Interesting Links for 06-10-2017

[andrewducker]

Court suspends Catalan parliament session in order to prevent secession announcement

(tags: Catalonia independence spain politics )

On language and racism in the Netherlands

(tags: Netherlands language racism )

Governments since 1997 have failed to build 600,000 houses

(tags: housing uk epicfail )

Slashdot is 20. Its creator reminisces

(tags: discussion history web geekery )

"We Don't Do That Here"

(tags: society work viaFanf )

Ivory trade to be banned in UK to protect elephants

(tags: elephants UK law )

Grant Morrison's Happy! is coming to tv. Looks intense, violent, and plausibly good

(tags: tv video trailer )

Comments

[calimac]

If white people in the Netherlands prefer to call themselves "blank" rather than "wit", then why not refer to the Vegas shooter as "blank"? Wouldn't that force a greater self-identification with the shooter's ethnicity than using a term they don't use?

I've seen the "We don't do that here" meme in action. It backfires terribly. Newcomers want to do things their way, and deeply resent being told it's not the custom.

Here's something that happens if you ban the ivory trade, as I can report from the US where it's the law: You can no longer import vintage pianos.

[haggis]

From the Twitter thread, it seems like blank has far stronger connotations of "normal" (meaning everyone not white is abnormal) than white does, which is why it is being resisted.

[calimac]

But if a "normal" person commits an atrocity, isn't that an indictment of supposedly "normal" people? I'm not talking about the general usage of "blank" vs. "wit", but the specific implications of what to call the shooter's race.

[haggis]

No, it doesn’t generally work like that for two reasons. One is that calling one group normal, even if you mean it in a statistical way, always makes that group sound like the default and all other groups as weird/abnormal/lesser. That’s why we talk about straight and gay or LGBT, cis and trans, disabled and able-bodied.

Secondly, people from marginalised groups are regularly expected to represent everyone from that group. Eg being discussed as a credit to their race or religion. That does not happen to non-marginalised groups. An individual’s accomplishments or behaviour is assumed to reflect on them and them only.

Finally, it’s obvious by the vociferous objections that describing the shooter as white is making people feel uncomfortable so that seems more effective.

[haggis]

I agree re "We don't do that here" - it feels like dodging the discussion (why is it not ok to say xyz) in the same way that calling racist/sexist/LGBTphobic stuff offensive dodges that question. And as a result, we are stuck having to prove that racism/sexism/LGBTphobia causes actual harm not just hurt feelings.