A couple brief statements

[bellatrys]

Really brief, not just brief for me - RL has, to mince no words, been dire, and I have been spending most of the last week alternately looking desperately for another job, feeling too sick about having to go in to work to function, and trying to do something that will just possibly be salable in terms of visual art which means that I have to spend

Comments

[david_wisdom]

Does anyone actually *know* - not just shooting your mouth off, not just the typical non-answery asspull speculation - where the beloved conservative anecdote about "niggardly" comes from? With citations?

David Howard, aide to DC Mayor Anthony Williams, used the word in a private conference regarding funding. He resigned, but was later rehired.

And all I'm gonna say about that is that I can think of about half a dozen synonyms for "cheap" off the top of my head that don't sound like racial slurs and are much more commonly used. And that I don't particularly care if a vaguely archaic word that does greatly resemble a racial slur falls out of use, particularly in light of my previous point.

[ginmar]

So who cares if there are other synonyms? Why can't he use whatever word he wants? The word's Scandinavian; who knows what his background is.

So if someone said

[bellatrys]

"pusi ... llanimous," there would be nothing at all questionable about that? There would only be "feminazi overreaction" if anyone said "WTF, dude?"

...or was that deadpan snark?

[bellatrys]

They only had small coffee cups left at the corner store this morning and I'm out at home.

Re: ...or was that deadpan snark?

[rikibeth]

oh noes! I hate it when my brain's only running on half a tank. COFFEE ADDICT, here.

Re: So if someone said

[ginmar]

That's different; by phrasing it that way they're obviously calling attention to the first two syllables intentionally. There's no evidence that this guy was doing this.

Re: So if someone said

[rikibeth]

Is that pronounced with the same emphasis, though? And, again, I'd be WTFing at the WTFers, because it's a word I recognize without thinking about it -- but I'd feel like the one who used that word was trying too hard to show off.

Re: So if someone said

[fledgist]

The problem was black Americans thinking that "niggardly" was related to "nigger".

Re: So if someone said

[fridgepunk]

the thing is that I doubt anyone would even know the real etymology of the word were it not for this whole thing about Political Correctness Gone Mad!!!!! relating to it - to the point that I'm sure part of the appeal of it is that many people had be avoiding using the word because srsly, it's the word "nigger" with a little "ly" on the end! and it's even spelt the same! How many words in the english language are that close to being homophones and yet do not even have funny spellings to distinguish them? Because english may be a terrible kludge of a suite of languages but even it's not that bad!

Which of course is the other level the PCGM! dog wait what have dogs done to you to warrant that kind of comparison? pig, no they're actually quite intelligent animals chickenwhistle goes to, because the scandanavian etymological root of a word that randomly happens to sound very much like a word all tigh'd up with europe's african slave trade is incredibly obscure, and aside from language nerds, no one should really be casually aware of the

Re: So if someone said

[fledgist]

It's not the etymology, it's the meaning. After all, "niggardly" means "miserly", "unwilling to spend money or give goods away", not qualities usually associated with the noun "nigger". The etymology was raised after people complained that the word was related to "nigger" when it was not.

If you are calling me a white racist, please get yourself a new pair of glasses. That's my photograph up there.

As someone who is (a) not white, (b) familiar with both the adverb "niggardly" and the noun "niggard", (c)eager to see you gather chickens to you with a high-pitched whistle, I await your response.

LOL WUT

[fridgepunk]

first of all, I was neither being critical nor attacking you for being white*, secondly, it is highly unlikely that black people are the one ethnic group that has never at any point been accused or hoarding or refusing to share community resources or trying to get something for nothing or generally being a veritable race of stingy gits of some description, and thirdly most chickens will, through the magic of operant conditioning, will generally come running to anyone who makes any kind of noise if it's the time of day you regularly feed them and you have their feed.

check, mate.

* though how do I know that your beard isn't a psuedonym!? Or that you haven't been lacing my tap water with pseudonyms and stealing my essence!?!!?!?!?elevenbackslash!!??!!

My beard knows its name

[fledgist]

...which is Beard.

Black people are not a single ethnic group, even in the United States (though black Americans are often shocked to realise that they are not ethnically the same as Somalis or Nigerians or Jamaicans).

I've been lacing your tap water with oxygen dihydride, however. Just so you know.

Re: So if someone said

[evilstorm]

Your comments, they amuse me.

Re: So if someone said

[fridgepunk]

everything is better with copious spelling errors that occasionally undermines the overall point that is being belaboured! (also The Hat!!!)

Re: So if someone said

[evilstorm]

So teach them otherwise. I mean, seriously, I might as well flip out over the phrase "a chink in my armour" because "CHINK! So you're saying chink = flaw --> YELLOW PEOPLE SUCK, eh? EH?" which of course is absolutely ridiculous. The answer to ignorance isn't to propagate it, it's as simple as going, "No, no you guys, seriously we're not insulting black people, we're sorry English has so many homophones but it really did come from something else entirely".