my friends of those ethnicities, and never meant in a serious derogatory fashion. :spin:
I think we should all stick to the PC cuss words. http://forums.eyesonff.com/images/smilies/rpg_009.gifhttp://forums.eyesonff.com/images/smilies/rpg_009.gifhttp://forums.eyesonff.com/images/smilies/rpg_009.gifhttp://forums.eyesonff.com/images/smilies/rpg_009.gif yeah!
We've become such a desensitized culture that we throw around words which might be offensive with little or no regard anymore. Using "gay" or calling someone a "fag" started in the early 1980's when AIDS was believed to be caused by homosexuals and for a time, they were demonized completely. Our culture has still not completely gotten over this phase and thus, many times, we call others "gay" or "fags" as a way to belittle and also to build up our own ego. In many cases, people who use these words for malicious intent, meaning they really do use "gay" and "fag" to indicate a sexual preference in a negative light, are people who are usually to some degree homophobic or battling some sort of insecurity or identity crisis and thus feel they must push their internal problems onto others as some form of closure.
In most cases however, the words are just used because they found a way into our collective social subconscious along with calling things we like, among others things, "cool", "hot", and the like. We are often unaware that we are even using these words and usually don't even realzie that we may be potentially offending other people. As a society, we've become strangely, both more politically correct and also much more easy going with regard to words and phrases in and out of context.
As for the N word, this is a much more touchy subject for some. The roots of the negative form of the word can be traced back to the 1960's during the Civil Rights Movement, where the word resurfaced to belittle those of African, West Indian and the like descent, after being largely disgarded for about 100 years. The word originated I believe during the Civil War, or more closely, right after the Civil War during Reconstruction when racial tension was also very high and Jim Crow laws reigned infamously. The word was used to call former slaves still subservient to whites and, even nearly 150 years later, this class struggle is still very touchy. To use the word now as a white person seems to be harkening back to days of slavery, while to use it as a black person seems to mean brotherhood and a kinship among those who were formerly oppressed and still to a degree feel oppressed in certain situations.
All in all, the words have become paradoxically both more offensive and less so as we enter a more and more politically correct age. It remains to be seen if the words will actually cause another shift in our culture or if they will lose the negative undertones they've taken on in this century.
Take care all.
People keep calling me gay as a derogative term.
I tell myself that anybody who gets offended by racism (when done in an obviously non-derogatory manner) is taking it too seriously. I apply the same to any -ism. But I don't force my opinions on others and so I refrain from using racist 'terms' around people I'm not that comfortable with.
Otherwise it's game on
I don't agree with people using the word "gay" to depict something homosexual. Sometimes I'm not just happy, I'm positively gay. Do I approve of their lifestyle? Yes, its fine. But do I want people to think I'm homosexual? No.
Sometimes I just want to be gay.
xD [img]http://home.eyesonff.com/images/smilies/heart.gif[/img]Quote:
Originally Posted by ShlupQuack
I agree.