Appropriate terminology

[frost_indri]

No: HPFGUIDX 89256

Punkie:
> > Sorry if I'm a cranky old woman, but I'm a cranky old woman 
about epithets.

Kneasy:
<snip>
> This post is intended as an exposition of the way I approach this
> potentially contentious difference of opinion. I don't expect 
everyone
> to agree, but that's only fair since I'm good at disagreeing 
myself.
> It, and my original post are not intended as a swipe at anyone, 
apart 
> from a small group mentioned below.

Frost: 
 Note taken.  

<snip>
>>
> But to  impose real world ideology onto fictional make-believe
> can lead to mis-apprehensions. I would point out (as I have 
before),
> that the people at the bottom of the heap in the Potterverse are 
not
> mudbloods - they are muggles; us in other words.<snip>

> So why not complain about the term 'Muggle'? It  would be more
> apposite to do so, don't you think?
>

Frost: 
  Actually, I do.  If someone were to call me a Muggle, I would take 
offense.  I have heard people use this term as an insult. Behold the 
power of JKR!

  Even so, in the WW world, it is an insult, just one that they 
don't think about. It's a pejorative. They look down on Muggles as 
silly, childish, stupid, handicapped, and lacking, all because they 
don't have magic.  They do not see or respect the many great and 
terrible things non-wizards do and have done. (Face it, when wizards 
have to be told that a gun is a sort of "Muggle wand" they are 
really ignoring a lot of what Muggles can do.)  Even Arthur, who has 
grasped that Muggles have done a lot more than the WW gives them 
credit for, can't help but be patronizing.

> The series was written about and aimed at a UK centered world. 
<snippy>
> Sure, we've had our own problems, but on nothing like the same
> scale. The vast majority of the members of minority groups here
> have arrived or been born in the last 50 years. 

Frost:
  Umm... there's different sorts of minorities.  England has had a 
history of a minority ruling over the majority, and that's what I've 
always seen in the books.  And not just the king (Queen), I know, 
since the Magna Charta the office has been loosing power) but there 
have been the ruling class. The rich, the blue bloods.  I always saw 
the wizards as a sort of nobility or aristocracy, only this is one 
that hid it's privileged life from the masses. And there has been 
the problem of the new aristocracy, and the old aristocracy not 
liking or accepting the new.  
 Regardless of race, this is an issue of one group thinking that 
it's better than another.   There are always slurs to go around, 
when there is something like that. The UK has had it's share of that.

Kneazy:
>There is no *history*
> in the way that the US has. And  to presume that the tale is
> intended as, or can be construed as a metaphor for *your* history
> and should conform to your social mores is, IMHO more the result
> of your own experiences than in the world reflected in the books.
>>

Frost:  
  You're right, ya'll have had you're own issues to deal with.  But 
the issues are similar enough that the feelings are the same.  So 
Punkie sees it in terms of what she experienced.  That's ok, cause 
its part of the reading experience. No person ever reads the same 
book.  We bring our histories, and what we know of history to the 
book.  I think that it gives her a much better feeling of what the 
reaction to the word should be.  I don't think that she thought it 
was a social metaphor for that specific issue, but a parallel, and 
something that she did identify with. (Correct me if I'm wrong, 
Punkie, since I could be off.)

Kneasy:
> The 'sins' manufactured by such fanatics (you cannot say dog - it's
> a companion animal!) are a long, long way from mainstream
> liberalism (where I presume you are positioned) and in my opinion
> they deserve parody.

Frost:  and what a good parody too!  I nearly fell out of my seat 
laughing! 
  You're right.  There are somethings that are overdone by the "PC" 
crowd.  But then again, there are times to change the language.  
Such as Punkie's example with N***r.  It's a terrible word.  It has 
so much connotation, and there is so much bad feeling about it that 
it shouldn't be used. It may be shorter and easier to say 
tha "African-American" or whatever other terms there are, but you 
cannot shed the connotations brought up by it.  
  Not being British I can't bring up any appropriate parallel terms, 
but I have no doubt that they are out there.  
  Anyhow, in the Potterverse, "Mudblood" is probably one that would 
fall under the terms of needing to be changed.

Kneazy: 
> For a different reason JKR has also invented a verbal sin, a term 
to describe a specific sub-group. In the WW it is meant to be 
shocking, but I am not in the WW and never will be;
<snip> 
I have no qualms in using it, and doing so says absolutely nothing 
about my attitudes or societal stance in real life. It doesn't 
insult anyone in the real world, only in the Potterverse.
> To  assume otherwise is something I find incomprehensible; it's an 
exercise in "let's pretend this means something nasty about real 
people so we can stop them using it." <snip>
 I'm a libertarian; reasonable freedom of expression is a tenet that 
is almost sacred. Unsurprisingly I deny others the right to dictate 
or censor my use of a made-up word describing a fictional concept. 
Sorry to get so emphatic, but it does make my blood boil. Others may 
read into the word what they may, but include me out.  And honestly, 
do you really think that anything said on this site will affect or 
hurt Harry or Hermione in the slightest?
> 

Frost: 
 Yes, I do. Can't you see Hermione crying now?  :(  (jk) ;) 

  In reality, I both agree with you and disagree with you.  The 
term, unless adopted by the language, doesn't mean thing to anyone 
real, and isn't going to hurt anyone. But then again, it does 
describe a real issue, even if the particular group named isn't 
real. You can easily insert any sort of derogatory term about any 
people group in the sentence, and have it make sense, and I can see 
how people would use those terms to define the word.  What's more, 
identifying "Mudbloods" with "Chink," "Jap," or even "N***r" is 
precisely what JKR wanted us to do.  (again, Any British equivalent 
that I don't know, please fill in the blank)  The word is meant to 
be offensive.  Personally, I think I'll refrain from using it from 
now on because it'll take away from my experience of the books.  But 
that is a personal decision, because, after all, it's not a real 
group. 

  I'm glad this issue came up because I didn't really think about it 
till now.  Now I associate the word with some things that I do find 
really offensive and I can understand the reaction that was given 
better.  Bleh. 

Anyhow, before I go, I want to apologize for using a couple of the 
terms I did to make my point, in case anyone was offended.  I really 
don't like those words, though I guess that's obvious from how I was 
using them.  Bleh.  

Frost