Quizzes & Puzzles22 mins ago
Are you proud to be English?
104 Answers
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Those who are English are constantly called British, why are they trying to wipe the English from the map?
But if some continue to class us as British why do they then shorten this by referring to us as 'Brits'?
If it is offensive to shorten the word of Pakistanis, then surely it is just as offensive to shorten the word of British by calling us 'Brits'?
Those who are English are constantly called British, why are they trying to wipe the English from the map?
But if some continue to class us as British why do they then shorten this by referring to us as 'Brits'?
If it is offensive to shorten the word of Pakistanis, then surely it is just as offensive to shorten the word of British by calling us 'Brits'?
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@JohnnySid - I was wondering how long it might be before you dropped in your favourite phrases, postmodernism/ poststructuralism, post marxism - and of course, blaming the "extreme far left" for taking over this country.
If the far left have taken over this country, they have done an awful job of it. You continue to drop these phrases into your posts with no explanation of what you mean by those terms, coupled with offering your opinion ( and blog) as fact, with no independent corroboration.
It does not matter what they call Pakistanis in India. It does not matter whether your memory is of people using the phrase in question "affectionately". The fact is that the term has come to be offensive, perjorative and often racist. Its not you , or AoG or anyone else who gets to define this- its those to whom the epithet is applied.
Political Correctness is not our worst enemy, it has been responsible for driving certain of the more offensive terms and phrases to describe ethnic, or gay individuals, to their benefit, making society much fairer.
If the far left have taken over this country, they have done an awful job of it. You continue to drop these phrases into your posts with no explanation of what you mean by those terms, coupled with offering your opinion ( and blog) as fact, with no independent corroboration.
It does not matter what they call Pakistanis in India. It does not matter whether your memory is of people using the phrase in question "affectionately". The fact is that the term has come to be offensive, perjorative and often racist. Its not you , or AoG or anyone else who gets to define this- its those to whom the epithet is applied.
Political Correctness is not our worst enemy, it has been responsible for driving certain of the more offensive terms and phrases to describe ethnic, or gay individuals, to their benefit, making society much fairer.
Poststructuralism and postmodernism are the very stuff of our modern culture, they are all around us and widely acknowledged. Poststructuralism (http://www.philosopher.org.uk/poststr.htm ) is a technique of literary criticism and has become a method of teaching creative writing that has deeply influenced modern journalism.
There is a fairly good piece on poststructuralism in lterary criticism at http://
The poststructuralist approach teaches that the story is king. It should need no outside referents and not be hindered by realist shackles such as statistics or science. It is crucial that the journalist does not say that what he/she is writing is poststructuralist because by doing so they destroy the story so poststructuralism is always subversive. Poststructuralism is always destructive and ends up treating every event as conflict rather than an opportunity for conciliation.
LazyGun, you say: "The fact is that the term has come to be offensive, perjorative and often racist. Its not you , or AoG or anyone else who gets to define this- its those to whom the epithet is applied. "
I did not say that the term "***" was not offensive to some people. I said that democracy must permit some degree of offensiveness, though, I did say that if such speech led directly to harassment or discrimination those who caused this should be prosecuted under the appropriate laws.
You are pleased that terms that you detest are banned under law because someone might find them offensive. Surely all democratic debate debate can potentially cause offence. If I claim that the EU is an attempt to resurrect the Holy Roman Empire you could claim that I am anti-German. If I say that Argentina is likely to attack the Falklands Argentines may take offence. If I say that single mothers might come from broken marriages single mothers may take offence. Democratic debate will be destroyed if you ban all giving of offence.
Now, why did you choose the racist/anti-racist axis for your particular taking of offence when all these other possibilities exist?
The far left has not taken over the country, they have damaged our democracy and media.
There is a fairly good piece on poststructuralism in lterary criticism at http://
The poststructuralist approach teaches that the story is king. It should need no outside referents and not be hindered by realist shackles such as statistics or science. It is crucial that the journalist does not say that what he/she is writing is poststructuralist because by doing so they destroy the story so poststructuralism is always subversive. Poststructuralism is always destructive and ends up treating every event as conflict rather than an opportunity for conciliation.
LazyGun, you say: "The fact is that the term has come to be offensive, perjorative and often racist. Its not you , or AoG or anyone else who gets to define this- its those to whom the epithet is applied. "
I did not say that the term "***" was not offensive to some people. I said that democracy must permit some degree of offensiveness, though, I did say that if such speech led directly to harassment or discrimination those who caused this should be prosecuted under the appropriate laws.
You are pleased that terms that you detest are banned under law because someone might find them offensive. Surely all democratic debate debate can potentially cause offence. If I claim that the EU is an attempt to resurrect the Holy Roman Empire you could claim that I am anti-German. If I say that Argentina is likely to attack the Falklands Argentines may take offence. If I say that single mothers might come from broken marriages single mothers may take offence. Democratic debate will be destroyed if you ban all giving of offence.
Now, why did you choose the racist/anti-racist axis for your particular taking of offence when all these other possibilities exist?
The far left has not taken over the country, they have damaged our democracy and media.
I'm not trying to sound important here, but I would like to say that as a current postgraduate in the humanities I'm fairly familiar with the intellectual movements JS is describing, and he isn't using them in anything like a coherent, sensible or academically rigorous way. I've also warned him numerous times that these are not terms which are likely to be found outside of modern academia, so a lot of people won't necessarily follow what he's trying to say - which was ignored.
Fredpuli43, the short answer is that a peculiar Left Wing philosophy has been adopted by students of the humanities and English studies and Political Correctness is a symptom of this. PC is pure genius as an act of political subversion because it spreads way outside its original target so that people are afraid to discuss whole areas of politics.
I have worked as an expatriot in Africa and the Middle East and we are ALWAYS known simply as 'Brits' never English,Scots, Welsh. Northern Irish are classed as Brits as well , but Irish Republic are 'Paddys' they never see it as offensive and even use the word to describe themselves. As in 'Are you a Brit?' ' No I'm a Paddy'
"You have a low opinion of the contributors to Answerbank."
No, I have a low opinion of how you put your arguments. I've no doubt that readers of this site are *capable* of understanding the terms you're using just fine, but you can't just expect people to understand the fairly obscure jargon you're using because it simply isn't that common outside of academia. Imagine if I wrote lengthy posts in Russian and then told anyone who asked me for a translation to use Google. It'd be monumentally arrogant. And other users have on numerous occasions asked to you be clear on what you mean, and your response has been to give them extremely long treatises on very particular examples of poststructuralism and telling them to 'read up'. It's just a bad way to put an argument forward and to be perfectly frank with you, it really gets under my skin. People like you are exactly why people have a bad view of academia and its language.
No, I have a low opinion of how you put your arguments. I've no doubt that readers of this site are *capable* of understanding the terms you're using just fine, but you can't just expect people to understand the fairly obscure jargon you're using because it simply isn't that common outside of academia. Imagine if I wrote lengthy posts in Russian and then told anyone who asked me for a translation to use Google. It'd be monumentally arrogant. And other users have on numerous occasions asked to you be clear on what you mean, and your response has been to give them extremely long treatises on very particular examples of poststructuralism and telling them to 'read up'. It's just a bad way to put an argument forward and to be perfectly frank with you, it really gets under my skin. People like you are exactly why people have a bad view of academia and its language.
Feel this thread has wandered far from the original question. Personally I'm not proud to be English....... but that's because I'm Scottish. I like being British and have no real problem with it being shortened to "Brit" no more than I have a problem with Scottish being shortened to "Scot" or "Jock".
-- answer removed --
well I for one didn't understand the contribution made by johnnysid. However, that might be because my eyes glazed over and i thought to myself "what has any of that got to do with the price of fish" or even the pride of the english!
oh dear, i consider myself to be fairly well educated (degree level) but pfffttt!
oh dear, i consider myself to be fairly well educated (degree level) but pfffttt!
bednobs, oh dear, your eyes also glazed over as you read the question: "If it is offensive to shorten the word of Pakistanis, then surely it is just as offensive to shorten the word of British by calling us 'Brits'? "
The short word for Pakistanis is shown on Answerbank as "***" because it is held to be offensive. The question asked by AOG was about Political Correctness and the answer I gave traced how this was due to the malign influence of postmarxism. This would upset postmarxists who enjoy operating without being spotted.
The short word for Pakistanis is shown on Answerbank as "***" because it is held to be offensive. The question asked by AOG was about Political Correctness and the answer I gave traced how this was due to the malign influence of postmarxism. This would upset postmarxists who enjoy operating without being spotted.
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