Because they’re asking you to.
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Go back and read the top of the thread. @chgoliz and @Mindysan33 answer your question right out of the gate.
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I said I agree that if that’s what women want I will pay attention to the words I use, I also said I don’t remember using the word to describe any women.
I asked the question because I’ve seen a lot of posts lately talking about it but no one really said what the problem is. The title of this topic included and why you shouldn’t so I thought I’d ask. I guess even discussing it is a problem. There’s some sarcasm above and it wasn’t until several posts in that someone posted what I should be searching for to understand the issue.
But if women don’t like it why is there a category on this blog titled Strong Female Characters?
And why is that song okay?
And why is any question in an attempt to learn something treated like it should not be asked?
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So…you have questions?
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Because in “Strong Female Characters” it is a necessary disambiguating adjective, which includes girls. (But definitely not the implicit-by-exclusion “Strong Male Characters”)
When you’re talking about things like doctors and pilots, and you feel the need to disambiguate by gender and/or sex, then it’s acceptable on the condition that it’s not based on male as the unspoken default. “Male pilots and female pilots have different experiences” is OK, “Pilots and female pilots” is not.
Also, English has a thing where any adjective can be nouned. Typically this referring to woman as “females” is only acceptable if you’re a Ferengi bartender.
That’s because when this process happens in relation to people, it often seems to turn those adjectives into epithets.
Take the medical condition where the nervous signals to the muscles cause them to contract all the time. This is called “spasticity”, and the adjective is “spastic”. A muscle can be spastic, but when it was turned into a noun and applied to people with the condition, and they were called “spastics”, it almost immediately turned into a term of abuse. Which is why the Spastics Society renamed itself to Scope.
When you take an adjective, noun it, and use it to describe people, it really sounds like you’re reducing those people to that quality and turning it into an epithet.
Not only do women not want you to reduce them to the quality of being female, they would also quite like femaleness not to be turned into an insult even by unconscious linguistic processes that most people don’t even see, but can feel.
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No it’s not, really. It’s the “constant need to repeat ourselves and it’s still not working” that’s the problem.
Think of it like this…have you ever had someone call you “boy” or some other word that made you feel “less than”, just out of tradition, without even thinking about how it might affect you?
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some of us have been repeating this kind of shit for much of our lives… Might be nice if some dudes listened…
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Exactly. It’s not a hard concept and it’s been explained ad nauseam at this point. It’s almost as if some people are trying their best not to understand.
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We’re starting to approach “Why can’t I use the n-word when it’s used in rap songs” levels, aren’t we?
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The analogy I was going to use is that it’s generally OK to use the phrase “Black people” but much more offensive and dehumanizing to say “the Blacks.” Again, noun vs. adjective.
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Hope that helps.
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As a man, I like to go to women doctors because they fucking listen.
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So, this makes me think you haven’t actually read the thread…is this truly all you’ve taken away from it? These were a few before yours, so should’ve informed your query:
What is unclear in that?
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That’s fine, and you won’t go wrong there.
It just seems like you kind of selectively chose what to read from the thread, and didn’t gain any deeper understanding of the issue other than, “because I said so,” even though several posters have tried to share the bigger picture. It is what it is. Baby steps.
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Because it’s dehumanizing (used for animals and almost never used to distinguish men as males) and othering and people have said this many times on this blog. No one needs you to agree though and I certainly don’t care to “convince” you. Say it all you like. People will just like you less for it and that’s fine. No one really cares how popular you make yourself and with what crowd but you most likely.
Let’s go Brandon! It’s a free world say what you like.
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STARTING to???
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Obligatory:
FFS.
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