Tolerance

Posted Aug 15, 2012 18:44 UTC (Wed) by daglwn (guest, #65432)
In reply to: Tolerance by corbet
Parent article: Aurora: DEFCON: Why conference harassment matters

We should not censor the ugly truth. People need to see it to understand.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 16, 2012 8:17 UTC (Thu) by ekj (guest, #1524) [Link] (8 responses)

Does that mean you'd *not* toss out the guy who, uninvited, tries to lick the tatoo of one of your female guests at a party in your house, because the rest of the party-guests "need to see the ugly truth" ?

Or do you at some point say: "If you want to stay at my party, you must treat all my friends with respect, if you can't do that I must insist that you leave."

Tolerance

Posted Aug 16, 2012 12:48 UTC (Thu) by tcabot (subscriber, #6656) [Link] (7 responses)

I would definitely bounce the person you describe. Assault and speech, however, are different things and must be treated differently. Censorship is a very, very slippery slope.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 16, 2012 13:07 UTC (Thu) by ekj (guest, #1524) [Link] (6 responses)

Yes. But hateful or harassing speech (especially when it is directed at a minority that you wish to feel welcome), isn't a good thing. And if you silently tolerate it, the minority can easily get the impression that the community accepts this kind of behaviour.

If I had 20 guests over at my place, 3 of which where black, and some person started spouting white-supremacist nonsense, you can be sure that I'd speak up about it, and demand that they either treat everyone with respect, or else leave the premises. They've got the right to free speech, but I have no requirement to let them borrow *my* living-room for the purpose. Furthermore "free speech" is not a "get out of jail free" card that allows you to harass other people.

Harassment that is verbal, is still harassment. It's reasonable, and indeed sensible, to insist that people do NOT engage in harassment of any kind, and to warn and/or expel those who are unable or unwilling to refrain from it.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 16, 2012 13:34 UTC (Thu) by ewan (guest, #5533) [Link]

"if you silently tolerate it"

I think it's fair to note that that isn't what happened here.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 16, 2012 20:17 UTC (Thu) by Lennie (subscriber, #49641) [Link] (4 responses)

If someone started spouting white-supremacist nonsense at my party which didn't even have coloured people I would ask them to stop or leave.

If it wasn't my party I would probably ask the organizer to do the same.

People are different, it would be a boring place without it, but that doesn't mean you can't have respect for others.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 17, 2012 21:21 UTC (Fri) by Baylink (guest, #755) [Link] (3 responses)

I believe "coloured", along with "Negro" and--amazingly--"Black" are now considered unacceptable descriptive terms for what we're not supposed to call "African-Americans", even if they are neither African, nor American.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 18, 2012 13:23 UTC (Sat) by Lennie (subscriber, #49641) [Link] (1 responses)

I'm not from the US, my first language isn't even English. So I have a question for you:

What is the term for people who are not white/Caucasian ?

Non-Caucasian ?

Tolerance

Posted Aug 18, 2012 14:05 UTC (Sat) by andresfreund (subscriber, #69562) [Link]

I am not a native speaker as well, but here - in Germany - when speaking english the term People/Person of color is used at times. I think I remember this being used in the US as well.

Tolerance

Posted Aug 18, 2012 18:40 UTC (Sat) by paulj (subscriber, #341) [Link]

In the UK "black" is in common use and does not appear to be offensive.