I wouldn't want Bajor in the Federation if I was a Fed
- Thread starter You_Will_Fail
- Start date
Ro is an unreliable, self-righteous liar and traitor (not to mention a complete bitch, but that's my opinion). Bajor in the Federation? Yeah, if Kira is anything to go by. Ro? Hell no.
/rant
As an avid supporter of the Cardassian Union and a philologist, hostile rants are my speciality.
Fundie is a pejorative for fundamentalists, maybe spent the extra second and spell it out. Or was it your intent to be fashionable derogatory towards others?
Umm, what's wrong with using a pejorative for people you deeply loathe? That's sort of the point.
Or are you of the once strangely common conviction that it's okay to fire-bomb and bayonet Japanese women and children to death as long as you don't call them Japs?
There's no real point about trying to find something good and commendable (or even tolerable) about fundamentalism, or pretending to be polite around it. If somebody deserves a crowbar across the face, he ain't gonna get called Honorable Sir.
Timo Saloniemi
Or are you of the once strangely common conviction that it's okay to fire-bomb and bayonet Japanese women and children to death as long as you don't call them Japs?
There's no real point about trying to find something good and commendable (or even tolerable) about fundamentalism, or pretending to be polite around it. If somebody deserves a crowbar across the face, he ain't gonna get called Honorable Sir.
Timo Saloniemi
The use of pejoratives, done often enough, can bring about the exact sort of dehumanizing consequences you describe. If you speak it often enough, it becomes truth, and once you've placed someone underneath you in that manner, then acting indiscriminately and with cruelty becomes easier.
As far as fundamentalists go--there are violent, spiteful, cruel ones. I have no problem calling them out on their behavior. And I do so.
However, I have never seen people like the Duggars act cruelly towards anybody or bash them for believing differently, and their beliefs could be called fundamentalist too because they are very conservative. (I actually met the wife in this show, BTW, and she is just as nice IRL.)
http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/tv/19-kids-and-counting
One could also call the Amish and Mennonites fundamentalist too, because of their great conservatism.
But using a pejorative lumps everybody together--judging them not by individual behaviors (which should be criticized when they are cruel), but making assumptions without looking at the individuals.
As far as fundamentalists go--there are violent, spiteful, cruel ones. I have no problem calling them out on their behavior. And I do so.
However, I have never seen people like the Duggars act cruelly towards anybody or bash them for believing differently, and their beliefs could be called fundamentalist too because they are very conservative. (I actually met the wife in this show, BTW, and she is just as nice IRL.)
http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/tv/19-kids-and-counting
One could also call the Amish and Mennonites fundamentalist too, because of their great conservatism.
But using a pejorative lumps everybody together--judging them not by individual behaviors (which should be criticized when they are cruel), but making assumptions without looking at the individuals.
...Which in about 50% of the cases is the right thing to do anyway.
The world doesn't consist of universal truths, least of all when it comes to things like manners or mores. Cruelty for one is an accepted human mechanism for coping with certain people and phenomena, even if it is not acceptable in certain other cases. And the empowered majority reserving the right to establish that somebody "deserves what he gets" is at the very foundation of the justice systems of the world, not to mention democracy.
Quite apart from that, pejorative is a flexible thing. What may sound unacceptable to some cannot be argued to be unacceptable to all. If somebody feels "gypsy" is a strong expression of disgust at a lifestyle and cultural identity, and somebody else feels it is a mild expression and fully intended as such, there's a conflict between those two but not necessarily much more. Yet if a few hundred million somebodies feel "nigger" is a strong expression of disgust at a lifestyle and cultural identity, then the somebody using it as a mild one is in deep trouble. With "fundie", we're certainly nowhere near "nigger" yet, while OTOH it's pretty much okay to feel negatively about those folks in terms of democracy - the majority being mildly pissed off etc. rather than a minority going all irrational with hatred etc.
...I wonder how "Cardie" in the Trek universe fares here. Mild, strong? Backed by majority sentiment, minority sentiment? Massively negative sentiment, minor annoyance? Deserving, undeserving?
Timo Saloniemi
The world doesn't consist of universal truths, least of all when it comes to things like manners or mores. Cruelty for one is an accepted human mechanism for coping with certain people and phenomena, even if it is not acceptable in certain other cases. And the empowered majority reserving the right to establish that somebody "deserves what he gets" is at the very foundation of the justice systems of the world, not to mention democracy.
Quite apart from that, pejorative is a flexible thing. What may sound unacceptable to some cannot be argued to be unacceptable to all. If somebody feels "gypsy" is a strong expression of disgust at a lifestyle and cultural identity, and somebody else feels it is a mild expression and fully intended as such, there's a conflict between those two but not necessarily much more. Yet if a few hundred million somebodies feel "nigger" is a strong expression of disgust at a lifestyle and cultural identity, then the somebody using it as a mild one is in deep trouble. With "fundie", we're certainly nowhere near "nigger" yet, while OTOH it's pretty much okay to feel negatively about those folks in terms of democracy - the majority being mildly pissed off etc. rather than a minority going all irrational with hatred etc.
...I wonder how "Cardie" in the Trek universe fares here. Mild, strong? Backed by majority sentiment, minority sentiment? Massively negative sentiment, minor annoyance? Deserving, undeserving?
Timo Saloniemi
Back onto Trek...I always had the impression that "spoonhead" ranks more severely than "Cardie," though Cardie certainly did offend Cardassians who heard it. The characters who used it were certainly not shown to have good attitudes towards Cardassians. In O'Brien's case we saw him have to work on that attitude--it was one of the major flaws of the character in my opinion. Getting publicly burned the way he did (in a way similar to what happened to Kirk with his Klingon remark) had to be quite a painful lesson to him. The only time you see him use it again after "Tribunal" is in "Empok Nor," when he is literally being hunted down and killed by drug-maddened Cardassians.
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Cardie
"Spoonhead" was severe enough that it almost got cut from "Empok Nor" on grounds that it would be like a Starfleet officer using the n word.
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Spoon_head
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Empok_Nor_(episode)#Background_information
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Cardie
"Spoonhead" was severe enough that it almost got cut from "Empok Nor" on grounds that it would be like a Starfleet officer using the n word.
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Spoon_head
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Empok_Nor_(episode)#Background_information
Wow. Some of the language in this thread I did not expect to have to deal with in a Star Trek forum.
But Star Trek addresses that very issue in so many interesting ways. Our characters are shown expressing downright hatred at things we may hold dear, such as religion, economy or bettering of lives through genetic manipulation. On the other hand, they are shown appreciating things such as Khan Singh's rule of terror. So the relativity of morals and the persistence of extremist views is on the forefront often enough. Derogatory remarks fly back and forth, and racism is a leading attitude for a number of well-liked characters. It only feels natural IMHO to discuss these ideas in the forum as well, without shying away from the approach used by the show itself.
One wonders if O'Brien ever had a chance to get confronted on his attitudes before. He seems to be the sole Border Wars veteran aboard the E-D, or at least never seeks the company of commiserators. The otherwise well-educated heroes seem rather ignorant of said Wars and O'Brien's plight. And we never learn of a phase in O'Brien's life that would have fallen between him serving on the Rutledge or the front (where "spoonhead" was probably among the milder words used in daily official briefings) and coming aboard the E-D.
Timo Saloniemi
One wonders if O'Brien ever had a chance to get confronted on his attitudes before. He seems to be the sole Border Wars veteran aboard the E-D, or at least never seeks the company of commiserators. The otherwise well-educated heroes seem rather ignorant of said Wars and O'Brien's plight. And we never learn of a phase in O'Brien's life that would have fallen between him serving on the Rutledge or the front (where "spoonhead" was probably among the milder words used in daily official briefings) and coming aboard the E-D.
Timo Saloniemi
The first time we know--in canon--of O'Brien being confronted about his racist attitudes is by Keiko in "The Wounded" (TNG). Indirectly Daro confronted him as well...not by being in his face about it, but rather by being on his best behavior. (As for Daro's own motivations, I think there are some interesting possibilities on why it was so important to him to get this right.)
Keiko then confronts him again in "Cardassians." But I think the biggest one was "Tribunal," where he had his rude language beamed across the entire quadrant. I'm pretty sure the fact that was public viewing everywhere would have to have been pretty humbling. NOT that the Cardassians were justified in that show trial. I simply mean that would have to have been a consequence of it.
On the conduct and name-calling towards people IRL...I don't think that's something we should just accept as "natural."
Keiko then confronts him again in "Cardassians." But I think the biggest one was "Tribunal," where he had his rude language beamed across the entire quadrant. I'm pretty sure the fact that was public viewing everywhere would have to have been pretty humbling. NOT that the Cardassians were justified in that show trial. I simply mean that would have to have been a consequence of it.
On the conduct and name-calling towards people IRL...I don't think that's something we should just accept as "natural."
I think that is more the fault of the extreme focus of the show on its starring cast, and the fact that over a 1000 people were just a number. We never did have much of a sense of culture and diversity on the ship, nor was the retconned Cardassian wars addressed too often on the programme to build up a sense of community from it.
I like how Christopher Bennett addressed the scale and nature of the conflict in his novel, The Buried Age. You can see his annotations dealing with it, in part, here.
Agreed - but that doesn't mean it should be considered uninteresting or unworthy of contemplation.On the conduct and name-calling towards people IRL...I don't think that's something we should just accept as "natural."
In any case, whoever decided that "fundie" is offensive? It's just an abbreviation, for chrissakes! It really takes an expert to know that "Jap" is not a welcome shortening of "Japanese" or "Paki" a polite short form of "Pakistani". And never mind that, "fundamentalist" is at least as offensive as "fundie" in actual content... If taken that way. But insults are always in the ear of the beholder, and the party doing the insulting has no power over whether his utterings are considered desultory or not. "Paki" is regularly used among the, well, Paki, although use by anybody else will probably result in a big stick shoved in the Khyber.
In the most general terms, anybody declaring a person's contribution to a conversation irrelevant because of his use of offensive language is just establishing herself as a doofus first grade. Language policing is the last refuge of the incompetent, after all.
This in its own interesting way establishes the scale of things: the galaxy immediately around the Federation is so vast and its history so varied that entire wars can disappear in the cracks easily enough. And no doubt thousands of stories are taking place aboard the Enterprise all the time, even if we only follow a select few of them.
Timo Saloniemi
