Some people are in fact responsive to “that’s a slur; the preferred term is X”, especially if X isn’t a barbarous use of language, if they were using the slur to encompass the whole group and got caught by a euphemism treadmill or just pick up their vocabulary from sources unsympathetic to Xes. And you don’t have to reject an offered word for being a syllable longer if you want to make that tradeoff. I think this is a case of Postel’s law, or should be.
Hmmm. I would be responsive to “that’s a slur,” but the follow-on “the preferred term is X” raises my hackles. The former is merely a request to be polite; the latter feels like someone is trying to dictate vocabulary to me.
Oh, I certainly didn’t mean to imply that there weren’t cases of suitable replacements for slurs (or that it wouldn’t be valuable to find such); rather, I only meant to claim that there existed a case where it isn’t obvious how to find a suitable replacement (contra jimrandomh above).
Some people are in fact responsive to “that’s a slur; the preferred term is X”, especially if X isn’t a barbarous use of language, if they were using the slur to encompass the whole group and got caught by a euphemism treadmill or just pick up their vocabulary from sources unsympathetic to Xes. And you don’t have to reject an offered word for being a syllable longer if you want to make that tradeoff. I think this is a case of Postel’s law, or should be.
Hmmm. I would be responsive to “that’s a slur,” but the follow-on “the preferred term is X” raises my hackles. The former is merely a request to be polite; the latter feels like someone is trying to dictate vocabulary to me.
I think it’s much better to offer a replacement than not.
Oh, I certainly didn’t mean to imply that there weren’t cases of suitable replacements for slurs (or that it wouldn’t be valuable to find such); rather, I only meant to claim that there existed a case where it isn’t obvious how to find a suitable replacement (contra jimrandomh above).