On 2/17/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
On 2/17/06, jayjg jayjg99@gmail.com wrote:
"Jew", "Muslim", and "American" are now "epithets", similar to "Nazi", "racist" and "pedophile"? And there's "no moral value" associated with being a pedophile or a racist or a Nazi?
"American" and "Muslim" are epithets along the lines of "Nazi" and "paedophile"? As Steve Bennett said, eep.
Either you are deliberately misconstruing my words or you don't understand what I'm writing.
Where I live, any of the following posters would "provoke righteous outrage from a fairly large proportion of the community: "I'm a pedophile", "I'm a Nazi", "I'm a socialist", "I'm a racist", "I'm a communist", "I'm a Jew", "I'm a Muslim", "I'm a American", "I'm a gay", "I'm hating you", "I'm liking your daughter", "I'm doing it with your mum", "I'm better than you".... etc.. etc... etc...
In the intolerant community where I live, the labels American, Muslim, Nazi and pedophile (among the other listed) on someones front door would all "provoke righteous outrage ... " I personally, believe it is very bad to be a Nazi or a pedophile, I don't think it is any bad at all to be an American or a Muslim. That is my *personal* opinion, and I believe that my view on what labels are "bad" are not shared by the rest of the world. Therefore, I do not want Wikipedia to decide which values of X in "I'm a X" on someones user page is acceptable. If you want Wikipedia to decide that, then please list the values of X that are acceptable and the values of X that are unacceptable.
Also, I checked a dictonary for the word "epithet." Epithet is a synonym for label (term used to characterize a person or thing) such that as "American" in "George Bush is an American" is both an epithet and a label. That was what I meant when using the word epithet. I also found that epithet can be used in a derogatory way such as moron can be an epithet for a person you don't like.
To reduce the likelihood of further misunderstandings, please assume that I'm not a hater of Americans or Muslims. OK?
-- mvh Björn