What's appropriate response to use of "gay" as der

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On another board, I just saw a person use the world "ghey" to describe a laptop that was being sold cheap because it's screen doesn't work.

I assume "ghey" means "gay", as in they're using that as a derogatory. That really bothers me, but I don't know what an appropriate response is. I was going to post something like "use of language like that is inappropriate", but I don't know if that would do any good in terms of the person not doing something like that in the future or in their "real" life.

Any thoughts?

Why is this hypersensitivity so prevalent these days?Free Speech and individual liberty seem like alien concepts to todays dweebs.

Uh. Wow. Amazing response there.

If business meetings were like Forums:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4d08mv4VG8[/youtube]


You seem new to internet. I think Merle (sinsbodly) posted a link to all kinds of people you'll encounter in internet, will try to find it.

and yes, ghey = gay.

If you try to reply with "that's innappropiate etc. etc." it will only fuel them to write more.
Best thing to do is to avoid that people (also called trolls).

I'm not new, but that's totally inappropriate. If I were running a forum, I'd give a warning, and then ban if they continued (well, as best as it's possible to ban on the internet).

I was just hoping there was some sort of way to instruct this person

Gay is not a negative word and does not necessary mean homosexuality either. If its not used in combination with a major
negative connotation I'm fine with its use as a general expression such as: "thats gay..." That means atypical in my minds eye not something negative. Though if someone was a bigot it might be an insult in their minds. I assume some hypersensitive PC person will have a problem with it to. Those people will always have a problem with something though. If I see it being used on WP I will make a judgement to the context and intent of the posters based on all I know about them. And such posts will be laughed at ,ignored, or removed accordingly.

Perhaps the world would be much easier if we were all raised the same way and were brought up with the same rules. But alas, we're different. Sometimes I feel like slapping someone in the face for doing things that I particularly detest, but unfortunately, many people are not like me. They come from different cultures and walks of life. Things that they do that may be perfectly normal to them might be considered unforgiveable to someone else. When it comes to situations like these, I find the best thing to do is to let it go, and completely ignore it. I can't decide what rules they follow, and cannot enforce my rules on them. So being angry would be pointless. People will upset you like that quite a lot (especially with the whole "gay" thing). I'd say, especially for these forums, be flexible about it.

Once I was playing on this Counter-Strike server that had a curse word filter in place, such that whenever you typed a curse word it would be changed into something like "I'm such a n00b, I can't even kill bots!" or "Wow, <Admin's name> owns me!" etc. So anyway I was cursing up a storm, having fun with the filter, and I get banned for "Going around the filter." Okay... I came back in awhile later and tried to explain to them that I actually basically went straight into the filter, rather than around it, citing the f word with a v in the middle of it by way of example. Furthermore, since they had the filter in place, NOBODY could actually see that I had cursed except for the admins. They explained to me that since I had typed the curse words into my keyboard and hit enter, I deserved the banning. I just couldn't find a way to tell those PC admins that no underage eyes had seen curse words that day!

Umm... End rant!

^^^
hehe

Darn, I was hoping for some help. I guess I'll just try to write something polite and/or report the post.

It's NOT appropriate to use something in a negative way like that whether it's in reference to someone's sexual orientation, race, or whatever else that they can't change.

gay isnt a bad word it means happy. popular culture in america has turned it into a bad word. probably a very naughty, naughty word even a bad bad word. sorry senator craig i couldnt resist

Yeah, I mean if someone was using it in it's original definition, but that clearly wasn't what was happening.

Using the word "gay" as derogatory is always offensive. Whatever your intention in using it that way, the message that you are sending is that gay people are inferior people. It's not being "PC" or "overly-sensitive" to suggest that you shouldn't use the word "gay" in that context.

That being said, unless you have some authority on the forum (admin, mod, etc.) or you know that a mod or admin agrees that the word "ghey" is offensive, there is no point in correcting they guy who said "ghey". 9 times out of 10 pointing out that someone is being offensive just starts long flame-wars online, where you end up looking aggressive and foolish. Nothing will change on the forum and the guy who said "ghey" will just be more eager to say it again, because he's learned that it gets him lots of attention. Save your efforts for those you can educate (like friends, online friends, or family) and make sure that you never say things you think are offensive just to fit in.

No problem. Feminism/women's rights has been my "special interest" for the past two and half years, so I've learned a lot about picking my battles.