Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveinGermany
Lee, let me give you a personal example of this "hysteria", the other year I was home, we'd been out shopping & at the checkout I was piling stuff into bags, being a bloke it's a matter of just cram it in it'll be fine, the step-mum said jokingly to me, "Not like that you mong !"
The peep of the checkout swipe stopped, the young girl (18-20) on the till then told step-mum "you can't say that !" to which we replied "in our house it's practically a term of endearment", she said no more but her attitude had changed entirely.
So you tell me, are we really that far from the "contrived facetious" examples Gordon & I have given. You're the Lad with the Canadian girlfriend I notice, when you visited Canada did you see the same level of intolerant control there ? I'd think not, from what I recall of the Canadians they seem mentally well balanced, more than can be said of some of our progeny.
|
That's a fine example, when similar happens to me I have no problem politely explaining that I was joking and no offence was meant. I do however try not to use words like that because they have caused significant damage in the past to some people. Its not that you cannot say the words but people are increasingly more sensitive about them. It is also up to the person taking such offence to realise the context and if it was meant to harm or not.
Canada has its own political correctness (yep I said Eskimo). We are currently in Virginia and you can easily get yourself in hot water when talking about guns or religion around here. I try to be very culturally sensitive but I don't believe there are words I cant say, just perhaps shouldn't as to be sensitive to how people feel about these words.