No he got fined for being a dumb A and going off on the ref.....
Kobe fined for saying a "slur"
- Thread starter ISUhawk
- Start date
No he got fined for being a dumb A and going off on the ref.....
ISUhawk
Well-Known Member
You just offended all Dumb A's!! That is $100,000 fine from HN. You should be more considerate of other peoples IQ's!!
DuffMan
Well-Known Member
You just offended rolls of socks!
You'll find me a long, long way from PC but I'm sorry you are being completely stupid here. I imagine a few "F*g" comments were dropped when some hillbillies drug Mathew Shepard across the countryside too.
Historical context has nothing to do with whether a comment is inappropriate or not.
HandsyHobo
Well-Known Member
You're missing the point. The degree to which a slur (a SLUR, not profanity or an insult) is inappropriate is irrelevant. It's a slur because it is intended to attack an unchangeable aspect of someone's personality in order to offend them on a very basic level.
You mentioned that you're not offended by Irish slurs (presumably because you are at least partially Irish) in your first post. That's a pretty easy thing to say in 2011. Back when the Irish were first trying to assimilate themselves into American society, I suspect you would have felt differently. I sincerely doubt that calling someone a "mick bastard" in 1889 would have gone over well. Honestly, you could probably say the same thing for 1935.
In any case, the cost of the fine is inconsequential. It's been made clear a number of times that they're doing it to make an example of him, since he is so high-profile. I agree that it's pretty steep, but I doubt that Kobe Bryant is going to miss $100k.
Exaaaaaaactly! If you don't think people have had their basic human rights violated as a result of their sexual orientation, you are living with your head in the sand.
This is my problem with this argument, do you really think anyone using the term f*g is calling that person a homosexual?! No, they are calling them a ******/idiot/etc.. the term has obviously transformed meaning and how do you account for that? It really has no relation to gays whatsoever. When someone uses the N word, in some instances they are doing it do call someone an N word and downgrade them for the color of their skin. But when a black person says it to another black person it does not mean the same thing at all anymore... it's more like calling a friend "man" or "bro". I understand Kobe definitely should not have used it and should be fined because a person in his position should not be using any term of any kind like that toward an official, but the direction of this thread has gone far, far from reality.
No, n***** is not commonly used by a white person in place to call someone an idiot. When someone is talking about a girl and says "what a B****", are you calling her a female dog? No, you're basically calling her very mean/rude. When say to a guy, "don't be a B*****", are you calling him a female dog? No, you're saying he's acting like a little baby. Your example has no relevance.
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HandsyHobo
Well-Known Member
So what? Do you think that makes it any more correct? I don't. Formulate your own opinion instead of looking to others to see if something is okay. I'm with the NAACP on that one; bury the word.
In regard to the intent of saying f*****, or whatever. As I already said, your intent when saying the word is irrelevant, because it still carries the meaning. The fact that you're a generation or more removed from the use of the word as a a slur doesn't make it less of a slur! There is no way to simplify that further.
Even if I have nothing against Judaism or jews, it doesn't mean it's acceptable to call my friend a jew because he's being a moron. Lack of intent doesn't decrease the impact of an identity-based insult. Again, there is no way to simplify this further. Just think about it.
The irony of this thread is that you guys are complaining about having to watch everything you say for fear of offending someone when, in reality, you shouldn't have to look to anyone else to know what is or isn't okay. It's very simple: don't say f*****. Don't say n*****. Don't use pejoratives that you know are blatantly offensive because of their origin. You shouldn't have to look to anyone else to know that's not okay.
Political correctness is a way for people to question what they say because of fear of ridicule. It has been pushed for many years and is now getting downright outrageous. Just way until PC culture becomes PC law. Slowly and steadily a way to infringe upon our free speech rights.
ISUhawk
Well-Known Member
So your saying that over time, slurs don't matter. So in 100 years gays won't take offense to that?
HandsyHobo
Well-Known Member
I think it should be pretty obvious to anyone capable of basic reading comprehension that I said the exact opposite.
Over time, slurs lose their edge because people forget where they came from or why they're actually offensive. But that doesn't make them any less of a slur.
grandmahawk
Well-Known Member
Credit to Duffman and others for taking time to point out the fact that ISUhawk is a bigot.
A couple of additional points:
1) ISUhawk claims that gays and lesbians don't have the same history of oppression, persecution, and discrimination as African-Americans, making the use of homophobic epithets somehow ok. If ISUhawk ever reads anything other than the local newspaper or ESPN.com, he might find it interesting to check out any number of historical studies about gays and lesbians, all of which will reveal widespread and centuries-long discrimination, persecution, and hatred towards gays and lesbians, both in Europe and the United States. It's foolish and pointless to try to compare relative levels of suffering by African-Americans or gays or Jews or any other minority group, so it's of little use to consider questions like "who suffered more?" But, without a doubt, gays and lesbians have been killed, sterilized, imprisoned, and tortured for their allegedly "morally offensive" identities.
2) ISUhawk has spent most of his time on here arguing that calling someone or something "gay" is ok because the term has, as an epithet, lost its standard meaning and taken on a new one: "girly," "weak," or "effeminate," according to ISUhawk. What ISUhawk (and Kobe, for that matter, who has made similar statements in the wake of this piece of news) seems incapable of understanding is that his (and others') assertion that "gay" is now just a general epithet does not in any way make it somehow less offensive. Indeed, that calling someone "gay" is now a perfectly acceptable substitute for calling him dumb or stupid or, at the end of the day, worthy of criticism is only further evidence of the widespread bigotry and hatred toward gays and lesbians in our culture. And to try to divorce the term from its still-existing meaning is to reify or normalize linguistically the stigma of homosexuality. It would be like substituting the word "black" for inferior and arguing that you're using it in a non-racist sense. It simply doesn't work that way, ISUhawk. Also, it apparently has not occurred to ISUhawk that calling someone "girly," "weak," or otherwise "effeminate," is to imply (or rather, state quite directly) that anything short of the hegemonic masculine ideal is inadequate and less valuable, not to mention demeaning toward women and people who are simply different.
A couple of additional points:
1) ISUhawk claims that gays and lesbians don't have the same history of oppression, persecution, and discrimination as African-Americans, making the use of homophobic epithets somehow ok. If ISUhawk ever reads anything other than the local newspaper or ESPN.com, he might find it interesting to check out any number of historical studies about gays and lesbians, all of which will reveal widespread and centuries-long discrimination, persecution, and hatred towards gays and lesbians, both in Europe and the United States. It's foolish and pointless to try to compare relative levels of suffering by African-Americans or gays or Jews or any other minority group, so it's of little use to consider questions like "who suffered more?" But, without a doubt, gays and lesbians have been killed, sterilized, imprisoned, and tortured for their allegedly "morally offensive" identities.
2) ISUhawk has spent most of his time on here arguing that calling someone or something "gay" is ok because the term has, as an epithet, lost its standard meaning and taken on a new one: "girly," "weak," or "effeminate," according to ISUhawk. What ISUhawk (and Kobe, for that matter, who has made similar statements in the wake of this piece of news) seems incapable of understanding is that his (and others') assertion that "gay" is now just a general epithet does not in any way make it somehow less offensive. Indeed, that calling someone "gay" is now a perfectly acceptable substitute for calling him dumb or stupid or, at the end of the day, worthy of criticism is only further evidence of the widespread bigotry and hatred toward gays and lesbians in our culture. And to try to divorce the term from its still-existing meaning is to reify or normalize linguistically the stigma of homosexuality. It would be like substituting the word "black" for inferior and arguing that you're using it in a non-racist sense. It simply doesn't work that way, ISUhawk. Also, it apparently has not occurred to ISUhawk that calling someone "girly," "weak," or otherwise "effeminate," is to imply (or rather, state quite directly) that anything short of the hegemonic masculine ideal is inadequate and less valuable, not to mention demeaning toward women and people who are simply different.
Hawkeye11en1
Well-Known Member
TBH, you really didn't get that over too well in your first post, if that is what you were going for. And yes, I have basic reading comprehension skills.
I am not surprised by the fine, but to me, 100K is a little steep. Shoulda been more like 15K.
grandmahawk FTW!!! You are my hero - I couldn't have said it better myself if I tried.
Bigots are bigots - their convoluted rationalizing in an attempt to demonstrate to everyone else that they are in fact NOT bigots invariably leads to exposing themselves as even bigger bigots than initially suspected. That's exactly what's happened here - very, very sad.
At this point there is no more need to try and explain it to him. He knows what you're saying but just will not take the explanation that what he is saying is pretty offensive. It's sad.
Here is where you (and others) are so far off base. Basically what you are saying is that somehow as a non-black or a non-gay or non-whatever have some magical right to determine on the behalf of those groups what connotations/underlying meaning certain words or phrases have for them. Talk about the definition of hypocrisy!
Also, you (and others) sound so cocksure about how clearly defined the rules for the usage of the N-word are in our society. I'm presuming (giving you the benefit of the doubt) that's because you are probably < 18 and haven't had the exposure to other ways that word has been used. I'm only 31, but even when I was growing up it wasn't uncommon to hear something referred to as "N-word rigged" - meaning something that had been fixed up or repaired in a half-assed or shoddy manner. What do you think the underlying message about blacks are in that phrase?!? I guarantee it's nothing that you would want to be labeled with just because of the color of your skin, your sexual preference, your choice of religion, etc, etc, etc.
The stark truth of the matter is, it's a long process but those type of phrases don't circulate quite as much anymore because many of the people who though they were ok to say are buried 6 ft under.
DuffMan
Well-Known Member
Not that it really matters, but I spent some time in the South. It is not uncommon at all for white people to call another white person the n word as a substitute for stupid, lazy, or a variety of other things.
That said, the word f***** isn't commonly used by educated and tolerant people as a substitute for idiot either.
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