Is slack a private social club and other issues my sorry ass has landed itself in

[Belacqua]

I want to point out that, from what I've read, Jorm's offense wasn't nearly the same as her calling someone a racist slur. She mistakenly used it trying to crack a joke. Not the same as someone calling her an Asian slur or a nutcase.

If someone used those words in what they thought was a joke, then the situations might be comparable.

[Jello]

Who'd have thought that throwing around what is pretty much the most offensive slur around, in a time of racial tension, would go down poorly.

Sorry Jorm, but honestly you should've known better.

(For the record, i don't think you're racist, i just think you should've thought about it first).

[Athene]

I'm NOT speaking for @SteelCurtain , but I can imagine that after having to intervene in the Christianity thread that somehow morphed into a N**GERmania fuck-fest of nothing but several posters woefully decrying the unfairness of being deprived of their N**GER fixes, he may have popped in on Slack and seen Jorm's little funny or whatever it was and not felt up to explaining that shit yet again. 

Now, I could be totally wrong as I am obviously NOT Steel. They may not even be the sequence of events, IDK.

But I do know how mentally trying it is to have to keep explaining this sort of shit to folks who 9 times out of 10 just don't want to understand. 
It's exhausting.

NOTE: I'm not necessarily referring to @Jörmungandr 's faux paus in voicing the following thoughts, but in regards to the various other elements that are currently bandying about in this and a couple of other threads.

Hang out in atheist spaces long enough and blacks will inevitably receive their N**GER wake-up call by those who feel compelled to "remind"  you and anyone who looks like that you aren't quite as worthy of basic respect and human decency as they are, and subtly attempt to assert their superiority by putting N**GERS in their place under the guise of free speech, being anti-PC, or just making jokes. They just can't help themselves.

And these are the very same motherfuckers will  pretend to speculate as to why "the Blacks" feel the need to create their own platforms, and call it reverse racism.
Well, there's the reason why. Enough of you go out of your way to make sure that blacks feel othered, out of place and unwelcome in mainstream atheist communities whenever it suits your fancy.

So, it is what it is.

Black atheists who participate in these forums need to recognize that these folks are NOT their peers or allies despite holding similar world or political views, lest they find themselves hurt and brutally disappointed no matter how anti-Trump, egalitarian, and/or liberal these assholes profess to be. They still benefit from white supremacy...and they know it. They've got every reason to make sure it prevails and do not hesitate to re-draw lines of racial hierarchy lines as needed.

This is "their" space and they like N**GERS to know that.

I've long been aware of this shitty little game and understand my role with perfect clarity.
Hence, the User Title: Unperturbed Interloper

I'm just here to talk about fish and make shit messy. 

[Angrboda]

@Jörmungandr My position isn't that we just go with his gut instinct. My position is that I'm white, and therefore, I will not say whether or not the word is offensive even if used in a joking manner in this context. It is entirely up to him, and other black people, how they choose to feel about it. I'll respect those feelings. Again, I don't think for a second you meant it offensively or that you are racist. I just don't think that's true. However, you took a risk and it backfired. It's not really that big a deal.

A while back, a Christian on this forum demanded that I remove the signature that I'm currently using, which if you can't see, is the back shoulders of an unclad woman. He had a reaction to it. He was disturbed by it. And like me and my presence on slack, he wanted it removed. Saying that it's up to a person to feel how they want to feel about it is fine, and it's true, but that doesn't address the issue at all. The question is are they justified in feeling the way they do about it, and does their feeling a certain way about it entail that the thing or act was wrong or inappropriate, or that they have any rights to do anything about it. I get frustrated when people post bad arguments. However people posting bad arguments making me frustrated and angry doesn't mean my hatred, if such develops, is justified, or that I have a right that the person who caused my reaction be removed. You say that my "risk" backfired, which is just noting that there was a reaction to my words, it doesn't say anything about why that reaction occurred or what the significance of that reaction is. Perhaps you meant to imply, people reacted to it negatively, therefore it was wrong and inappropriate, but that doesn't follow, and if that's what you're saying, you're simply asserting that it was wrong and inappropriate and your mere assertion doesn't deserve the time of day. It's possible that people reacted because I was being unreasonable in posting that. It's possible that Steelcurtain and others were unreasonable in reacting the way they did. Or any of a number of other possibilities. So, while I appreciate that you thought you were contributing something to the discussion of that question, you really haven't. You've described the situation, calling it a backfire, and said that people are entitled to their feelings, neither of which I would dispute, but those aren't the questions at issue, and being entitled to your feelings, and being entitled to remove someone from slack or from the forum because of your feelings are two very different things.

I hope to get to some of your other points eventually, but seeing as there hasn't been much activity in this thread lately, I may wait until Monday to look at further replies. And in the meantime, I'm still waiting for Steelcurtain to explain his comment. If he is accusing me of being a racist, then I want to know, and I find that rather offensive and unwarranted. That he's chosen not to address my question and the reasons for his not addressing my question are things I can only speculate on.

It would certainly be understandable right now if I felt that Steelcurtain and Huggy are unreasonable black people who uses the race card as a weapon against white people. Perhaps Thena as well. Would that entitle me to have them removed from the forum, Shell? Being entitled to your feelings in this case doesn't really mean squat.

So I'm still waiting for somebody to justify Steelcurtain's behavior with something more than a political opinion or a rather extreme opinion about language, or simply trusting the guts of the people involved.

And I get that Steelcurtain was offended and I do respect those feelings. I'm sorry he was offended, but that doesn't mean that I should feel sorry for having said what I said. I would like to make peace and move on. But there are some serious issues here pertaining to the interests of this community which need to be addressed, and so far they haven't been. Saying that people get offended and that they're well within their rights to get offended tells us nothing. Recently 7 Christians demanded changes to the forum because they were upset with how they were treated on the forum. The lot of you seem to be saying something along the lines of, "Well, they're Christians and they're offended, and they're Christians so they should know what offends them so we should just give them what they want." Is that the only argument I'm hearing? It seems so. If someone has said something more, I'd appreciate someone drawing my attention to it.

[Jello]

I can't believe there's an argument even happening here. Even if not meant in a racist manner, what you said was racist. End of. You give someone an inch, they'll take a mile, you gotta be zero tolerance with this shit.

Last i checked, most places have an anti-racist language rules in place, and whilst slack may not be subject to all the rules, i'd imagine that one still pertains.

[Angrboda]

I can't believe there's an argument even happening here. Even if not meant in a racist manner, what you said was racist. End of. You give someone an inch, they'll take a mile, you gotta be zero tolerance with this shit.

Last i checked, most places have an anti-racist language rules in place, and whilst slack may not be subject to all the rules, i'd imagine that one still pertains.

Let me grant you your premises for the sake of argument. In what way was what I said racist?

Just as a starter, Oxford English Dictionary defines racist, as, "a person whose words or actions display prejudice or discrimination on the grounds of race." Now, that may not be the end of a discussion of what the definition is, but going on that, you're suggesting that I was displaying prejudice or discrimination on the grounds of race, and I just don't think you've made that argument. Like many here, you just want to declare it wrong and have your declaration be accepted as compelling. It's not. Recently Drich referred to me as a Dragon Lady, which is a pejorative term describing a specific type of Asian woman. Many people consider that racist. I don't really think Drich was being racist and I certainly don't think Drich should have been removed because of it. Your argument seems to imply that there would be justification for removing Drich for calling me a dragon lady. Is that really your position?

(ETA: And the suggestion here seems to be that terms about black people may be entitled to treatment that terms about Asians, Mexicans, white people and others are not entitled to having and that black people's feelings and offense entitles them to certain rights that my feelings and offense as an Asian woman do not entitle me to having. If that is what staff is saying, I'd like a clear statement of that from staff. If that is not what staff is saying, I'd like a clear statement of that from staff as well.)

(ETA2: So far, and this is just my impression that I'm getting is that this boils down to, "Our community has certain standards, and our community holds that what you said is wrong. Your community may have different standards and not hold it wrong, but in doing so, your community is wrong, and you and members of your community are unacceptable." If that's a valid characterization, that seems way more bigoted than what I said.)

(ETA3: And just to be clear, going from memory, the Prime directive says that making a post to provoke a reaction is a violation. Obviously, certain reactions, such as intense and serious discussion are excluded from that and perhaps others. So, it's not at all clear that the prime directive would apply in my case, or necessarily in all cases. I'm not going to go into it in detail, but saying that in all cases the reaction provoked justifies disciplinary action seems both unreasonable and a misreading of the Prime directive.)

And George Carlin weighs in on the topic. Not that I want this to become a meme thread, but just to point out that there are more valid opinions on the matter beyond those of you arguing that saying something like I did was wrong.

[Jello]

I can't believe there's an argument even happening here. Even if not meant in a racist manner, what you said was racist. End of. You give someone an inch, they'll take a mile, you gotta be zero tolerance with this shit.

Last i checked, most places have an anti-racist language rules in place, and whilst slack may not be subject to all the rules, i'd imagine that one still pertains.

Let me grant you your premises for the sake of argument.  In what way was what I said racist?

You used a big ol' racial slur? A word that's inherently racist because of it's origins, and i doubt will ever be not racist when used by anybody who doesn't fit into the group it's aimed at? 

As i said before, i don't think you're racist at all, but you should have known better, and this argument shouldn't even be happening. I don't know if you're trying to save face or something, but it's really backfiring. 

As i was saying. You give someone an inch on this kind of thing, you'll have someone else making some really racist statements and then just going "oh it's a joke", meaning that if you punish them, they could pull up this case, if it went the way you want it to, and be like "Oh why are the staff being biased". You gotta be zero tolerance with things like racism. Shit sucks, but that's the way the cookie crumbles, friend.


EDIT (Just for the sake of saving some problems down the line, i'm off to work now, so if i don't reply, i'm not ignoring anyone, i'm just at work till around 7pm my time).

[Angrboda]

Let me grant you your premises for the sake of argument.  In what way was what I said racist?

You used a big ol' racial slur? A word that's inherently racist because of it's origins, and i doubt will ever be not racist when used by anybody who doesn't fit into the group it's aimed at? 

Doubling down on your assertion doesn't help, jello. Simply repeating what you said doesn't make it true, unless you're ready to confess your sins to God and Jesus, because Christians have repeated their assertion that God exists many times. It doesn't make it true, and neither does your statement make it true that my statement is racist. And your argument that it's racist because it has racist origins just will not fly. That's an example of the genetic fallacy and a patently bad argument. "Somebody once used a gun to kill an innocent person therefore guns are inherently immoral" is a very bad argument indeed. And again we have the argument that black people have a right to use the language and white people do not. I'm not going to respond to that argument at the moment, but I strongly disagree. And black people or anybody else having "owned it" isn't a valid argument to my eye.

Try again, jello, or anybody else. (when you have time)

And this does indeed appear to be a case of "my people who think it is wrong are right and acceptable, and your people are simply wrong and unacceptable." Why that seems reasonable to anyone, if so, confuses me. But that seems to be the position that staff has embraced, and they seem to be doing nothing more than circling the wagons on this.

---

And I would like to add in the popular dictum that the answer to bad speech is more speech, not censorship. I have been censored and I don't think the staff are justified in doing so.

---

I feel like changing my title next to my avatar to something like, "I'm just an Asian nigger." How would staff feel about that? How about you, jello? Is that racist? It seems that would follow from what you've said. And that would mean that I was prejudiced and discriminatory towards myself. That's moronic and incoherent. Something is very wrong in Denmark. (Huggy references ftw!)

How about you, Thena? Would calling myself an Asian nigger be an example of me dehumanizing, demeaning and controlling blacks?

---

And I have reported Drich for a violation of the Prime directive for calling me a dragon lady. Let's see how fair this staff really is. I, personally, am expecting to hear crickets.

---

As i was saying. You give someone an inch on this kind of thing, you'll have someone else making some really racist statements and then just going "oh it's a joke", meaning that if you punish them, they could pull up this case, if it went the way you want it to, and be like "Oh why are the staff being biased". You gotta be zero tolerance with things like racism. Shit sucks, but that's the way the cookie crumbles, friend.

This leads to a very obvious slippery slope, jello. Do we ban the use of the word yellow, if used as a description of an Asian person, because it could lead to abusive and discriminatory uses of it?

[Tiberius]

Administrator Notice
Closing this thread while it is discussed by staff.

[arewethereyet]

Thread closed.