Comment by dotancohen
3 days ago
My grandfather was a slave - he passed in 2007. I have no objection to the term master, nor have I heard anybody ever who was affected by actual slavery to take offence to the term.
I remember much debate about this, and not once was an actual affected person mentioned who took offence.
1. My whole point was that it is not about anyone in the affected group taking offence. The question is whether other people can come to devalue people in the affected group. In this context "offensive" doesn't mean taking offence, but devaluing. To take and extreme and controved example, if I tell a subordinate that the women on our team were "diversity hires" who did not deserve to be hired, the harm is not in a woman hearing I said that. It is done even if none of the women on the team ever know I said that. Similarly, it doesn't matter if the women on our team all agreed with that statement and weren't offended by it.
2. I make absolutely no claim about the effectiveness of using or avoiding certain terms even in the relevant context. I'm only saying that people misunderstand what "offensive" means in this context. It means things that may make some people think less of others, whether or not those others know about it or are offended by it.