[COFFEE] Bar fight about woke culture

And that’s what’s wrong with so-called “inclusive” language. It blows the over-sensitivities of a tiny minority out of proportion and forces everyone to use a kind of doublespeak (really 1984 should be read by everyone, again and again, until they understand it). A language designed to break the link between word and meaning. A system that is forcing people to deny reality, to deny what their eyes are seeing, namely that there are two biological genders and the members of each are easily distinguishable from each other (there are very rare medical exceptions, of course).

A man can therefore never give birth to a child, for example. You can redefine what the word man should mean, of course, just as you can order everyone to call a chair a table, but you cannot redefine the meaning behind it. A chair is a chair, even if you call it table. By redefining words you are obscuring reality, make understanding reality harder and derive people and their identities of the means to express themselves.

Wokist gender definition (self-identification / pronoun choice) is tautological, it has no meaning beyond its definition. A woman is a person identifying as such, nothing more. The very word then becomes useless, as it describes nothing, unless you follow wokism and believe in the totemic importance of pronouns.

By contrast, the experiences and identity of the vast majority lose the word to describe themselves. To be a woman is more than to menstruate, just as there are fundamental differences between transwomen and biological women. Transwomen deserve to chose and express their identity, but biological women do as well. There is nothing wrong with calling a chair a chair. A woman is a woman and a transwoman is a transwoman. Of course everyone should be polite and tolerant, but no one should be forced to deny reality because some people demand that.

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Duly noted, so that leads us to the next difficult question imho: in these cases, who has the authority to determine whether X or Y is ethical or not (or even whether it is a question of ethics at all)? I’m sure many people here on this forum or more generally in Switzerland or the world would agree with you, and others would disagree. How would a company determine which direction it should follow here?

I totally agree on the merits. But it is our nature that you mainly promote your peers.
There are few ways of doing it start forcing equality and diversity and from there you can move on or enforce polices to promote it and let the things go.

Anyway the problem that we have is another (you just mention) the head needs to be an expert and skill on the topic. I think is totally wrong and out dated. Your head needs to lead and not be an SME.

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Those look like terms that are difficult to define themselves. Would you have any authoritative source as to what constitutes an “undisputed standard”? Is it a democratic process? Is it enough to have 50%+1 of peopleof the same opinion, or would you need 100% for it to be “undisputed”? Or is it somewhere between those?

Referring back to an earlier message: I’m not sure what makes you think that the executives are not in (at least) as good a position as you and I to make that call. I’m sure they have at least some internal data, to which you and I don’t have access, pointing one way or another. Could you enlighten me on that?

Any chance that this is also just the effect of free market/capitalism, ie a company that would enforce such policies would not be maximizing its sharholders’ value?

Quite the opposite. As I wrote above, I am against discrimination and for equal rights for everyone, which is why I oppose wokeism.

Of course there are reactionary anti-wokists, but demonising everyone who is anti-woke as reactionary is completely wrong.

There is a strong classical liberal case against wokeism, as expressed by The Economist, for example.

There is also a strong feminist case against wokeism, as for example expressed by J.K. Rowling.

Both pieces are open-minded, thoughtful and well-written, in sharp contrast to the dogmatic, aggressive, whining arguments one usually gets to hear from woke activists.

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Don’t take it personally but I don’t share your opinion at all and I’m sorry but I won’t take the time to debate this here. It’s boring and I feel like I’ve seen it all already. JK Rowling. What a joke. I will mute this thread.

I hope that someone will have the patience to go thru this, but I don’t expect much.

The point of my post was to keep the neon’s thread on topic, god knows that I don’t have the patience to debate transphobia.

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Hi guys. I didn’t read the whole thread, but I have an example of the woke mind virus spreading near us. In Germany there was a climate strike and the musician Ronja Maltzahn was supposed to perform, but she was cancelled by the woke mob because she is wearing dreadlocks, which supposedly is cultural appropriation.

These people have their brains twisted to the point that it is impossible for me to comprehend. I guess the goal is to make up to everybody who was ever hurt or discriminated or abused. Striving for equity in society is a path to totalitarianism.

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You don’t have to venture as far as Germany.

It’s happening in Switzerland, fresh from the presses:

Bern: Band muss Konzert abbrechen – weil weisse Musiker Rastas tragen - 20 Minuten

Von Deutschland bis Schweden: Berner Dreadlock-Vorfall macht europaweit Furore | Berner Zeitung

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I can’t help but think that number is a bit of randomness or arbitrary on top of an already fairly subjective position (that ethical considerations should guide business decision making), don’t you think?

So does that mean that they should just be maximizing profits as the only objective metric that they can work with?

Meanwhile in Germany, some now deem it inappropriate if white people listen to music played by non-white people. Because, to quote in German:

" Wir müssen in unserer Arbeit sensibel sein und beispielsweise darauf achten, dass Konzerte keinen exotisierenden Faktor haben. Das kann schnell passieren, wenn ein ausschließlich weißes Publikum einem schwarzen Künstler oder einer schwarzen Künstlerin auf der Bühne zuschaut."

So, as per wokeism events need to be supervised, to make sure everyone’s hair cuts are acceptable, everyone only plays the kind of music they are allowed to, and everyone only listens to the kind of music they are allowed to. Whites must not have “non-white hair cuts”, must not make “non-white music” and they must not listen to non-white musicians.

Is that really the kind of society we want to live in?

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Maybe not on this level but you could easily send out two fake job descriptions and measure how many and what kind of applications you receive. Didn’t check, but I’m sure there’s research out there (in peer-reviewed journals, not in bar fight internet forums).

A) “We look for an active and driven employee that champions the objectives thanks to his/her high intellect”
B) “We look for a dynamic and focused employee that campaigns for our purpose thanks to his/her good understanding”

I’m not into this woke things, but maybe the first one is just fine for applicants or shareholders who use expressions like “it’s a scam” or “brain twisted people subjected by a mind virus” (no offense to the writers, just to give an example of very angled words) in every other sentence, and the other attracts a more diverse group of applications (incl. woman) that might simply not feel addressed by the wording in A).

So yes, meeting the expectations of your customers or important employees might as well contribute to maximize shareholder value or whatever the shareholders want. Up for them to decide.
Not all is a “culture war”, some is just different ways of doing business.

What’s next, I’m not allowed to cook or eat spaghetti bolognese if I’m not Italian?

How dare you eating spagetti bolognese, only Schabowy for you :rofl:

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All this meddling (which, i suppose, would have to come from the State if you hope any binding effect or sanctions) into a company’s internal work and decision-making feels a bit… interventionist? It’s almost a form of communism where the population assumes a far-reaching influence over business decisions, forcing the company to go against its profit maximization strategy to respect the wish of the community. A bit strange no? What if suddenly the population requests more and more “woke” measures from companies, even where it doesn’t benefit them financially?

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A: what the hell, you’re eating dim sum?! That’s so disrespectful!
B: chill out, it’s pierogi…
A: oh… well make sure you don’t add any soy sauce!

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I’m not sure I have much more to say on the topic. I just feel like there is a slight incoherence in what you’re saying.

  • On one side, you want to uphold individual freedom and “less government, less regulation, less legal boundaries”. On the other, you want essentially to create a new norm (be it legal or moral, but with the effect of changing companies’ behaviour anyway), drawn from an external and to a large extent subjective source of authority (there are centuries of philosophical debate on what “ethics” is). That norm would then restrict the way in which companies can behave.

  • On one side, you consider that “Companies have a mandate to maximize shareholder value”, but on the other you want them to restrict their behaviour because whatever is not your opinion on this matter is “intolerable” and “imposing a political agenda”.

There are a lot of elements in your messages, but I feel like it often comes back to your personal issue with “wokeism” (whatever the definition). From this starting point, you then try to build an argument that the world should match your view and anything else in inacceptable.

Is it possible that you are trying to build a sort of objective construct to defend a view that is, ultimately, purely subjective, and that you have difficulty accepting that people or companies may not think like you? Ultimately, you’re free to boycott Neon or UBS, just like you’d be free to boycott Nestlé, Facebook or whatever boycott is currently relevant and for whatever reason. And in return they are free to think that the loss of your business is a regrettable but necessary incidence of their profit maximizing mission.

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George Orwell 1984 in action.

War is Peace
Peace is War
Killing civilians is just collateral damage

In your example, of course they read differently. Because they are different!!!

A) Is what the company really wants
And B) Is what they are forced to say

It is a way of lying to candidates, because once they land in their new desk, what the company will expect from them is A, not B.

Dynamic doesn’t necessarily mean active.
Focused doesn’t necessarily mean driven.
Good understanding doesn’t necessarily mean Intellect.

On A) it is clear the kind of profile they want. And they express it without second intentions. If you apply for that job you know what to expect.

On B) you are being deluded by woke stupidity and if you get the job you might land in a place that you didn’t expect, not fulfilling the company expectations. And if you don’t get it, it is a waste of time.

It is an euphemism (or a blatant lie) like the “emotional salary” and all that crap.

As if there were not enough crap with deluding job advertisements, to do it even more with this woke thing.

Besides all this : What in hell is wrong with “active” or “intellect” or “driven” ??? Both men or women can have those qualities. Why is it not good to use those words?

What? :sweat_smile: Where do you see that?

Don’t you think you described that in a twisted way, pulled the Swiss Re guidelines totally out of context?

While Swiss Re says that mother, sister, daughter are indeed to be avoided, so are father, brother and son.
The point is to use gender-neutral terms.

Personal anecdote
For years I’ve been calling the person who gave birth to my child, “my partner” (because we’re not married, and “my girlfriend” seemed kind of too youthful for parents). I found it strange at first, but now i find it totally normal term.
I’m glad the world is catching up.

That’s so, but that doesn’t make it any better. I just mentioned the cancelling of female words, since nobody cares about discrimination against men.

Language rules such as this are an authoritarian attempt to force the over-sensibilities of a tiny minority on everyone and in the process discriminate against the living reality and identity of the vast majority. The latter indeed think of themselves as men, women, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters. Why should anyone be offended because of that, why should their identities not be mentioned?

Your personal example is not a great one - partner is naturally gender-neutral and I agree a different level than either girlfriend or wife. More interesting would be how would call your partner in German - Partner*in or Partnerin - or how you would call her if you were married - spouse or wife?

And it never stops. The zealots continue to look for things to be offended about and expect everyone to bend backwards to care for their over-sensibilities. See the UBS rules above. Are you now stopping to use words such as “active”, knowing there are people who imagine themselves to be offended by it?

Why can’t we instead use common sense and general friendliness? If you invite a group with mixed-gender partners, you’d naturally use mixed or gender-neutral terms, for example. No need for a rule-book, for censorship or any invented “gender-neutral” language.