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Pooh-Bah
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Apparently it means - You can look it up.
First posted Re: lexiphanicinism (Q&A about words)- 6th May by tsuwm, Explanation - 12th May - Pieman, same thread. Also mentioned somewhere re:segue (Miscellaneous).
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In reply to:
Apparently it means - You can look it up.
But how rude (the expression, jmh dear, not you). I mean if someone doesn't want to explain why can't they keep quiet? Posting isn't obligatory.
Only mildly tangentially, I wonder why some people prefer to ask somebody else and others prefer to look up whatever they want to know. Generalising wildly, Indonesians seem to be much more likely to ask someone than those of European-descended cultures (there must be an easier expression) are, and women are often alleged to be more willing to ask somebody for information such as directions than men are.
Bingley
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>>But how rude. I mean if someone doesn't want to explain why can't they keep quiet? Posting isn't obligatory.<< I can think of three possible reasons: 1.) They do want to show off. 2.) They want to give others a learning opportunity (this is the least likely of the three, I think.) 3.) These things are so familiar to the users that they use them without even realizing that not everyone knows what they know. (Oh dear; too much repetition!) >>I wonder why some people prefer to ask somebody else and others prefer to look up whatever<< My opinion is that this is just due to the person's characteristics: whether he/she is self-confident, fearful, social, more of a loner, etc. Perhaps the supposed reluctance on the part of males to ask for help is due their feeling the primeval need to be the infallible bringer-home of the sabretooth, etc. 
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>They want to give others a learning opportunity (this is the least likely of the three, I think.) why would you think this?  if one is to use this medium to any extent there are some very basic and easy tools one can (should?) learn, for answering questions such as "what is the meaning of the word x" or "who was person y", and in the process avoid importuning others -- you don't even have to crack a book very often to Look It Up!
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Ok, first-- If I understood you correctly, Tsuwm, what you said just above means that it would be nice if people would learn how to learn, and then they wouldn't have to pester others for help. Would you believe I agree?  Though I will say that there are points where folks are so lost that they don't know what questions to ask, or that means of self-help are even available. I hope that people will be understanding, or at least forthcoming, in this case, as I am in that position frequently! >>Poster: tsuwm Subject: Re: YCLIU >They want to give others a learning opportunity (this is the least likely of the three, I think.) why would you think this? <<< My point here was based on the fact that things such as YCLIU, just as an example, get posted with no explanation. I think it is not very likely in that case that the post-er would be offering a learning opportunity. If that was the intent, then he or she would post the explanation as well, or at least give some clue as to a reference.
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>My point here was based on the fact that things such as YCLIU, just as an example, get posted with no explanation. and I agree, that would be rude. it's the same situation as in writing technical documentation, you don't use a *real acronym until you've introduced it parenthetically to the long form, otherwise you have discourse that is Fouled Up Beyond All Recognition (FUBAR). Once I've introduced You Could Look It Up to a thread, YCLIU is all you get if you are rude enough to continue to behave in a neanderthalish manner.
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Ohmigawd, 1.-- For the second time today, I have read something on the 'net and then gone out and seen the same thing! Just got back from a shop that had a sign behind the counter that read, "If you're ashamed to ask, then you're ashamed to learn. Ask, ask, ask...until you know it for yourself!" Ohmigawd, 2.-- Tsuwm is in agreement!! Whistles! Cheers! (After I recover from my faint! ) And, I am unable to resist taking the bait: "continue" is the operative word in your last sentence, sir. I feel sure that a fair number of these questions come from people who have not found the original post that explains things, in which case they are innocent of neanderthality (what about marking that one in your dictionary, william?) And then there are those who simply need more than one session to really take something in.
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>"pc-ness" (which BTW seems to be another created word which fits uncomfortably in the mouth, but is not
considered an abombination)
Gosh, I'd not have used IMNSHO and PC-ness if I had known I was going to raise a ruckus. I plead cultural ignorance on the first count (using an acronym that not everyone knew). In my very early days of doing this computer stuff, we used modems that were so glacially slow acronyms and any other shortcuts were absolutely essential. My first modem was, if I remember correctly, had a speed of 256 baud. That's less than one percent of the 28.8 speed with which I now connect. Connect time was also pretty expensive. I courted my wife, whom I met on the Internet, at those speeds! I plead guilty to not thoroughly checking out the culture before I made that "offending" post.
As to PC-ness, I used that term with a sneer in my fingers, and I just assumed that the disdain I hold for political correctness would bleed through. Our culture suffers when we can no longer call a shovel a shovel.
Ted
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07/26/2000 12:20 AM
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>I'd not have used IMNSHO and PC-ness if I had known I was going to raise a ruckus<
Ted,
I don't think IMNSHO and PC-ness caused a ruckus. They're words I use regularly and happily. I just used them as a example of awkward new, made up words that nobody objects to, to show that perhaps it wasn't the form of the word that mattered.
Agreeing with many other posters, I think open debate is the precious and important thing. Long live it!
BTW if you had checked out the culture before posting, would that have been "pc" of you? ;)
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Aren't most of the discussions about terminology ways of mocking serious issues? Those of us old enough to remember the 60's saw how the feminist movement was treated. The issue was never about burning underwear, but that was a way of deflecting discussion. When you don't have a logical or ethical leg to stand on, use sarcasm.
The issue about words is not that a group of "Them" wants us to say "spokesperson" instead of a perfectly good neutral term like "representative." The issue is respect (as was previously posted.) There is a real difference between the people who refer to my son as "autistic", "developmentally delayed", or "mentally challenged" and the ones who call him "dumb", "weird", or a "retard". By making people think about what they say, and what it means, the "PC Police" are, on balance, doing us a favor. Certainly it is easy to find humor in terms such as "waitperson", but remember a time when labels based on skin color, gender, first language, creed (or lack of it), or even birthplace were used to decide who could live where, who had tax money spent on their education, who could run for office, who could vote, or even who could live.
It's easy to laugh about the fuss that was made at a recycling center. Seems that dyed and undyed paper are recycled differently, so two bins were marked respectively "White" and "Colored". On the one hand it is refreshing to know that the young man who posted the labels had no idea why anyone would find that offensive. On the other hand it is well within the lifetimes of many of us to have seen signs like that on public restrooms, drinking fountains, waiting rooms, or entrances to buildings. Those same signs also were on a lot of things, even when they weren't physically present. Oversensitivity? Maybe. After all, we all know how *those* people overreact to everything. On the other hand maybe we are just erring on the side of trying to be fair and kind to each other for a change.
Sorry for the length of the post, it just hurts to see good ideas fail because people want to make fun of them rather than think about them.
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>>Sorry for the length of the post<<
No need to, JMike. I think it tied the thoughts of a few of the different threads together. Nice to see you posting.
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jmike
wonderful ideas, and i see exactly what you mean.
ideas can fail because of too much sarcasm and conservatism.
when you put "white" and "coloured" in that context it's impossible not to feel what you feel!
and i think everyone should be careful as much as possible. but sometimes people aren't aware of the references they are inferring.
in these kinds of cases surely it's better to explain to them their "brick" than to fire them.
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Exactly, William. I do not advocate litigation, fines, or other punishment for using "wrong" words, especially when it is completely unintentional. There is a huge difference between ignorance and malice - the former can be readily fixed. I do think however that anything which makes us try to avoid *consciously* hurting anyone cannot be all bad.
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#4357
07/27/2000 12:21 PM
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JMike,
I don't recall opening my heart for you to read the words written on it, but you did. Love you too.
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07/28/2000 12:34 AM
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tsuwm >>if one is to use this medium to any extent there are some very basic and easy tools one can (should?) learn, for answering questions such as "what is the meaning of the word x" or "who was person y", and in the process avoid importuning others -- you don't even have to crack a book very often to Look It Up!<< Jackie >>I feel sure that a fair number of these questions come from people who have not found the original post that explains things<< I have to say I asked someone privately what YCLIU meant, because I didn't know and I felt that in the context I came across it (on this board), I 'ought' to. My behaviour here is exactly equivalent to my behaviour in the 'real' world. If someone uses a term I don't know and I feel comfortable, I ask. If someone uses a term I don't know and I don't feel comfortable asking, I ask someone I trust privately, or look it up - whichever is easier / faster. I know more about words than about web resources to help me with words. I wouldn't know where to start looking up acronyms on the web, so it was easier to ask a person. One option might be a links page to reference resources, so that anyone could check before posting a question. But reference resources aren't interactive and don't put a human spin on things the way a discussion board (or a private email) does. And one of the things I get out of this board is 'conversation'. I think it's a shame that I felt unable to ask publicly what YCLIU meant. (I'm over it now I'm a journey(wo)man! ) Also, tsuwm, I reacted badly to your suggestion that asking a question like this was 'importuning'. I looked up 'importune' - 'unfit, troublesome, grievous; inopportune, untimely, unfit; persistent in solicitation; irksome through importunity.' I don't think asking about the meaning of a word or acronym on a board which serves to facilitate discussion about words and language fits any of those definitions!
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Thank you Bridget, I couldn't agree more. I could have gone to Onelook to look up YCLIU, but since I was here any way, why not ask in a forum about words?
I still think it is a rude response to a request for information, but now I know what it means I also realise the people who use it are the last people one should ask its meaning.
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07/28/2000 11:51 AM
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and, while we're deciphering these acronyms, would some kind soul please let me know what LOL means?
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>>some helpful person<<
IL'dIU. FYI: Information that comes across as "Here, you
blithering idiot" is not likely to be perceived as helpful.
I think in cases like that, the messenger rather kills the
message.
To repeat something that has been said several times in other threads, part of the problem may be due to the fact that we are using words on a screen. There is no possiblility of being able to see the giver of information
smiling in understanding, for example.
I do realize that those of you whose jobs or interests involve using this method of communicating all day every day have had to learn to shorten the time it takes you to
get your message across. I'm just trying to remind you
that what to you is merely an efficient time-saver can
appear to some people as something rather more negative than that.
I think this can be likened to the child who is told that
he is getting an immunization shot "because it will help
you". He may hear the words, but all that gets through
is the sting.
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here's a funny thing: I don't recall anyone here actually advocating the use of this stuff (other than in the interests of saving time in olden days). HTH.
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> would some kind soul please let me know what LOL means?
Laughing Out Loud.
Others are:
ROFL = Rolling On Floor Laughing
ROFLKFIA = ROFL Kicking Feet In Air
TEd
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To all other know-nots besides myself:
IL'dIU, and HTH= hope this helps.
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IL'dIU What????? (See, I told you now I'm a journeywoman I'm not afraid to ask!  )
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>>IL'dIU
What?????<<
Sorry, all you deer-I mean Dears (just finished reading all about those sheep!).
I made this one up! Hoped the 'd would give the clue. ==
I looked it up.
If turn about = fair play, I still don't get the license
plate on the black convertible Golf, though I did catch
the bug. (I think that bug would qualify as one of Australia's "odd" animals.)
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> Forgot to say - the absolutely WORST piece of PCspeak I ever heard in person was 'dermatologically challenged' for
'black'.
The user was most definitely a covert racist too.
I believe that we are all racist (though I am sure that there are many of you who will deny this to the death) but some of us are simply more tolerant or accepting than others. But that is not to detract from your point. The 'person' in question obviously takes some inane pleasure from coining an extremely bigoted racist remark.
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> >>I wonder why some people prefer to ask somebody else and others prefer to look up whatever<<
> My opinion is that this is just due to the person's characteristics: whether he/she is self-confident, fearful, social, more
of a loner, etc. Perhaps the
supposed reluctance on the part of males to ask for
help is due their feeling the primeval need to be the infallible bringer-home of the sabretooth, etc.
I disagree strongly on this point. I don't feel there is any machismo involved wahtsoever. I am not a sociologist or a psychologist but my observations lead me to believe that women tend to ask for advice more often than men because they are socially more astute. Men are more solitary in comparison and therefore tend to believe that they must find out answers for themselves. This does not in anyway make either group more or less intelligent. It just highlights the way that men and women gather information. During my university days I found that the girls in my class would ask questions far more often than the men but that they also relied heavily on study groups and interaction with the men in the class. Whether this is significant or not I do not know but there is definitely a pattern.
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>"mentally retarded", "backward", educationally impaired" "one with learning difficulties" whatever we call something, if we don't respect the thing we are referring to, our discriminatory nature will catch up with us sooner or later.
Another point about PC words is that when people change their points of view they need this kind of words and, if necessary, new words must be coined.
I’ll try to explain myself. You can teach people not to eat rice but you need to provide those people with another food, because if not they would have to choose between doing what they should not or starving.
And contrarily to the point quoted I think that certain words by themselves can alter our mental patterns making us having more or less respect for any subject. This thing I believe could be explained as a feedback caused by some words, so by using a pejorative word people would tend to disregard the subjects of this word and by using a PC word this same people would become more attentive with this same subject.
Juan Maria.
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>Forgot to say - the absolutely WORST piece of PCspeak I ever heard in person was 'dermatologically challenged' for 'black'.
Mine was “celibately challenged”.
Juan Maria.
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>Do other languages have this problem or is the "Man" - man problem confined solely to English?
We have a different problem that, sometimes, can be exacerbating. Every Spanish noun has a definite gender, for example a clock is male and a towel is female. But nouns or adjectives that define persons, animals, professions etc. can be made male by ending in “-o” or female by ending in “-a”. And the sexist question arrives when we use plurals. Conventionally is established that “-os” termination must be used when referring a group or mixed sexes and only if the whole group is composed of female members we can use “-as”.
Modern PC usage, mainly in administration, is forcing us to use the cumbersome termination “-os/as” instead of the old “-os”. So when writing a school program a teacher must write “Los alumnos/as, los niños/as, los profesores/as”.
This is definitely cumbersome but the alternative is definitely sexist so we are waiting for some ingenious invention that can solve this problem.
Juan Maria.
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>I still think it is a rude response to a request for information
Speaking of rudeness one of the worst is RTFM -Read The Fantastic Manual-.
As you can think this is used mainly by charitable people.
Juan Maria.
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juanmaria,
what do you do when people start using your new word in a pejorative way?
i think we look for new words to escape from the fact that we want to express something cleanly even though we haven't really changed our ideas at all.
history is long. it's pure arrogance that makes us think we're in the driver's seat now more than any time in the past. people were as smart as us 50, 500, or 5000 years ago, and they talked about the same things.
and they invented new words, just like us. and strangely, these words haven't changed a single aspect of our characters yet. we still use them to hurt no matter how free of these associations they seemed at the time of their installation.
this doesn't mean i don't think language should change - i'm not a conservative at all. but a word is just a sound to describe something. its use is up to many more people than its inventor could dream of.
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07/29/2000 10:03 PM
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>history is long. it's pure arrogance that makes us think we're in the driver's seat now more than any time in the past. people were as smart as us 50, 500, or 5000 years ago, and they talked about the same things.
and they invented new words, just like us. and strangely, these words haven't changed a single aspect of our characters yet. we still use them to hurt no matter how free of these associations they seemed at the time of their installation.<
Sadly, yes, the 'bad' parts of the human character are still here - but so are the good ones. Juanmaria's example is a case of hope that things might improve and an attempt to make a fresh start (at least that's how it appears to me).
The world is hard enough as it is - if we all stopped hoping it could be better and trying to do something about it, how much worse it would be!
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#4377
07/29/2000 10:09 PM
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>>Modern PC usage, mainly in administration, is forcing us to use the cumbersome termination “-os/as” instead of the old “-os”. So when writing a school program a teacher must write “Los alumnos/as, los niños/as, los profesores/as”. << Look on the bright side, JM. It could be worse: "Lo/as alumno/as, " etc ad nauseum.
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>I believe that we are all racist (though I am sure that there are many of you who will deny this to the death) but some of us are simply more tolerant or accepting than others.<
'Brick, I think this relates to the point (only about racism, not sexism) that I was trying to get at in my first post on this thread.
It's very easy to change our intellectual, uninvolved opinions on a subject and decide what we think.
It's much harder (close to impossible) to change our attitudes and what, in our deepest subconscious, we feel.
Unfortunately actions are more often driven by feeling than by thinking. In this context, speaking and choice of words is an action. 'PC-ness' is good in that it might encourage us to think about some of those unconscious attitude and feeling-driven choices. Unfortunately it doesn't necessarily encourage us to do that especially once it has been taken to extremes that enable us just to mock it rather than think about why anyone cared in the first place.
It's all part of that battle between what we think we 'ought' to be and what we actually are!
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the theme for this month's kids classes is "colours".
the colours i have in my crayon box include one described as "hadairo", skin colour.
it doesn't look much like skin to me, more like pale candle wax.
i've heard that saying skin colour is "out" because of the many different possible colours this could mean but doesn't.
what's the new word?
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>>i've heard that saying skin colour is "out" because of the many different possible colours this could mean<<
Yes, that happened here, with the giant Crayola crayon
company. Up until just a few years ago, one of their colors was labeled "flesh". Of course it was pink-toned.
Now the label reads "peach". This goes to show what has
already been said, about how such a seemingly insignificant
term can have such far-reaching impact. Since Americans are so strongly influenced by advertising, maybe a marketing change could actually help change attitudes?
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from the Crayola Crayon Chronology (YCLIU), submitted without comment:
Prussian Blue - name changed to "midnight blue" in 1958 in response to teachers' requests
flesh - name voluntarily changed to "peach" in 1962, partially as a result of the U. S. Civil Rights Movement.
Indian Red - renamed Chestnut in 1999 because of educators who felt some children wrongly perceived the crayon color was intended to represent the skin color of Native Americans. The name originally was from a reddish-brown pigment found near India commonly used in fine artist oil paint.
24 new colors added in 1998, including "Pig Pink"...
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Ah, the tsunami strikes again!
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>This is definitely cumbersome but the alternative is definitely sexist so we are waiting for some ingenious invention that can solve this problem.
Juan Maria:
I disagree; the use of -os to describe a group is not in and of itself sexist. That's an evil fiction that has been visited upon us by people who are just too darned sensitive for their own good (and ours). Certainly there are words that are sexist, such as calling the lady who works down the hall "honey" because the obvious intent is to denigrate her, to make her less of a person thanthe male speaker, to relegate her to a subordinate position. But to say, and pardon me if I get the Spanish wrong, los profesoros to refer to a faculty group that could be all male or part male part female, is simply using language to communicate.
I have not separated the males from the females, so I have not made the women of lesser stature than men. Granted, if I say las profesoras, I have designated a group of faculty that is all female. But unless I have done so in a way that devalues them, I have simply been descriptive.
The counter-argument is that if the person hearing my communication PERCEIVES that I have denigrated women in some way, then I have indeed done so. I reject that. If in the totality of what I say there is a pervasive aura of sexism, then I would indeed be guilty. But if I have been only descriptive of a group or subgroup without assigning value judgments, then it is purely communication.
There do exist words that are now considered so racist as to be beyond the pale, even though they were ostensibly not racist 200 or even a hundred years ago. Mark Twain's use of "nigger" is frequently cited in this regard. Somewhat paradoxically, I reject the idea that this was not racist. It was. Regardless of what many people now say, Twain's use of the word was not desciptive, it was categorizing into a group that had a lesser stature and was definitely pejorative in usage. Mind you, I still think Twain's stuff is great literature, but to say that he was not racist is to ignore the entire culture of the period during which Twain wrote.
I have seen attempts to change he and she to (s)he. I have seen people take his and hers and change them to hirs. These are grotesqueries that deserve all the abomination we can heap upon them. When I write regulations, training manuals, articles, whatever, I routinely alternate between the masculine and feminine pronouns. But it would not bother me a bit to use she and her and hers exclusively if that would stop the language Nazis from carping. Though milder grotesqueries, I avoid saying "his or her" or "she and he" because they clog up sentences with unnecessary junk. I've never succeeded in making a sentence flow properly with these constructions.
It's time, my friends, to reclaim our language from the clutches of those who would gut it to the point of absurdity. And that applies to other languages. I have to admit that I'm a bit surprised that political correctness has struck Spanish. I'd love to know if the French have paid any attention to political correctness.
Thud!
Ted jumps down off the soapbox
TEd
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