Of course, the difference is quite clear.
I meant the issue of causing and taking offence.
For me it hangs on whether offence was intended.

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That subtle admixture of the absurd and the surreally plausible...

Sorry, I was being terse. That's what I meant, there's a huge difference between chanting 'Allah is a peedo' and 'Do you think that a desert religion of the seventh century can, or should, be adapted for the 21st century western world?'
Of course, both may cause offence, but the second shouldn't.

Sure. One is designed to cause offence, the other is designed to provoke debate and consideration.

The problem is when the latter is used to put a gloss of respectability on the former, often when the person posing the question fails to address the absurdities of their own (claimed) belief system.

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Ten seconds... the pain begins.

Fifteen seconds... you can't breathe.

Twenty seconds... you give up and turn off the Jeremy Vine show.

A few years ago there was an incident where an Islamic student called a teaching colleague a "Jewish gaylord". This led to some debate in the staffroom about how severely this should be dealt with.
As neither an anti-Semite nor a homophobe that comment would be pretty ineffectual levelled at me as I don't regard being Jewish or gay as bad things to be. Frankly "Jewish gaylord" just sounds rather silly to me and hard to take seriously as an insult. However, to some Muslims, Jewish & gay are regarded as terrible things to be. So this student was trying to cause offence by using, what he regarded as, the worst insult he could think of. Bearing that in mind, is it right to take into account the socio-ethnic background of the speaker when determining response?

What about Ken Livingstone likening a Daily Mail reporter to a Nazi war criminal for 'only following orders'? Seems like fair comment to me. But then we found out the reporter was Jewish and it becomes more complicated.

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That subtle admixture of the absurd and the surreally plausible...

NBC forced to apologise after ill-timed ad features a monkey doing gymnastics - right after showing Gabby Douglas' gold medal victory



A bit of psychological projection from Jack here. Manages to blame the fall of Western Civilization on others rather than direct it to his own ilk.

Maybe it would have been sensible to not air an ad of a monkey doing gymnastics during the gymnastics section of the Olympics. Of course, it is rather ironic, for anyone to think it is funny to denigrate black people by using lower primates as an example.

Of course racist white people never make the association between monkeys and black people

Of course Jack gets to, hypocritically, decide what is offensive to people and what isn't.

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You may say I'm a dreamer.... but I'm not the only one....

Goldmann Sachs, Barclays et al are off the hook, then?

(I bet those cunts can punctuate.)

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Brigate di Transizione

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2184351/Parents-jailed-beating-daughter-17-having-black-boyfriend.html

Mother and father jailed for beating their daughter, 17, for 'bringing shame on the family' by having a black boyfriend


Readers unsurprisingly ignore the terrible actions of the parents in this article and concentrate on the perceived double standards and 1-way-racism.








And this cretin seems to have ignored the numerous references to their racist abuse:

But that's impossible to measure. And it shifts the burden of proof onto the victim. I like the analogy with stepping on someone else's toes: I may not have intended to cause pain, but I have done so; the victim's pain is real and does not require justification; and it's not unreasonable that I should acknowledge my mistake, and the pain I have caused, with an apology. If I do not apologise, well, I come across as a bit of a cunt.

Moreover, as Andy points out, we live in postmodern times, and today's archetypal racist uncle knows how to blur his racist banter with layers of irony. This is the defence that privileged people love to use: I have convinced myself I'm not a racist, therefore if a person of colour has taken offence at something I've said, it's because they're too touchy, or don't have a sense of humour, or are deliberately looking for racism in whatever I say. Personally, I have more faith in black people being able to spot racism than white people, since one of the main benefits of white privilege is to be blind to the myriad ways in which white supremacy pervades our culture. And since I'm not very good at identifying racism, I will certainly be guilty of it — even though I do not condone it. When that happens, it's up to me to say sorry, and to learn from my mistake.

With the obvious exception of the diffference in severity, how is this any different from the Shafilea Ahmed case?

True. It's an uncomfortable story for the Daily Mail, really.

Of course. Naturally if I accidentally offend someone I too would apologise, as any decent person would.

You've taken my comment out of context. I was thinking about a scenario where offence is intend, but doesn't work.
If someone thinks I'm gay, I take no offence because being gay isn't 'a bad thing' so there's no reason to be offended.
However, if someone who is a massive homophobe calls me gay, it might be different. They are trying to be offensive by calling me the worst thing they can think of and are assuming that I share their bigotry. The fact that they think it's a term of abuse means that it becomes one, regardless of my personal feelings. Does that make sense?

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That subtle admixture of the absurd and the surreally plausible...

Oh, I see. Sorry. That makes more sense now.

I sometimes get the opposite — a straight person, usually a woman, mistakenly thinking that by being in my company she can use a word like 'dyke' in a jocular, bonding sort of way. The intention is not malevolent, but unless it's someone I know really really well I consider it an abuse of privilege. I used to put up with it; now she'd be politely asked to fuck off.

That kind of thing depends on the relationship. Close friends get away with saying offensive things to me which an acquaintance would not (stranger's even less so). Context is everything, it's not simply the words which are used but, when and how they are said............ and who says them. What would happen if a lesbian called you a dyke? Would she "be politely asked to fuck off" too?

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That subtle admixture of the absurd and the surreally plausible...

Agree about context.

As for the question, no — it's different, innit? I wouldn't do it myself, though, unless with very close friends — partly because I'm bi and thus a bit suspect to some, partly because I'd worry I was being presumptuous and invasive.

However, I think the debate about causing offence is over-focused on language. I get just as cheesed off with negative behaviour and body language. Last time I was in London, someone was tut-tutting on the underground while my partner was holding my hand. In fact, I'd just come out of the hospital and had started shaking while waiting for the train (it's a side-effect of my meds). I'm not sure who the tutter was, but there was one Mailite-type man reading the Metro newspaper, and he was naturally my #1 suspect!

Problem there is the assumption that the tut-tutting is prompted by you holding hands. It's a good bet that it was, but for all you know (based on the info in your post) he could just have thought you had an appalling taste in shoes. Without wanting to sound frivolous, I'm reminded of an episode of 'Extras', where one character tells another that they are not welcome on a catering bus (this all being on a very hierarchical movie set). The person being shunned is black, but the reason for her ban is due to her job, not her ethnicity. Of course passers-by don't realise this...

I agree that it's often hard to spot a clique or a privileged elite from the inside. And often I think that when comfortable White people say "what's all the fuss about, it's just words", it's because they have never been subjected to a taunt or insult meant to hurt, disempower or remind them of their place, so as far as they're concerned, it is all banter and meant in jest.

Of course, there's plenty who know exactly the power of the words they use, but who dress it up in "everything's a big jolly to me, why can't it be so for others?" terms, while disguising very unpleasant attitudes.

_________________
Ten seconds... the pain begins.

Fifteen seconds... you can't breathe.

Twenty seconds... you give up and turn off the Jeremy Vine show.