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#4364 07/28/00 04:12 PM
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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
#4365 07/28/00 04:40 PM
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To all other know-nots besides myself:
IL'dIU, and HTH= hope this helps.


#4366 07/29/00 04:26 AM
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IL'dIU

What?????
(See, I told you now I'm a journeywoman I'm not afraid to ask!)


#4367 07/29/00 11:05 AM
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Ta, Ted


#4368 07/29/00 11:45 AM
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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.)



#4369 07/29/00 03:36 PM
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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.


#4370 07/29/00 03:49 PM
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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.


#4371 07/29/00 06:50 PM
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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.

#4372 07/29/00 06:51 PM
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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.

#4373 07/29/00 06:53 PM
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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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