>I’m going off the rails on an [ableist slur redacted] train. Also: Cat poll!

>I broadly agree with David, Florencem et al. Two comments–Sam, the Feministe viewpoint is a little more reasonable, and a lot more complicated than that. I know about the euphemism treadmill, and it might look like they're just trying to spin the wheel of euphemisms ahead a notch, but they aren't. What they want is more ambitious, for good or ill.They would still be angry if you call your opponenets "neurologically atypical," because their complaint is that you should not equate moral badness or wrong conclusions with mental disability. –Diane K, I read your comments. They were deliberately hostile and inflammatory. I would definitely call them trolling,. In my mind, trolling is not about saying thigns you don't mean (necessarily), trolling is saying things you know will be inflammatory to your audience. I think you should take a step back and rethink whether those posters really deserved some of the things you said to them.

>…And now I've been over to Feministe, and I see that the first polite criticism of David was followed immediately by an aggressively abusive rejection of that criticism. Which was in turn followed by another polite, but more insistent, response to David, which David replied to in a dismissive and hostile way.After that, both sides got louder and angrier, but it's really clear who turned things ugly, and it wasn't the PC police.

>anthonybsusan: "my use of the word "crazy" regarded Janet Folger Porter, who masterminded the "testimony" of two fetuses in the Ohio statehouse."I'll throw in my $0.02. No one can seriously argue that right-wing conservatives are marginalized in the United States, but I would certainly argue that they should be. Calling their actions "batshit insane" (or the like) is not the act of marginalizing an oppressed minority, but the argument seems to be that we shouldn't do so because this may be insulting to batshit insane people. In other words, we can never say "something is seriously wrong with you if you interview fetuses in the Ohio legislature," because other people do indeed have something seriously wrong with them and therefore could find it offensive. If someone asks me not to use certain terms on their blog or in their community, I will absolutely make the effort out of courtesy (which is an outgrowth of empathy and respect), just as I would in their home. But in a public forum or on my own blog it's another matter entirely. I think that we have to be very careful here. In our discourse we need far more mockery and ridicule aimed at stupid and dangerous ideas and people, whether or not other stupid and dangerous people may be offended. To insist that liberals in general should always be above employing potentially offensive tactics is foolish and short-sighted, precisely because language is such a powerful weapon – mockery works. This very blog is built entirely on that concept. If one wants to marginalize right-wing conservatives, anti-feminists, etc., how does one do so without using marginalizing language? And while I agree that we can and should consider the potential harm to marginalized groups of the terms we use, the outright banning of a word like "idiot" in all contexts is…pardon me, idiotic. Maybe I should just change my blog header to read "This is NOT a safe space for idiots."

>@Orion,I will definitely grant that my initial response to Tori was a direct hostile attack. I could see where things were going (another ableist language police shit fight) and I was angry.My mock "apologies" in my later reply were clear sarcasm against everyone. I'm guessing you're referring to my direct attacks against sabrina and Nahida. Sabrina declared that my "awful language" gave her a panic attack. I don't know what the hell we were supposed to do with that piece of information, but I never RSVP to pity parties. Honestly, swearing and vehement disagreement give her panic attacks? So now we must lower the bar to there in order to protect her?Nahida lost it because saurus decided that "butthurt" must be indicative of anal rape. No matter that I didn't use it that way, and the term is commonplace in the feminist blogosphere. One person said it was a RAPE TERM (which I think I'm naming my next Rock Band, btw), and thus it is now verboten by all.So yes, I found both those things offensive, both people looking to claim victim status in order to gain control over other people. Only instead of getting butthurt, I poked. Hard.Why don't we all continue down the road to Duckspeak, only instead of quacking all we say is "privilege."I also found it ironic that I was called "douchey" and no one rose up to defend me after I pointed out how sexist the origins of "douche bag" are. I thought we can't use any words that are -ist?

>I was commenting angry. Part of my point was to argue how absurd I thought people were being. Part of my point was to mock the people I thought were being most so.So yes, trolling. Guilty as charged.Although I will say that I no point was I arguing in bad faith.

>The problem is when well-meaning people jump on you for using "offensive" language based on an *incorrect* understanding of what's offensive to the population they claim to be speaking on behalf of.For example, I have a work colleague who's a member of the a Sioux tribe. I was telling friend of mine about him, and she explained to me that I shouldn't use the term "Sioux"–I should use the term "Lakota" instead–because Sioux is a pejorative term in that community.The problem is, that's not true. I asked my Sioux colleague, but you wouldn't have to–all you'd have to do is Google "Sioux" and you'd find things like the Rosebud Sioux tribe's website. Basically anyone with even the most minimal engagement with the Sioux know that the term is not offensive to Rosebud Sioux (maybe it's offensive to some other Lakota-speaking tribes, I'm not sure). I think it's reasonable to expect that if someone is going to tell you which terms are and aren't acceptable to a community, they should have at least some kind of minimal engagement with that community.

>These discussions bring to my mind, Whoopi Goldberg's "Most of all, I dislike this idea nowadays that if you're a black person in America, then you must be called African-American. Listen, I've visited Africa, and I've got news for everyone: I'm not an African. The Africans know I'm not an African. I'm an American. This is my country. My people helped to build it and we've been here for centuries. Just call me black, if you want to call me anything."

>I just read through the comments section over there. This is so awesome on so many different levels. David, you were doing great standing up for yourself, at least until the mod stepped in. You're in the right, of course, about the language issue. And you defended yourself manfully, I was impressed. You used the internal inconsistencies of their logic to turn the point around, bringing in your supposedly feminist abuse survivor experiencing a trigger from the comments, making it a social class issue, etc. Ha! Awesome. But, that's very similar to what I see Scott Adams as having done in the original essay that upset so many people- he was using the logic of the MRM worldview to derail their own arguments. That seems to be the point that you and others have missed here. (Not that he didn't screw up with his deletion/response/I meant to do that which was pretty lame.)Another thing: I read the MRM blogs myself because they are the only ones talking about father's rights which is an issue that I have a strong personal stake in. I enjoy and appreciate your blog for calling out some of the extremes from these blogs – helps me to keep things in perspective and not let myself get carried away by anger over injustices in my personal experience. So I appreciate what you do for my own reasons even if I often disagree with you. That said, if you are going to call people out for extreme bullshit, you're a hypocrite if you only do it where the MRM is concerned. I thought it was cowardly of you to back down when the mod stepped in, because you were in the right and the language police bullshit was complete bullshit. Not incidentally, this kind of ridiculous victimhood competition in those comments could have been a parody written by an MRM, I doubt even a parody could have gone as far as some of the commentators over there did. I wonder if you can see that this sort of thing is part of what the MRM is reacting against?

>diane k, you used a rape attack against a woman who has on several occasions been extremely open with her situation on feministe. The use of the term butthurt has always been a rape narrative. To dismiss people who have trigger episodes over that is cruel. I'm glad that you personally don't have to live through that but as a rape survivor myself I see your comments as attacking and then you go on to mock her for getting upset over being triggered? Not okay. Not okay at all

>@victor:And you defended yourself manfullyThe thing MRAs but also everyday privilege deniers like yourself never seem to grasp is that people like David aren't interested in being "manly." This is a central part of the feminist critique of social attitudes: concepts like manliness and femininity need to be seriously questioned.I wonder if you can see that this sort of thing is part of what the MRM is reacting against?The main thing the MRM is reacting against is that uppity women are demanding full human being status. Don't sugarcoat it.

>"David would (I'm gathering) never object to someone criticizing the use of "retarded" or "nigger" as an epithet, but when people criticize "idiot," suddenly they're Maoists? Seriously?I just can't take that kind of double standard seriously" The problem is, how can anyone keep up with all of it? I've been visiting Feministe for a good year now, and I can't recall ever seeing the word "idiot" called out. It seems like about every two weeks at Feministe, an otherwise thoughtful post is derailed by policing a single word or phrase within that post. And the thing is, once someone calls a word or phrase out, you get a rush of dogpiling afterward. The moderation on the site is really sloppy at times, and I sometimes think they enjoy seeing this kind of argument unfold. Who cares about the subject matter of the post, let's make sure that we beat this asshole and her/his defenders into the ground for saying the word "crazy!" It makes us all look foolish and silly to outsiders, including those who love to tear feminism to shreds. Furthermore, it makes it that much harder for people to get together and actually work around these issues. I sometimes get the sense that amongst some feminists, it's an all or nothing attitude. You best be the most polished, well read, articulate, up on every last form of oppression known to humankind with all the attending language – or you're an enemy unworthy of respect or consideration.

>The use of the term butthurt has always been a rape narrative.You're assuming that everyone is aware of the perpetual usage of that term being a known rape narrative, and I can only answer for myself here, but that's the first that I have ever seen that term and my initial thought was that it was referring to a spanking. Not everybody is up to speed on the use of various terms or how various terms are understood in different groups.There's nothing wrong with pointing out how a word or phrase might be considered offensive or a trigger within any particular group, but if the aim is to prevent someone from unintentionally provoking (at this point I am referring to the pointing out of David's unintentional provoke), don't be provocative in your explanation. For example, Tori's initiating the topic of the use of the term "idiot":"David, I know that idiot is a pretty commonly used term, but it’s also one with a lot of ableist implications. I agree that what he did was misogynistic, lacking in good judgment, and bad — but I don’t see the need to conflate any of those qualities with cognitive impairment."In my opinion, the drawing attention to the usage of the term, as was done in the first sentence, was okay. But the second sentence ended on a provocative….. almost a holier-than-thou…. note. Even if not meant in a holier-than-thou way, the explanation of why "idiot" has ableist implications could have been handled in a manner more akin to a simile than a metaphor.In addition, I thought GallingGalla's response was even more provocative. If I'm not mistaken (and if I am, I apologize), Feministe is a moderated site and comments are not published until approved by a moderator. Did it not then occur to anyone there to maybe give David the benefit of the doubt in that when he fixed his "typo" and responded about said fix, he may not have seen Tori's comment because it may not have been published yet when David viewed the existing comments? No, GallingGala has to provoke by equating David's lack of response to Tori to Scott Adams' behaviour, "I dunno, but I wonder if you think that those pointing out ableist language in your posts have poor reading comprehension and that’s why you’re not bothering to respond?"

>I have to call into question your title, David. A woman's breast is a beautiful thing that can give pleasure and/or nourish an infant. To use it to refer to misogynists is a terrible insult to boobs everywhere.