Comments on: Sex

By: Calfy

Calfy — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 00:30:50 +0000

Absolutely, though Pip’s point makes me think that transgender probably is a better term than transsexual. On the whole trans people can only assume a gender and become recognised as masc. or fem. rather than become male or female. Genders are quite probably a load of nonsense though (I can’t think of many ‘feminine’ qualities that are essentially female, and the ‘masculine’ traits are nowt for a man to be proud of). And if a ‘woman in a man’s body’ would like me to ascribe a feminine gender to possessive adjectives whilst referring to ‘em [as in 'her'] then I’ve no problem with that, (despite revelling in using ‘they’, ‘them’ and ‘theirs’ as a gender-neutral singular pronoun).
And secretly I do like knowing that women are “blonde” whilst men are “blond” and other little quirks of English.

By: john malpas

john malpas — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 00:31:28 +0000

Political correctness is the latest substitute for religeon. Know what to believe and when to believe it makes you definitely one up.
In the good old days there would be such quibbles anbout religious nuances. And these quibbles could be purely pedantic or bloodily authoritarian.
Come to think of it in a lot of the world it still is.

By: Philipa

Philipa — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:17:21 +0000

“Lazy people have taken a sweet and innocent scientific word and corrupted it into something altogether more sleazy”

Like they did with ‘gay’ ?

I love this post, Blue. Excellent.

Can I add a little something though? Chromosomes. What I mean is “If you are a man who would prefer to be a woman or vice versa there is nothing wrong with that. Nobody cares.” True, very true. But if you are a man you can never be a woman. Oh you can chop your penis off and take hormones to grow bigger breasts. But you don’t grow a womb or ovaries and your chromosomes don’t suddenly change from John to Jane. No-one actually changes sex, or gender. It’s just window dressing really.

I am a woman. That’s a very special thing, just as a man is a special thing. And whilst there may be the occasional natural aberration, you can’t be me by taking a few pills of having a doctor cut and paste. Women are far more than that. There is no such thing as a sex change.

By: Dave H

Dave H — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 14:28:28 +0000

“Have you seen the Tenth Edition of the PC-speak dictionary?” “No, said Winston.”

As has already been touched on, saying the name of the country whose capital city is Islamabad (or is it Karachi?) creates a major dilemma, because you can’t say ****stan without saying ****, the mere mention of which gets you dragged from your bed at 3 a.m. by armed police. This being a land of free speech, after all.

I’ve found the best solution is to pronounce it the way Benazir Bhutto used to (she was an Oxford lass, and ought to have known about these things): Pah-harkistan. Simples.

The problem with that is, of course, the inevitable day when you hear: ‘typical ****ing Pah-harkis, always causing trouble.’ What to do then?

By: Letters From A Tory

Letters From A Tory — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 09:17:57 +0000

“Why wrap it up in a politically correct blanket of old nonsense?”

Because they can. The PC Brigade need no other reason.

By: MTG

MTG — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 08:55:49 +0000

I feel obliged to feign outrage on the next occasion you call me a Brit, VonS.

By: dickiebo

dickiebo — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 08:11:54 +0000

I think that most of these politically incorrect words are only unacceptable to most people by the way they are used. We all know, very well, whether we are intending a sleight or not by the way that we use the word ‘Paki’. Some words, like ‘nigger’ are clearly unacceptable nowadays, but most of the no-no words are sometimes OK. Whoever thought that Robertsons’ Marmalade would have been stopped from having their golliwog logo? Absurd.
When good men say nothing………………………

By: JuliaM

JuliaM — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 05:51:23 +0000

“This is not an isolated linguistical occurrence.”

No, it isn’t. Control the language, control everything…

By: Richard Elliot

Richard Elliot — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 01:31:03 +0000

Language isn’ static, but evolving as I am sure you’d agree.

I think the evolution of words is a cultural thing. I noticed that during the recent Pakistan cricket tour of Australia, it was perfectly acceptable to refer to the visiting team as “Pakkis’. In the UK it would be a racist outrage.

I don’t know how or why culture / society attaches new meanings / emphasis to a word. An idea for someone’e dissertation! The examples I can think of all seem to stem from a movement or campaign (formal or informal) to bring and issue to the fore and take ownership of a word.

By: Furor Teutonicus

Furor Teutonicus — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 00:40:24 +0000

XX Why wrap it up in a politically correct blanket of old nonsense?XX

Because without this “P.C”, these imbicilin no marks would never stand a cats chance in Hel of getting their “15 minutes of fame”.

It is the ONLY hope they have in life of EVER getting noticed outside of their own living room.

Arsehole wannabees to a man.

Of course, I have got to the stage where I would have answered “Oh, O.K then would describing it as a queer with it’s bollox cut off suit you better”?

I would never have thought of it before “P.C”, but now I am so pssed off at bioeng “told” what to do, I could not give a shit if any one is offended or not. In fact I hope they ARE!