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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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"Gay" through the agency of semantic shift is rapidly taking on still a new meaning (especially with teenagers) uncool, unattractive, not socially acceptable: What a gay haircut.; That band is so gay http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/anonymous@EA23610781/-/p/dict/slang-g.html?which itself is smearing (shifting?) into an even wider def, general disparaging term http://www.peevish.co.uk/slang/g.htmThis shift is punctuated by a recent news report: A Mormon high school student...disciplined for saying "that's so gay" in class....never meant to demean homosexuals and said no one had warned her the phrase was offensive"
dalehileman
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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My favorite citation is this.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Quote:
My favorite citation is this.
heh.
formerly known as etaoin...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I know,lets codify language. we'll set up committees to moniter word usage, and only the proper word can be used to describe a thing (or action or state of being)
NOTHING will be permitted to change.
Language will be become like stone.
Only stones are not living things are they?
and language is.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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addict
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Quote:
"Gay" through the agency of semantic shift is rapidly taking on still a new meaning
Hey Rip Van Winkle! Young’uns have been using gay to mean lame for a long time now. Lame was its default meaning when I was in high school about a decade ago. To denote actual homosexuality, usually some more offensive, cruder word was preferred.
P.S.
School is gay!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I still object to it being used to equal lame because, unless I'm mistaken, it started from the derogatory meaning towards homosexual men.
Imagine that you (anyone) have a sister whom you cherish, love dearly, and want to protect. Say her name is Emma. Say she has some condition that makes her a target of derision; maybe Tourette's. Early on, her classmates began using her name to represent any out-of-place sound, and now the entire school says, for ex., "I did an Emma" or "he's so Emma". Emma may have long been gone from that school, but it's still derogatory, and I'll bet you wouldn't like it.
Edit: I have no relatives who are gay that I know of; I just think it's wrong to put people down.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jul 2005
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Hydra: Thank you for that, I had no idea. To an ancient creature such as I ten years ago seems like yesterday
Ads a former prescriptivist, however, I would have wholeheartedly agreed with Jackie. But now as one converted, with my fellow descriptivists I merely assume the position of symbolic capitulation recently sanctioned by the otherwise conservative State of Massachusetts if not Vermont and Connecticut
dalehileman
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To take Jackie's example one step farther, let's say you start at this school ten years after the original Emma has graduated. Your name is Emma. People say "That's so emma." Then they look at you and say, "Oh, I don't mean you, Emma. In fact, until you started here, I didn't even realize emma was a person's name - it's just an emma word. I feel so emma now." No amount of pleading will get them to stop using it, even if it's only to stop using it to your face. How do you feel now?
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
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Quote:
I have no relatives who are gay that I know of; I just think it's wrong to put people down.
There is a wonderful woman in our church whose first name is Gaye.
What is more noteworthy, though, is that she is married to a man whose last name is MANN.
"I am certain there is too much certainty in the world" -Michael Crichton
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