Self-censorship, Group-think
Oct. 4th, 2019 09:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogRecent events have me thinking again about self-censorship and bowdlerization. I've never read any of the Brontës, but I'll quote Charlotte Brontë in expressing my discomfort with defanging venomous words by replacing them with obvious stand-ins.
“The practice of hinting by single letters those expletives with which profane and violent people are wont to garnish their discourse, strikes me as a proceeding which, however well meant, is weak and futile.” -Charlotte Bronte
This (self-censorship) is one of a few examples of practices I follow because they have become socially necessary to avoid hurting other people and provoking anger, but with which I fundamentally disagree. (This is not to say I am right or wrong in that disagreement. It may be that I am lacking information or have failed to fully consider the information I have.) This is true from both an outside and inside perspective. When I think of slurs that could be applied to me, the idea that people who have already chosen to use hateful and hurtful language, or those who don't generally have any need to think about the hurt such language can cause, should be spared from facing up to those slurs if I decide to write or talk about what they've said about me is frustrating. It feels like I am taking power away from myself and ceding it to them.
Either I self-censor in ways that make me feel like my communication is less effective and that I have been disempowered, or I become the subject of anger and potential ostracism by people, groups, and communities that I otherwise might support or find togetherness with. This stuff is really hard for me to navigate and is reminiscent of similar issues that I often encounter when thinking about whether I can feel like a part of progressive, activist communities. I'm so naturally inclined to disagreement and analytical discussion, and there's always *something* a group espouses that I disagree with.
"...it's the suppression of the word that gives it the power, the violence, the viciousness." -Lenny Bruce
“The practice of hinting by single letters those expletives with which profane and violent people are wont to garnish their discourse, strikes me as a proceeding which, however well meant, is weak and futile.” -Charlotte Bronte
This (self-censorship) is one of a few examples of practices I follow because they have become socially necessary to avoid hurting other people and provoking anger, but with which I fundamentally disagree. (This is not to say I am right or wrong in that disagreement. It may be that I am lacking information or have failed to fully consider the information I have.) This is true from both an outside and inside perspective. When I think of slurs that could be applied to me, the idea that people who have already chosen to use hateful and hurtful language, or those who don't generally have any need to think about the hurt such language can cause, should be spared from facing up to those slurs if I decide to write or talk about what they've said about me is frustrating. It feels like I am taking power away from myself and ceding it to them.
Either I self-censor in ways that make me feel like my communication is less effective and that I have been disempowered, or I become the subject of anger and potential ostracism by people, groups, and communities that I otherwise might support or find togetherness with. This stuff is really hard for me to navigate and is reminiscent of similar issues that I often encounter when thinking about whether I can feel like a part of progressive, activist communities. I'm so naturally inclined to disagreement and analytical discussion, and there's always *something* a group espouses that I disagree with.
"...it's the suppression of the word that gives it the power, the violence, the viciousness." -Lenny Bruce
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 03:14 pm (UTC)The Rev Thomas Bowdler was a local man, btw, it's very much a Shropshire name...........
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 10:50 pm (UTC)Lately I've been trying to purge ableist words from my vocabulary. It's hard, and complex, because 1) many of them really don't mean what they used to and are never used in that context, and 2) I self-identify as a few of them, and I will continue to use those words to describe myself.
But that's contemporary inclusive language, not bowdlerization. The latter is ridiculous (but not stupid, which was the word I wanted to type).
no subject
Date: 2019-10-05 10:03 am (UTC)Because people in the past used turns of phrase or plain -isms and -phobias is no excuse for censorship.
That was then and this is now and this is a historian saying so.
But personally avoiding words or phrases you know to be unpleasant or hateful? Absolutely!
But what would I know as a trans woman with Romani and Jewish ancestry? :o)