An Early AM Question
Jan. 14th, 2010 07:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I know some people on my f-list thought the male nurse House spoke to in episode 6-8 (the Thanksgiving ep) was gay. If you thought this, what specifically made you think it?
You can screen your comment if you like.
ETA: I have turned off comment tracking for this post. If you have anything to say to me, you can send me a PM or direct email. If anyone says anything offensive to you in this post, you can let me know directly.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:27 pm (UTC)i merely suggested a different word, because there are different ones, rather than one that relates back to an unfortunate historical legacy
i didn't say there was harm - i said that there ways to ask the question that reinforce stereotyping, and ways that are more neutral
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:28 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:31 pm (UTC)Call me irrational again, yes, oh god yes!
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:35 pm (UTC)Oh, I'm- I'm- UNNNGH!
God, you're the best. Listen, I'm gonna be busy for like... a few weeks, but, I'll call you sometime, 'kay?
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:42 pm (UTC)you got called on some shit, apparently it made you angry, and you're deciding to overreact to neutral points people made to you
or, you know, dismiss anything that criticizes your comment some more
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 05:56 pm (UTC)I stand by my original points. I stand by my decision to use certain words, and my position that semantics shouldn't be argued about in this kind of situation. I also believe pretty firmly that people should try to avoid being condescending if they want to keep an argument civil and fair, and I saw a full-on fight about to break out between the two of us that would have had nothing to do with the original point and everything to do with us yelling at each other. Nothing I said was going to make me sound non-aggressive in your eyes (because I honestly didn't think I was being aggressive, and thus had no way to change it), and nothing you said was going to sound non-condescending in mine.
You're continuing to try to make me angry, so your accusation of aggression is really a self-fulfilling prophecy. The more you accuse someone of being mad, whether they originally were or not, the madder they're going to become.
Do you really want to continue arguing about whatever it was we were veering into? I can do that. I do have class in a little while, but I'm free besides that. I'm not trying to sound snotty, it just sounds like you had something you wanted to say, and if it's something relevant to the debate, then I welcome it, and I'll accept that I was hasty in judging this discussion as a fight waiting to happen.
If not, what would have been the appropriate response to your statement that I was being aggressive? I saw a fight looming and tried to diffuse it, that was my chosen response. I'm not normally one to back out of an argument, honestly, but I have a track record of days-long internet fights that go nowhere and end with both parties feeling quietly superior over an entirely ambiguous outcome, and I didn't really want this to become one of those situations.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 06:35 pm (UTC)Just wondering.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 06:42 pm (UTC)Asking for clarification is fine in any situation. Arguing about semantic meaning of a question is, in my mind, pointless. The original comment wasn't a request for clarification. It was asking why queerness has to be interrogated, implying that the question was doing so. That sounds more like a sly way of beginning an argument about semantics than a simply request for a rephrasing. If the original intention was to clarify Dee's meaning, then that could have been asked outright, the way that the original commented wanted Dee to ask HER question outright.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 06:47 pm (UTC)I think you're ascribing malice where there is none, but that's my opinion. There's a difference between dialogue and argument, after all, and asking about clarification of intention and wording isn't necessarily combative.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 07:20 pm (UTC)I agree! I agree completely, I really, really do.
This was what
Do you think the male nurse House spoke to was straight? Why or why not?
Or, in other words, why does queerness have to be interrogated when straightness doesn't?
To me, that sounds a lot like implying that Dee was interrogating (obviously a negative thing), and not very much like asking for clarification. The words "what do you mean by that?" or "what makes you ask?" might have been more appropriate, if that was what she honestly wanted to know. The implication wasn't malicious, but it was a little negative. It definitely wasn't a simple question for clarification.
I don't think semantics are pointless, I think arguing about them is, especially since it is, in almost all situations, more civil and less time consuming to simply ask for a rewording.
I apologize if my thoughts sound scattered right now, I'm sitting on a bus and typing this on my phone.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 07:24 pm (UTC)If we don't discuss (or argue about) semantics, then won't they become pointless?
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 07:40 pm (UTC)Semantics will always be important, we all know that. Go debate them as you please, but I really have to get to class and I'm going to back out of this whole discussion, because I can't keep it up with multiple people all night long. (Ba-dum tisshhh.) That said, I appreciate you keeping a friendly tone. Thanks. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 06:43 pm (UTC)Why shouldn't semantics be argued about? You can't always have it both ways - it's not necessarily fair to examine queerness without examining the way in which straight perspectives are approaching it.
I thought you sounded aggressive because of your repeated statements that zulu et. al.'s, as well as my own, comments were pointless at best, distracting us from "the real work" of advocacy at worst. I believe you did not intend to come across that way, but you did; similarly, I was not initially trying to come off as condescending, but that's the way you read me.
No, I already said it, and you have already indicated that it's not really something you're interested in discussing, although I appreciate the offer.
IMO, and as I usually do, if someone is seeing me as aggressive/condescending/snarky/whatever when I'm seriously not trying to be, I usually ask why they feel that way and clarify that I'm not trying to be.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 07:34 pm (UTC)I'm very outnumbered in this argument, I'm exhausted, and I have to get to class. Take the last word if you want it, I'm done.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 07:39 pm (UTC)you jumped on me after a neutral comment, and so i said you were bring aggressive, and i didn't particularly care how you saw me after reading the comments you were making
so w/e
(o, i wasn't asking, btw, because i know why and i know why i said it, and that's the end of that story)
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-27 07:06 pm (UTC)OH I DON'T HAVE THE ENERGY FOR THIS/WAHWAHWAH/I'M DONE HERE BUT let me continue on for three more paragraphs and if you reply to anything I say in those paragraphs I'll put on the air of a tired parent who is trying to calmly indulge their bratty child.
I get what you're saying here but everyone here is being atrocious about it, especially you.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-27 07:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-14 06:46 pm (UTC)