Holy mother of God *is horrified*

[elspethdixon]

Oh my God, every time I wincingly look back at the ongoing Cultural Appropriation bitchfight of doom, it gets worse. I'm not otherwise going to get involved, but here, I just couldn't help myself.

So, for those, like me, who hadn't seen or heard about Teresa Hayden's post wherein she expresses her anger over people badmouthing her husband (at least, that's what I assume she was doing from the descriptions - I haven't read any of the stuff involving him, either, but apparently he said things that offended people, refused to appologize when called on it, and then deleted his journal because people were yelling at him): Holy fuck, she calls fans of color and those who support them nithings.

In terms of offensiveness, as a former student of old English? Fuck, people, that's, well, not as horrible as the other n-word (which, please God, I hope no one's actually said), but it's pretty god-awful. Like, enough that I was reduced to staring at my computer screen in horror.

She has basically stated that all the people who disagree with her husband (including but not limited to, fans of color) are hateful, malicious, deformed, insane, sexually deviant, possibly cannablistic, sub-human or less-than human things. Because that's what that word means. It means monster. It means Not-a-Person. It means Grendal in Beowulf, the Ring-Wraiths in LotR, the in-bred, cannabalistic degenerate monsters in Lovecraft's "The Lurking Fear."

That's what she's saying fans of color are. Maybe she doesn't really know what the word means and implies, but even if she just thinks it's an old spelling of "nothing" that would be offensive all on it's own.

And to think I used to respect her so much...

ETA: Apparently, there are differences between the Old Norse and Old English definitions, with the Norse one being a far worse insult and the Anglo-Saxon version being a little less on the digusting monster side and more on the outlaw side (see the discussion of several people with more expert knowledge than me in comments). Both versions are still insults, though.

Comments

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

http://elspethdixon.livejournal.com/180488.html?thread=853512#t853512

Er, she's not what I'd call precisely agreeing with you. And you'll notice how aelfgyfu_mead managed to correct Elspeth's understanding of the word WITHOUT calling her stupid.

[elspethdixon.livejournal.com]

Yes, I really appreciated that - though I was prepared for someone with a much better knowledge of the subject to pop up and correct me if it turned out I was wrong.

There's always someone out there on lj who will know more about something than I do.

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

Well, oddly enough there's a difference between:

"You are wrong on this word because you are hysterical"

and

"You are wrong on this word because of X, Y, Z"

Who woulda thunk it?

[elspethdixon.livejournal.com]

There's also the tried and true, "You are wrong and hysterical, because any intelligent person would know that XYZ" (which I've seen elsewhere during the course of this whole thing, largely from medievalist as she explained that people were interogating E. Bear's text from the wrong perspective).

I've been both hysterical and wrong before, and no doubt will be again, but in this case I'm hoping that my not being entirely correct won't cause people to be distracted by etymology/conflicting word definitions from the major issues at hand (TNH openly insulting fans of color in a post full of implied threats). Because the fact that I'm very far from an expert on Germanic languages doesn't make that kind of behavior from someone in her position any less awful.

(frozen)

[laura-holt-pi.livejournal.com]

I haven't called anyone stupid, least of all Elspeth, whose intelligence is in marked contrast to the lack of intelligence on both sides of the current hysteria. If I considered her stupid, I wouldn't try to correct what seems to be an honest mistake.

(frozen)

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

The below is a direct quote of your original comment. Nothing has been either taken away or added:

I really would advise everyone to calm down and check your facts. "Nithing" merely means a person whose actions have made them an outlaw. It has nothing to do with monsters, sexually inclined or otherwise.

Likewise, "draggle-tailed" merely means untidy it's an adjective, not a noun and has never been a term exclusive to women, nor does any meaningful definition of it include the word "slut".

Maybe, if people can stop becoming hysterical over words they don't fully understand, this discussion could leave the realms of playground bullying and tackle some of the issues that all the drama queens pretend to care so much about.

Yeah, from where I'm standing, you called her stupid. You didn't call her out by name, but it was most certainly implied that Elspeth was among the "hysterical" people who "don't fully understand" the situation, and are being "playground bullies", not to mention "drama queens".

(frozen)

[elspethdixon.livejournal.com]

least of all Elspeth, whose intelligence is in marked contrast to the lack of intelligence on both sides of the current hysteria

I think there have been many very intelligent people speaking up in this discussion. deepad, nojojojo, nextian's post on religion, avalon.willow, and spiralsheep all come to mind. Also zvi_likes_tv, yeloson, and sparkymonster's encyclopedic knowledge of past discussion of this nature (seriously, every time I turn around, she's there with some other link to an essay about exactly what people are talking about. I wish my knowledge of, like, *anything* were that extensive).

Also, I am freezing this particular portion of the thread, because it's tangential to the main discussion and I don't want it to turn into an exchange of insults or she said/he said argument. Or into dragging other fans' names through the mud.