'Niggardly' Offense

[ThePantaloonDog]

I'm certainly offended by the mother's ignorance. Maybe I can sue her or something.

And I'm sure ignorant people pronounce Niger exactly like ****** despite the fact that Niger is not pronounced as such. Perhaps people like this kid's mother should send a letter to the country of Niger asking them to change their name in case it is mispronounced and offends someone.

Ignorance is not an excuse!

edit: Che pointed out that my previous argument didn't follow.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by MrFun


She could have chosen from dozens of other words that nowhere near resembles a slur that targets a minority group.

Yeah, and she could have, but why should she even consider that? What kind of language fascism is that?

The word "homo" is a slur, so should we avoid teaching kids any word with the prefix "homo"?

No homonyms, homophony, homogeny...

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by ThePantaloonDog
I'm sure little 5th graders when called a Niger from Nigeria immediately come back with "But Niger isn't pronounced like that!"

Spoken English is different from written English. If you mispronounce a word and use it the way you'd you another word that sounds exactly like what you're saying, you're actually saying the second word and not the first.

[Caligastia]

To think I actually worried that nobody here would be idiotic enough to side with the mother on this.

I should have learned by now that no matter how moronic the point of view, someone on Apolyton will support it.

[Lincoln]

Another tempest in a teapot. My, my, What if the teacher had taught about a space man who wanted to fly to uranus but he was too niggardly with the fuel so he ended up in a black hole instead? Then we would have a problem...

[CyberGnu]

Cali,

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Lorizael
Do the words have different roots? If their roots are the same, I might see a problem with this. Otherwise it's just someone being far more sensitive than they have any right to be.

They have completely different roots.

[CyberGnu]

'Niggardly' is a ancient norwegian word, imported to england by the vikings... '******' comes from the river Niger, obviously more recent than the vikings (since the brits didn't know Niger existed until the 14'th century or so).

[CyberGnu]

At least I think it is from the river, and not a bastardization of 'Negro'. Either way it is older.

[Rex Little]

Originally posted by Tolls
"Niggardly" has come up before...some congressman used it I seem to remember, and there was a ridiculous hoo-ha about it then.

IIRC, it was a Washington, D.C. city official who used the word; he said something like, because of budget constraints he'd have to be niggardly with city funds. One of the guys he was talking to was black and took offense. Some people called for him to be fired, and I think he wound up resigning. It was only 3-4 years ago, I think.

I seem to remember reading that the word "niggard" has Scandinavian roots, but it could be Middle English. Edit: I wrote this before I saw CyberGnu's post, which would seem to confirm the Scandinavian origin.

[CyberGnu]

Rex and Tolls, yeah, I remember that, and it still pisses me off...

[Carver]

Originally posted by Sonic
Che, you say Niger and Nigeria can't be used as offense by kids?

How about the following quoute, which could be very easily considered as an insult:

You are a Niger from Nigeria

Sonic, you are a total moron. People from Nigeria are Nigerians.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov


Yeah, and she could have, but why should she even consider that? What kind of language fascism is that?

The word "homo" is a slur, so should we avoid teaching kids any word with the prefix "homo"?

No homonyms, homophony, homogeny...

Ok, maybe white people have the right to own the feelings of black people, and tell THEM what they should find acceptable, and what they should find offensive.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Another tempest in a teapot. My, my, What if the teacher had taught about a space man who wanted to fly to uranus but he was too niggardly with the fuel so he ended up in a black hole instead? Then we would have a problem...

Ok, maybe white people have the right to own the feelings of black people, and tell THEM what they should find acceptable, and what they should find offensive.

Well, when some black people have utterly moronic feelings, then perhaps they should own those feelings .

Total idiocy. People like that parent shouldn't have the right to reproduce. There should have been no punishment for the teacher at all.

[Skanky Burns]

Reminds me of chemistry in highschool, where we were told to think of words starting with "bi". I think she was teaching us the word "bipolar". Anyway, we were given a warning to only think of appropriate words.

Speaking of which, I wonder what the parents view on the word "bicycle" is? Or bike? A certain minority group should most certainly be offended by these words!