This’ll force those raCISt ReTHUGliKKKans to check their privilege. VERY progressive.
Your rights end where my feelings begin.
@TeamRocketGrunt Funny thing, my rights are protected by the constitution. Your feelings? Not so much.
To be fair, I rather they spent the 16k reviewing applications and releasing decisions for the thousands of EA kids they deferred. Never heard of a school not denying a single applicants and deferring by masses.
@TeamRocketGrunt
Honestly, I can’t tell if you are being sarcastic or if you mean what you said, especially that last line.
@fallenchemist
I was being sarcastic.
@bearcats
[QUOTE=""]
can’t understand sarcasm
calls others retarded
10/10
[/QUOTE]
@TeamRocketGrunt
OK, that’s what I hoped. Just as a friendly note, sarcasm is sometimes the hardest thing to pick up on in an internet forum. Sometimes an appropriate emoticon helps.
As far as if you see another member using inappropriate language or otherwise violating the Terms of Service, the Flag function you see at the bottom of each comment is so you can report it. Please do. We take these kinds of issues very seriously. It is what keeps CC an excellent forum, at least IMO.
I didn’t read through this entire thread, only the first post. Like most liberal movements, this Michigan thing is benevolent in origin but will fail in implementation. Banned words? Have they completely lost their minds?? Right, instead of trying to articulate my frustration I’ll leave y’all with two quotes that I think sum up my position.
“You should be able to say whatever you want; it’s the only way to evolve. If we deny anyone an opinion, we cannot grow.” - Gaahl, musician
“I have a constitutional right to freedom of speech, and you do NOT have a constitutional right to be offended.” - my old history teacher
Baloney, freedom of expression does not include freedom to insult. That was never the intent of freedom of expression. If saying something is hurtful to others (within limits of sensitivity of course), it should be discouraged.
Do you guys really believe that this $16k was taken out of state funding (taxpayers’ money), financial aid funding or admissions office resources? LOL! Universities do not work that way. Michigan has 20,000 employees working in hundreds of departments, both academic and administrative. It has an endowment of $10,000,000,000 and an annual budget of $7,000,000,000. Every penny of Michigan’s budget is compartmentalized and accounted for. If that were not the case, the university would be unable to operate. This $16k was never intended to be allocated to scholarships or admissions.
@Alexandre Actually freedom of expression does include the freedom to insult. Go read the constitution. And I have no idea on what basis you can judge what the intent of the founding fathers were. Did you speak with them?
The whole concept is stupid. Banning certain words. We should encourage everyone to say what’s on there mind, in their own words. At least then we will know who/what we are dealing with. Having the thought police is a scary thing.
On the flip side, people who protest the loudest are often not the ones who “should be” offended. They are often a group of folks mining for stuff to complain about. Also, the rest of us need to toughen up and not be so easily offended.Remember…Sticks and stones! Sticks and stones!
And, finally, if it is being funded by private monies, who are we to tell other they can’t waste their money on stupid stuff.
Well, that is 100% wrong, as the courts have said many times. Now when the insult manages to rope in factually incorrect statements that damage a reputation and/or cause loss, then you have slander, libel and other issues. But simply calling someone a jerk? Completely protected as free speech. What freedom of expression does not include is freedom from consequences. Clearly if you insult someone, people are free to shun you, insult you back, and as has been discussed, fire you if the person you insulted was your boss or if your boss gets tired of you insulting coworkers. In some cases, it even doesn’t protect you from a punch in the mouth, if the insult is considered provocative enough. No bright line for that one, just a lot of gray that might depend on the mindset of the judge or jury to avoid assault charges. But for the insulting speech itself? The government cannot lock you up for simple insults.
Not even of the President. That was settled with the Sedition Acts of 1798, which proved so unpopular they helped get Jefferson elected in 1800 and were quashed. But insulting politicians back then makes today’s politics look tame by comparison. The original intent of the First Amendment was exactly to allow free criticism of the government and individual politicians, which absolutely included insults since they were common and vicious at the time. Adams never agreed with that, being thin-skinned. Hence the Sedition Acts, which as I say were a factor in his being our first one-term president. One of Jefferson’s first actions was to repay people that were fined under those acts. But there is nothing special about politicians in this regard. I am free to insult anyone I want. Don Rickles made a living off of it. People were free to avoid his act. People are free to avoid me if they think my insults are distasteful. But they cannot stop me. I am absolutely free to insult.
Of course hurtful speech should be discouraged. I think that has always been true that most parents try to teach their children to be nice and respectful. I would bet that saying “If you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything” has been around forever in some form or another. That is a long way from institutions, especially government associated institutions, getting into the business of trying to tell us what words are OK and what words are not. Once it starts, it runs the risk of mushrooming out of control, or at least going overboard. I would argue that with words like “crazy” and “illegal alien” and “ghetto” included on the list, it already has.
^not the first time Alexandre tries to push his Europe version of “free speech” on America!
Now to be fair, if we do get new guidelines banning insults from King Alexandre, MSNBC would be out of business.
fallenchemist, I did not say that it is illegal, I said that it is not the intent of free speech.
bearcats, I do not know what the founding fathers had in mind, but I know how the world was in the late 18th century. The concept of free speech originated in a time when calling people names was punishable. It was even legal to kill someone over a perceived insult (dueling in the US was legal until the early 19th century and perfectly acceptable until the Civil War). Freedom of speech was also conceived at a time when virtually all people protected by the law were white, christian men. As such, insults were primarily restricted to one’s mother, honor or questionable lineage.
The concept of freedom of speech arose primarily to protect people’s personal rights in their struggle against tyranny and to practice their religion free of persecution. It was never intended to encourage insulting a person’s core believes and person honor.
@Alexandre
The problem is that an “insult” can be whatever you want it to be - it’s entirely subjective. Why should the Michigan overlords arbitrarily decide that certain specific words should be banned? Is it not an insult to call someone a “meanie,” or a “bad person?” What if someone’s mother died, and you make a “yo mama” joke -.that could be very offensive; why aren’t “yo mama” jokes banned on campus? Perhaps they already are…
You should watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5YDVCAEMXE
Alexandre - You can’t have it both ways. You contrasted freedom of speech, a fundamental legal right, to the freedom to insult in the same sentence. That leaves no other interpretation than you are talking about legalities when you say that freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom to insult. In the context of the First Amendment right to speak freely, we absolutely have the right to insult freely. It happens every single day in newspapers, on talk radio, and in personal interactions. I mean you even used the phrase “does not include”! Not “did not intend”, but “does not include”. That is outrageous beyond my having words to describe it. I repeat, if it does not include it how do you explain talk radio and its ilk? You may find it distasteful, you might even hate it, but that is irrelevant. I am asking how it could even exist if freedom of speech “does not include” freedom to insult?
It is only in the next sentence that you talk about the intent of that amendment. And since you go on to say
it makes no sense for you to assert that it wasn’t part of the intent of free speech. In fact, you pretty much argue that it was. You are exactly right that in Europe there was no right to insult people in power. That is exactly why the several states insisted on the First Amendment. They were terrified of a strong Federal Government and the inability to speak out against it and against people in power. They absolutely knew that allowing this kind of free speech and free press would result in the freedom to insult. Ben Franklin in particular was all over that and was quite involved with his grandson in his newspaper career, which led to the Aurora, one of the most highly charged and insult filled publications at the time. And in the one attempt to go around this amendment and go back to the European model (thought by many to have been a response to the Aurora), it failed miserably and died quickly, as I clearly cited.
They also knew that individuals would suffer the consequences of using their right to this kind of speech, such as duels and the like. I am not sure what your point is in bringing that up. No one ever said that insults were not punishable, they just are not punishable by the government. Now we no longer allow people to kill over insults, but that was individuals, not the government, and social norms change. And as I mentioned even today a punch in the nose can be excused if the provocation is strong enough. Perhaps in 50 years that won’t be accepted by the courts and society in general either.
Finally you say
I am sure that is true that it wasn’t intended to encourage it, but it wasn’t meant to discourage it either. It was meant to allow people to say what they wanted about whomever and whatever they wanted, including saying negative things. It wasn’t called Freedom of Good Speech, or Freedom of Polite Speech. Obviously speech isn’t entirely free, we all know there are exceptions where in fact the government can put you in jail for certain speech. But saying “that’s so ghetto” isn’t one of them and was never intended to be.
fallenchemist, when I said “did not include”, I meant did not intend. In this context, I used intend and include interchangeably.
Well, that strikes me as bizarre since they don’t at all mean the same thing, and most especially in that context since the First Amendment was always intended to be very inclusive. This isn’t Wonderland and you are not Humpty-Dumpty.
I know Alexandre got that, but for those of you scratching your heads , here is the excerpt from the famous work by Lewis Carroll:
That’s actually a pretty good quote for this entire issue. Since Carroll was using satire, I can only assume he would be a bit bothered by the reach being taken in this campaign. JMHO.
After reading most of this thread, I think I see the ultimate problem: entitlement. The thing is, if you are not a part of a group that is marginalized by that language, you do not get to decide whether or not it is offensive.
As a white person from a wealthy family, I have absolutely no right to dictate how other races and disadvantaged people feel about my use of potentially offensive words. In that situation, it is my job to create a safe space for those people to tell me how they feel about it, and use that knowledge to amend my speech patterns. It costs no money and almost no time to make the world more hospitable for other people.
On the other side, as a queer woman with mental illness, I have all the right in the world to express my discomfort with terms relating to any of those three labels. It is then your job to not fight me about it, because at the end of the day you are not the person suffering that damage, I am. So instead of policing people’s emotions and identities, try to be at least a little bit understanding. Like I said, it comes at no cost to you and makes my (and most other people’s) life infinitely better.
UM’s campaign is aiming at exactly that. They’re saying you should be mindful of your language. You should be aware of the consequences that other people suffer from your words. They’re trying to raise awareness for sensitivity in the infinitely complex and impactful art of language. Nobody’s coercing anybody. Nobody’s rights are being taken away. Just open your eyes a little bit. I find that to be incredibly valuable.
“After reading most of this thread, I think I see the ultimate problem: entitlement. The thing is, if you are not a part of a group that is marginalized by that language, you do not get to decide whether or not it is offensive.”
I am entitled to my freedom of speech, and so are you. But you are not entitled to regulate what I can say, especially when I am not saying anything that directly insult you.
Ex.: That Calculus test raped my brain cells.
“As a white person from a wealthy family, I have absolutely no right to dictate how other races and disadvantaged people feel about my use of potentially offensive words. In that situation, it is my job to create a safe space for those people to tell me how they feel about it, and use that knowledge to amend my speech patterns. It costs no money and almost no time to make the world more hospitable for other people.”
Oh, hello there, white guilt.
“On the other side, as a queer woman with mental illness, I have all the right in the world to express my discomfort with terms relating to any of those three labels. It is then your job to not fight me about it, because at the end of the day you are not the person suffering that damage, I am. So instead of policing people’s emotions and identities, try to be at least a little bit understanding. Like I said, it comes at no cost to you and makes my (and most other people’s) life infinitely better.”
You can express it if you want, but it is no one’s job to cuddle you. Instead of policing other people’s expression to satisfy your emotion, try growing a backbone or thicker skin.
"UM’s campaign is aiming at exactly that. They’re saying you should be mindful of your language. You should be aware of the consequences that other people suffer from your words. They’re trying to raise awareness for sensitivity in the infinitely complex and impactful art of language. Nobody’s coercing anybody. Nobody’s rights are being taken away. Just open your eyes a little bit. I find that to be incredibly valuable. "
Nonsense. You’re too naive to see the bigger picture. This is just pure propaganda, and this isn’t the first time they pulled stunts like this.