A few issues I have with the decision that I want to make. The context of the word Pocahontas used again Sen Warren is racist. It was used by the president in a derogatory way and continues to be used as such. Plenty of words on their own are not racist, but when put into context where the meaning is used to incite others it becomes a racist term. Now I won't say what those words are as that would be against the forums rules. To claim that Calling Sen Warren Pocahontas when the term only became an issue after the president used it at his rallies during the campaign as a direct insult makes all other uses by default racist.
The members that are using the term know good and well what the original intent was and continue to do it. Why are other racist terms flagged but this isn't.
Well said.
Excellent and well argued post.
And agreed.
While I like and respect the fact that the mods took the time and thought (and effort) to discuss this particular issue (and the wider issue of racism in general - and indeed, sexism, where it intersects with racism, as it clearly does in this particular case), I agree with
@MacNut on this.
To my mind, the issue isn't simply a matter of whether calling Senator Warren "Pocahontas", is racist, - perhaps, subjectively, it may be argued that it is not.
However, it has become so, once President Trump used that noun to describe her, and by so doing, this has altered the context, and invested that term with the freighted weight of racist insult. Context is everything in such a discussion.
As
@MacNut has pointed out, those that use this term now, are doing so in this context, and knowingly continue to do so, and are thereby reinforcing the racism implicit (and explicit) in the original insult.
But, context is everything. And here, the context is not simply the clearly expressed racism of President Trump (and the fact that this seems to give those who echo his words permission to express themselves thus), but the wider context of the history of the United States and the issue of racism.
Just as the political and cultural fault line of the UK is social class, and the most loaded and hurtful and offensive insults in that society are based on - or derived from - social class, in the United States, the political and cultural fault line - for historical and other reasons - is race.
Insults that derive their offensive power from race carry an especially pernicious power to wound and offend in the United States, precisely because of the fraught (and, at times controversial) history of race relations in the US.
Might I respectfully ask the mods to reflect on this matter further, or, a little more.
