I just got up from conversation with a couple of older black men, that I said “well I got to go back to work and start cracking the whip.” And it occurred to me then that it was probably a really insensitive stupid thing to say.
Sadly, it hadn’t occurred to me until it’s already said.
I think this is a fantastic example of what you’re talking about.
On its face, “cracking the whip” doesn’t need to be seen as offensive. Humans have collectively spent far more time using whip cracks to motivate animals than fellow humans, I suspect.
However, the determination of offensive speech is not in the hands of the speaker, but rather in the reception by the listener. That is to say, you can have the purest of intentions but if someone is offended by what you say, no amount of explaining takes away the initial offense. And generally you don’t GET to do that explaining. Damage is done, and that person may then avoid you or already have a shifted opinion of you.
I’ve had to learn this lesson the hard way. And fortunately have had friends who were willing to tell me that I had offended them when I thought what I said was completely benign.
I hate how everybody else gets to judge whether or not someone’s speech is offensive, regardless of what someone intended
That’s just how humans are. It’s not just about words but actions too. If you get drunk and drive your vehicle and hit and kill someone you go to jail. You didn’t intend to kill anyone so why should you be held responsible? Sure intent matters but it’s not the only thing that matters.
If you get drunk and drive, you had the intention to do something you knew could result in someone being killed. The intent very much matters in determining responsibility, and it’s the reason you’d likely be charged with involuntary manslaughter, but not murder.
Though some people have been convicted of murder in such cases.
My point wasn’t that intent doesn’t matter, it’s that a lack of intent doesn’t mean you can get off. You didn’t intend to kill anyone but still get charged for killing them.
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That doesn’t mean a lack of intent will absolve you from crimes. If so things like negligent manslaughter wouldn’t exist a people wouldn’t be in jail for accidently killing someone.
The only thing I hate is the impatience with which some people act when something offends them.
I get that anger or frustration is the motivator but if this person who offended you is not just some random asshole, speak up and explain first. Maybe some people aren’t pieces of shit, they’re just repeating phrases they’ve heard a million times and never thought about.
Not everyone’s had that moment of realization that there is a ton of colloquial slang that is (or has been repurposed to be) a really fucked up dog whistle.
Yeah it sucks but also it’s both gut feelings and self defense against bad actors.
Being a person is hard and that’s one of the ways. But also we get to decide how we respond to it. Some things like OP’s example naturally feel “oh fuck yeah I shouldn’t’ve said that” other things leave a conflict of opinion.
Words can hurt. And intentions matter when we hurt people but they aren’t the only thing that matters. Someone hurt in a car crash caused by you driving poorly may decide that they don’t want to give you another chance to drive with them in the car and that’s their choice.
How we respond to accidentally hurting people though will speak volumes about us. Do we apologize and attempt to change, ever striving to be a more positive force in everyone’s lives? Or do we lash out or respond with apathy, even when third parties say we’re in the wrong? I know who I’m trying to be, and I hope others see the value in that person.
I watched a college professor asking a Korean if they ever considered the work “Nega” (you) could be construed as offensive to people. Like, bruh.
The Spanish community having to pick a new name for a color (as if the new one wouldn’t be used the same way).
Screw this racist comment! ;)
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There’s a 100% chance that you didn’t get the joke.
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And yet, you are.
Descriptively speaking, I think that it’s more complex than it looks like - the determination depends on the linguistic community, not just the listener.
Whether offense exists is more on the listener (or audience rather). Whether any action (a simple “sorry” or more severe) should be expected is the complicated part.
The offence existing or not can’t depend solely on the listener, because existence is an objective trait and feeling offended is subjective. Your parentheses get it though - it includes the audience (the linguistic community, not just the listener). I’ll use a silly example to show that.
Let us suppose that someone (“Bob”) got offended by your usage of the word “listener”, claiming that you’re insensitive towards people who communicate through sign languages, and since they’re mostly deaf that you would be ableist. (It’s insane troll logic, but bear with me.)
Bob can certainly feel offended by that. But that won’t change anything, if other people do not consider it offensive. At most they’ll tell Bob “you’re making shit up, touch grass” and call it a day.
The picture however would change if Bob got offended by something and people around him agreed with him.
Both are complicated, I believe.
Maybe you’re right. I don’t know. I’m now thinking about someone going off on a racist tirade alone in the woods. I guess that’s offensive.
But with your example, if you are offended by “listener” then offense exists. The greater community advisory corrective action could be “no action required, don’t even say ‘sorry’ is you don’t want to”. What action is taken does not change the fact that I offended someone. There could be a social-sphere that actually comes down on the other side and says “we don’t use that word here”, I don’t know. But I wouldn’t feel right trying to argue about.
I want to be clear to anyone reading this, no I do not think there is or should be anything like a formal committee. Just the social-sphere you wish to inhabit.
I get what you’re saying, but nobody who says they are going to start cracking the whip is talking about training animals. Even if they were, that’s not an inoffensive metaphor, either. You’re either comparing subordinates to slaves or animals. You’re suggesting that physical violence, the threat of torture, is an appropriate motivator, or you wish it were. If that’s not what you’re saying, then you shouldn’t say that, even as an exaggeration or a joke.
It is an offensive metaphor. You may not offend everyone, but if you have offended someone, it’s not their fault you said something offensive. They didn’t choose to be offended, and made no determination about what you meant. You should say what you mean, clearly, and with intent. Carelessness is not an excuse for using offensive language.
@themeatbridge
Not training animals. But I’m pretty sure many of the people who use that phrase think they are talking about horse-drawn carriages, as per the etymology given by the American Heritage Dictionary.
I think that’s more likely what @TheRealKuni was referring to.
It’s still best to avoid it of course.
Cracking a whip near a horse makes it run in the direction you want at the speed you want. That’s training an animal. Employees or subordinates aren’t horses to be frightened with loud noises, either.
So, the sleigh driver who wastaking his family for an hour-long ride was training the animal? It was also used to make recalcitrant or reluctant work animals perform better while working. You could call that training, I suppose, but it’s a bit of a stretch. It also wasn’t uncommon for race horses to be whipped to make them go faster. I don’t know if it still is, it’s been far too long since I bothered to check anything horse race related. But cracking the whip was used for a very long time to get animals to work. Also people, which is the problem.
Whatever the context, you’re comparing people to animals or slaves. Which is better?
I was talking about history, backed by common knowledge which can be easily corroborated, and not very much my opinion about those acts, except the last sentence.
Also, people are animals. Perhaps you could use that as a reason to treat animals better instead of as an excuse to treat people worse.
You’re fucking with me, right?
Sure I am. It’s not like the first child abuse case in America wasn’t fought using an animal cruelty law…
Do you call the local animal shelter when it’s raining cats and dogs?
What the fuck are you talking about?
It just seemed you were taking an idiom literally.
I was discussing being offended by an idiom because of its connotations, but you’re talking about motivating employees with loud noises. This seems to me like you’re offended by the idiom’s denotation.
So, do you call the local animal shelter when it’s raining very hard, assuming literal cats and dogs are falling from the sky and need homes? :)
(Please don’t take any of that too seriously, I wasn’t trying to be malicious and life is far too short!)
I worry that I didn’t properly communicate my thoughts in my first post, since in your reply to me you seemed to think I was placing blame on the receiver of offensive speech.
I assure you, I’m not blaming anyone for being offended. I would hope that, as language and communication are both complicated and all of us are, quite literally, constantly learning to be better at it, some measure of grace might be extended all around as long as people operate in good faith.
If someone is genuinely offended by something I say, that is not their fault. It means I was careless in what I said, did not properly gauge my audience, or, far more often in my own life experience, spoke in ignorance. Like the time I made a “your mom” joke to a coworker whose mother had died when he was a child. I was ignorant of that fact, and so something this is obviously rude but intended to be playful was received in a way I had not anticipated.
In that circumstance, this coworker informed me and I apologized, and never again made a “your mom” joke to him. But at the same time, he understood that most people our age at the time had living mothers, and was therefore not angry with me. Grace was extended, because life is hard and it isn’t worth being upset when we can get along.
Another time I was speaking to a Jewish coworker and asked about her interpretation of the creation account in Genesis, and was then comparing it with the interpretation of my devout Christian parents. I was genuinely curious, but she later told me that it offended her that I so cavalierly talked about her holy text in a way that seemed to imply shared ownership. Perhaps she thought I was trying to evangelize (I was most certainly not).
To me, this exchange is still somewhat baffling to this day. Both religions read and interpret the Torah, surely she knows that fact already? But I still don’t blame her for being offended. That reaction wasn’t something she decided on. Instead it taught me to be a little more gentle in the way I talk to people about their religion until I know them better.
Circling back around, the idiom “crack the whip” is nearly always, at least in my experience, tongue in cheek. And is usually somewhat ironic: the person saying “I should go crack the whip” is also not working when they say it, after all. To me, it evokes a carriage driver who has become distracted talking to someone and realizing they should be driving the horses.
I fully comprehend that isn’t how everyone may view the idiom, and idioms by their inherently non-literal nature can be subject to broad interpretation. So that particular idiom I avoid using. My entire point was to say that this OP, asking for a list of offensive phrases, is taking an important step in learning to communicate better: they are realizing the onus is on them to avoid offending others.
Now, all of that said, there is equally a responsibility on my part as a listener to allow for grace when someone offends me if I have no reason to assume malice. That is to say, if some relatively thin person says around me, “Ugh, I’m so fat” while looking in a mirror, my initially emotional reaction is to be offended by their ostensible declaration that being fat is disgusting and that therefore they must find me, a much fatter person, so much more disgusting.
But what’s probably happening there is that this person is expressing their own insecurity. One that I share, which is why it offended me. Yes, there’s an outside chance that this person is trying to be a dick and insult me in a roundabout way, but people are usually too self-centered and merely insensitive rather than malicious. So it’s better for me to apply the best interpretation of what they’re expressing and go through life happier.
Anyway, I’m sorry if I offended you! :)
It shouldnt be taken literally, its a metaphor, yes… Whats your point?
I gotta say I agree with you
Fuck you, grow thicker skin. Clear enough?
Crystal clear. You’re angry and want me to go away because it bothers you that I’ve pointed out how offensive certain language can be.
Feel free to hang around by all means. I am sure we agree on way more things than we disagree.
People need to toughen up while also learning how to respect each other.
It’s ironic when the people claiming that everyone else needs to toughen up or grow thicker skin because you don’t like being criticized.
You’re allowed to be offensive, and I’m allowed to tell you when you’re being offensive. If everyone thinks you’re an asshole, that’s not because everyone is too sensitive.
As long as we agree
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I too learned this the hard way, but with an image. Specifically, the “Shut Down Everything” meme. It’s an older meme and I used it in chat room with a much younger (Zoomer) crowd. The image has some resemblance to certain offensive depictions of Black people. I think it was accidental, given that it appears to be more an influence of MS Paint.
Someone got offended and talked to their manager. Unfortunately it was only months later that I got word through my manager. I would have appreciated an opportunity to offer to apologize to them face-to-face. I should have spotted the resemblance and not used the meme.