this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2023
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Didn't someone really waste time writing an article about statements like "falling on deaf ears" being hurtful? There saved everyone a click.
Why is it hard for you to believe? If someone is telling you that the language you’re using is harmful, is your reaction really to say, basically, that you don’t care and you’re going to continue using it?
If you're offended by the phrase falling on deaf ears, which is very much just an expression, then you need to go outside more. Nobody is trying to offend deaf people with that phrase.
If nobody is trying to be offensive, and deaf people (one of whom wrote the linked article) are saying that using “deaf” in this way is offensive, and you continue to use it because you don’t care… you’re being offensive. Is it really so hard to change the language you use?
Intent is everything and if someone is clearly not using a word with the intent to offend you, you being offended is a YOU problem, not a them problem.
And before you go say shit like able people can't know how bad it feels.
1, I'm not "abled".
2. I've had people call me these words meaning to offend and hurt me. THAT actually does hurt. These words being used without any intention to hurt or offend anyone, doesn't matter to me at all.
And sometimes, using those words to offend is perfectly appropriate to express what you want to convey.
Like how many Americans have absolutely retarded levels of overblown reactions with a word like cunt.
Intent is actually not everything. Legally speaking, if I run over a person with a car and they die, I can’t get away with it by saying, “well, I didn’t intend to kill them, so there shouldn’t be a consequence”. The impact of that person’s death is greater. It’s not murder, but it’s still manslaughter.
Ableist language is the same: it still causes harm, but obviously not harm to the body.
Legally speaking, if you didn’t intend to kill them it actually does change the consequences.
There are a lot of two vehicle, or pedestrian, traffic fatalities that don't result in manslaughter charges.
https://globalnews.ca/news/8973010/man-lying-in-road-hit-car-killed-comox-valley-rcmp/
To date, no charges have been laid.
Intent is huge.
Even if no charges are laid, someone is dead. The intent to kill wasn’t there, but the impact is that someone is dead. It doesn’t matter if a person didn’t mean to kill someone, but again, someone is dead.
This is why impact matters far more than intent. This is an extreme example, but it still applies in all situations. Someone might want to argue their way out of offending someone else, but the damage has already been done.
In the valid to the discussion case you said something with no intent to harm or insult anyone and you didn't harm them, they decided you harmed them.
In the case of a car accident, you literally fucking killed someone.
It's Apples and Oranges, a false equivalence argument that goes straight into the trash.
Both are about impact vs intent. Both are about harm. I’m sorry you can’t see that.
If I accidentally spill hot coffee on you and say that it was an accident, you’re still going to be upset. You’d be more upset if I said I did it on purpose, but let’s not pretend that being offensive accidentally is okay.
You're being deliberately obtuse and wilfully ignorant if that's what you took from the article.
And not that you care, but it isn't about offence
So, deaf people say "Please don't say that," and you are the smug asshole that says "How the fuck will they know what I say, they're fucking deaf. Open season on insults boys!"
No, I'm saying there is nuance to phrases like this. There are multiple meanings to the word deaf. Jesus, it's like talking to a brick wall sometimes.
They're trolls from Hexbear. They like to label us as ableist and bigots because it makes them feel superior.
I have no idea what hexbear even is. I don't disagree with everything in the article, just think saying phrases like falling in deaf ears, or a dumb decision, is way extreme on the scale of this is problematic language.
A bunch of Hexbear concern trolls cosplaying as social justice warriors.
That's fine but answer the question.
That's exactly the mentality they have.
Any thought that goes contrary to them being perfect turns them into petulant brats that allow them to justify having a hissy fit against the left.
Dude, I'm about as left leaning as it gets. The mental illness comments mentioned in the article, sure, that's kind of problematic. But statements that are literally just expressions that have been used for probably half a century or more like "falling on deaf ears". Gimme a break. Find something actually a problem to focus on, like the climate crisis, or the Assault on trans rights in the U.S.
not proudly flaunting ableism and refusing to listen to people with the actual lived experience, the way you are, you're not.
in other words: fuck disabled people
Yeah, definitely didn't say 'fuck disabled people'. This is literally a made up problem.
Is using racist language a “made-up problem”? If not, how is racist language different from ableist language?
People who are affected are trying to tell you it's not a made up problem. It is your ego and aversion to criticism and personal development that is telling you otherwise.
Language changes. We’ve stopped using some expressions because we’ve realized how hurtful they are — the n word, all sorts of slurs related to being LGBTQ2S+, etc. Here’s one more. Doubling down on this is exactly like arguing that you should still be allowed to use the n word because it’s been used as an “expression” for more than half a century.
Not even sort of the same thing. The n word is a racist term people use to intimidate people. Falling on deaf ears is an expression used with a specific meaning. Now if it was intended as an intimidation tactic or something to make people fearful for their life or insult them that'd be different. This is neither of those things.
There’s a difference between intent and impact (which is in and of itself a pretty important concept in antiracism). Basically, impact always trumps intent. If I use a phrase that insults someone else, and I said “I didn’t mean it that way, so you shouldn’t feel insulted”… well, that doesn’t work. It’s a pretty privileged position to say that an ableist expression is value neutral. If somebody is saying that a phrase is not okay with them, why argue? What’s the harm in just going, “Okay, I’ll stop using that phrase”? People don’t generally make up words to get offended at, and certainly don’t write articles (multiple articles, multiple books, multiple YouTube videos…) to try to invent outrage unless they’re trying to discredit this topic. If someone says that your language is harmful or discriminatory, what does it cost you to listen to them and to change the words you use?
“If you're comparing the badness of two words, and you won’t even say one of them? That's the worse word.”
I admit I didn’t read the article, but I can say that with the phrase in question of “fall on deaf ears”, it’s a complicated situation. The phrase is poetic in nature and I’m hesitant to try and erase this particular phrase from modern day. I have fear that there will be an over correction towards being non offensive and that creativity as a result will suffer. As someone who has a fondness for poetic expression, this feels like a “throwing the baby out with the bath water” type of situation.
But what’s great about this is finding new and creative ways to express yourself! “My points fell on rocky ground” — Biblical allusion. “They believed me as if I were Cassandra” - Greek. “My words fell on them like the sun under an umbrella.” If you want to keep the synecdoche, “Their ears weren’t ready to hear me”. There’s opportunities to be really creative and poetic if you’re interested in language as rhetoric!
Colloquially, nobody will blink at “They refused to listen” or “It was like I was talking to a tree”.