BristolUK

Is that better or worse than the cooked variety?

Souvy

I think you are perhaps being a tad over-PC. It`s only offensive if the person at the receiving end finds it offensive.

Almost Canadian

Teaandtoday5

I am finding you funny too often for you to get more karma so

Ok I'll bite. That's rubbish. I admit I was surprised by the use of this term. I thought only my Dad still said stuff like that. I hadn't read far enough back in the thread to catch the wings theme, and the sexism of 'bird' but still... Also on a public forum you have no idea who is on the 'receiving end'. Are you seriously saying no words are offensive unless used directly in a name-calling situation?

Stinkypup

"The rule of Souvy" might be acceptable in your little world but I don't think that would be wise to apply on a public forum. Using this rule one could for example be racist but that is ok because it was a general comment and not pointed at anyone specifically who could find your comment offensive.

At the receiving end? I'm not sure what you mean. You are addressing a public forum... You have made your opinion clear but do you not think other people on the forum might be slightly more enlightened than the pair of you and might actually be offended by the comment? I chose to say no more once Novacastrian had replied with yet another inappropriate comment in a thread which had clearly for the time being drifted in a more serious direction but then you chose to continue it. Perhaps not surprising given that you have trivialised the comments.
Feel free to keep digging though, that hole is getting deeper.

Souvy

As I say, offense is taken, not delivered. You cannot offend someone if you use a term that you consider or intend to be offensive and the other party doesn`t. Black people took back the N-word and gay men took back the word queer. Neutralisation.

bats

Yet you didn't say the N word.

I think Stinky is right and wasn't being over sensitive. Using terms like fairy in a public conversation is wrong, you have to know your audience and that's impossible on a public forum.

BristolUK

I was in the middle of trying to post just that when BE had a funny 5 minutes.

dbd33

"receiving end" is a phrase that might bear rethinking in this context.

I think suggesting posters are unenlightened is going too far, people banter using terms that fit the flow of the theme, not necessarily the terms they would use on a job posting. As well, this is a forum which might reasonably be thought to be read primarily by Brits and so one would expect more freedom of expression here than one would in a public place in Canada. "Fairy" is not the worst description of a person I expect to see today.

Stinkypup

Strike out my highlighted comment- make it " than the three of you"

Teaandtoday5

Assuming (dangerous as I don't know you) that you don't belong to either of those groups, are you seriously suggesting that attempts to reclaim those words make it acceptable for you to use them? As bats has pointed out, clearly you don't. You surely cannot justify the use of derogatory terms by suggesting others might not find them offensive?

dbd33

Souvy is neither Black nor (primarily, overtly) homosexual.

Teaandtoday5

The 'banter' justification has become a bit of a laughable cliche.
Should banter be banned? - BBC News

dbd33

The banter itself aimed at being laughable cliché. No one uses "fairy" to describe a gay man in earnest; the archaic nature of the expression serves to make the usage camp rather than prejudiced. "Bird" is less defensible but I think the objection to this instance of "fairy" is po-faced and an instance of taking offense on behalf of others who may, or may not, be bothered. We should fetch a gaymo for comment.

Teaandtoday5

The assertion that no-one would use such an expression in earnest I suspect belies the experience of many. It does however confirm my suspicion (not the first time I've thought this) that you are arguing for the sake of it, rather than from any real belief in the points you are making.

It would be great if these things could truly be described as archaic. When my oldest was in primary school I heard one of the mothers call the very suntanned son of her friend a 'darkie'. You would have thought that had died a rightful death in the seventies, but was still being used, with no shame, in this millennium. Sadly some things take longer to die than you would think.