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I'd cut this a bit more fine. Many of us (well, me, anyway) write on social media as if we were hanging out with friends, where anything goes, and where there are years of trust in play.. But these are public media, and I think that all that was being asked was that we remain mindful of what would be likely to be offensive to others, and especially when some of those others told us as much.  The manner of it was what set me off, but the message makes sense.

I don't, tho,  think that language deemed offensive has had much to do with the small numbers of those who contribute. None of the lists I've been on has had more than at most (and briefly) a dozen active participants. This was even true of Wompo when I was a member, and it's a very large list. It may just be the nature of the beast. I think the same is true for facebook.

-----Original Message-----
From: Dylan Harris <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Oct 10, 2014 1:20 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: another list trouble -- knacker

I certainly won’t. I’ve no intention of besmirching a perfectly honourable profession by refusing to use their name just because a bunch of bigots elsewhere happen to use the same word. The bigotry should be addressed, not the label. I admit I don’t get this concept of surrendering a word to bigots because they happen to abuse it; surely the effect is to give them a richer lexicography, making them sound more intelligent. Address the bigotry, not the language.

I learnt, as a kid, that a knacker was someone who neutered male animals. This must have been a regional use: the formal definition is someone who disposes of dead animals. The verb comes from this noun, I believe.


From: Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: British & Irish poets <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Friday, 10 October 2014 06:23
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: another list trouble -- knacker

Now that you know this, will you continue to use the word in the familiar British sense?

<[log in to unmask]>

Ouch!!!
 
A little mousing around, and I now at least see where Jimmy is coming from on this one.
 
Apparently the noun “knacker” in Southern Irish slang isn’t remotely similar to the participial adjective that I’m fairly accustomed to using.
 
It’s not as far as I know current in England, for which I’m tempted to say, thank the lord, as there are already more than enough prejudicial terms in English colloquial speech used when referring to travellers in general or the Romany people in particular, without adding this to the lexicon.
 
After a short and in this case singularly unpleasant visit to urbandictionary, I now see why Jimmy bracketed it with Spastic and Retard.  It would seem, in so far as I could stomach any of the virulently nasty explanations in urbandictionary, a word singularly without any redeeming qualities, and one which brings out the worst in those who chose to explain it.
 
Robin
 
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