Chief Wahoo in the Crosshairs

[bn2cardz]

Originally Posted by tschock

Same question, different post. How about 1 person being offended?

I already answered this, let me go back at you. If only 1 isn't offended can you keep doing it? Let's face it, though, you are putting up a wicker man because there isn't just 1 person offended. I proposed a question that you are choosing to ignore because you can't continue to argue your side and confront the question at the same time. Or maybe there is a reason I can't think of.

What reason do you have to continue offending any percentage of people?

My child recently offended a friend at school by using the phrase "scaredy cat" because she was scared of something. This is a term that is used in our house freely including to describe ourselves when scared of something.

My advice to my daughter was "just refrain from using that phrase from now on so as not to offend her, she doesn't understand the context in which you use it."

I didn't say "lets take a poll of all your friends and if it is only 10% then don't worry how she feels"

[tschock]

Originally Posted by bn2cardz

I already answered this, let me go back at you. If only 1 isn't offended can you keep doing it? Let's face it, though, you are putting up a wicker man because there isn't just 1 person offended. I proposed a question that you are choosing to ignore because you can't continue to argue yourside and confront the question at the same time.

My child recently offended a friend at school by using the phrase "scaredy cat" because she was scared of something. This is a term that is used in our house freely including to describe ourselves when scared of something.

My advice to my daughter was "just refrain from using that phrase from now on so as not to offend her, she doesn't understand the context in which you use it."

I didn't say "lets take a poll of all your friends and if it is only 10% then don't worry how she feels"

Apologies if you already answered that. I missed it (or misunderstood). I'm not "choosing to ignore" what you said, but numbers ARE important.

My "1 person" example was the extreme case (obviously), but it was to make the point that there IS a difference between a small number of people taking offense to something, versus something being offensive to the larger group. Hence my original post to this discussion.

You daughter example is interesting, and a 1-to-1 association. Not 1-to-many, like Chief Wahoo. But by following your own logic and in conjunction with the Chief Wahoo discussion, shouldn't you have told her not to use this term anymore AT ALL because it might offend others besides her friend? That would be more in keeping with your position, OR AT LEAST, not implying my "1 person" was a straw man argument.

Again, it gets down to numbers (or trade offs). 1 person offended out of millions, that person needs to get over it. And in that extreme example, I hope you are not implying that the offending party change. That would be downright silly. But obviously at some point, if there is enough aggregate offense, then that symbol would be offensive to the aggregate as a whole.

That said... I don't have any defense for Chief Wahoo, nor was it ever my intent in to establish one. I don't care either way.

What I was trying to get to is when does a symbol IN AND OF ITSELF become an offensive symbol. And I'm not implying this in the Chief Wahoo case, but sometimes we are too quick to "take offense" these days.

[Section103]

Numbers are important, but there are no easy answers and that alone should not hinder a discussion. If 1 person is offended, that's not enough. But is there a magic number or a magic percentage? I dont think there is. I dont think 50% is the magic number.

And who should be included? The entire population or only specific portions? If 100% of the Native Americans are offended but nobody else is, is that enough or too low because its below the magic % threshhold? Should only Native Americans be included? If Im offended, does that not count as well? And what about those who arent "real" Native Americans - you know, those whose bloodlines are less than whatever arbitrary % someone thinks it should be. Do they count?

Yes - real questions to consider. No real easy answers from any side.

[Bill77]

Well Chief Wahoo has come a long way since the 40's, but maybe he has a little farther to yet to go.