Does cited material merit special consideration when the content is potentially offensive or unwelcoming?

Question

I added an answer to the discussion of Lou Reed's lyrics and I realized later that it should have been a question in its own right. I’m reluctant to delete that answer because of the comments and votes on it, but I will if it’s confusing the issue. I’m asking whether the EL&U community feels that citations of potentially offensive or unwelcoming content should be treated differently and not whether a particular instance is offensive. I realize some folks are tired of talking about the discussion I referenced here, but this isn’t a duplicate.

I think it would be worth getting community feedback on the idea in this comment:

"offensive or unwelcoming", that's POB. Does it violate the be nice policy? Can anything "quoted" ever violate it? If an answer doesn't align with your views, it is at your discretion to DV it. But if at anytime I'm disallowed to cite what someone else once said, that's censorship. – Mazura

Should citing what someone else has said be held to a different standard than original text from the author of a post when it comes to violating the Code of Conduct?

Let’s assume the citation is relevant to the answer and the author feels that particular citation is critical to their answer but a significant number of people find it unwelcoming.

Are there any mitigating qualities, like the length of the citation, historical significance, etc. that would cause us to keep a citation that we would normally remove if it had been original text? What factors would cause us to keep a question about source material that is deeply offensive to some portion of the community?

Also consider from one of the comments on the answer:

Just some more food for thought. What if you quote something that is acceptable now, but not in 10 years time? Or for that matter, something that was acceptable a few years back but no longer now? Especially when talking about etymology it may well be that (almost) everything on a subject is no longer acceptable, but that shouldn't mean it's automatically out of scope. That's like not teach history because it may be construed as offensive. – JJJ

I would like to separate (if we can) the actual incident here with a more general discussion of what kinds of factors should be taken into account when citing potentially offensive material, keeping in mind that the goal is to make EL&U as welcoming and inclusive as possible without undermining its primary purpose as a knowledge sharing site.

Answer 1

This is not a duplicate of the 'colored girls' question because it is asking a general question (ie are quotes or cited material) that is only one aspect of the other question (ie is 'colored girls' in a quotation offensive).

Quoting or citing is not the same as using or calling or referring but it is not entirely invisible.

(Quoting and citation are not identical but are similar enough for this issue)

This is the old use-mention difference. Calling someone a taboo word to their face is confrontational, but telling someone else that you said that is not confrontational to the listener.

I think that is what most people here stop at.

The further nuance that I think people are missing is that a mention only weakens the taboo nature, not eradicates. For example:

When I opened the door, I saw the $$$ $$$$ $$$ chainsaw start $$$$$ing into the $$$$$; the b$$$$$$$ of $$$$$, the gurgled screaming, the maniacal $$$$$. Then silence, And then $$ $$$$$ $$$ $$$ dental $$$$$ $$$ $$$$$$.

That was all intentionally bowdlerized, but give you some mental conceptions of something awful. It is (probably) acceptable here but even without any identifiable taboo it is obviously a taboo subject.

(note that there is no black and white; tabooness is a continuum).

This is all in the context of disinterested (as much as that is possible because it is never totally possible) discussion/research of words, where we sometimes need to discuss these taboo words. In public discourse about politics or race relations... ugh it's so complicated.

This is not about political censorship at all (or at least I don't see that). It's about common courtesy, realizing that others may be hurt by incidental, unnecessary things that the speaker doesn't realize.

TL;DR A quote/citation of a taboo term is not bad in the same way as a direct use is, but the taboo is only weakened, not eradicated entirely. You can still see the word (a quotation is not a black box, you are intended to understand the contents, but just not directed at you). Context must be explained to make the use of the taboo terms acceptable.

---

There are related contexts with different levels of shock involved. The strength of taboo blasphemy, slurs, bodily functions (sex, excrement, illness/incapacity) can be reduced but not removed.

• strong/weak - there is a continuum of strength of tabooness for words for the same concept: 'shit' is much more taboo than 'feces', but the latter is still not the best dinnertime conversation.
• used vs reported/mentioned/discussed - a slur yelled at someones face is much stronger than reporting that someone else yelled the slur, but
• necessary/incidental - if you are specifically discussing the taboo nature of a term, that is exactly when you have to have the term 'mentioned'.
• contemporary/historical - the strength of a term may be different than what it used to be (and is not necessarily linear).
• the speaker - using an epithet about oneself (or group) is much weaker than using it about others (though still troublesome).
• artistic/non-artistic - an artistic composition has a certain social cachet that protects it somewhat from every-day taboos. For example, nudes in art are tolerated more than nude walking down the street.
• sarcastic/sincere - a sarcastic use is less direct than a sincere one. But sarcasm is easy to miss.
• language itself/implication - In 'shit' vs 'feces', the strength of taboo is inherently part of the word 'shit'; in 'feces' it is only implication. There is nothing taboo about the terms 'God', 'is', and 'dead', but their implication in a sentence could start wars, depending on whose god you are impugning. Note though that changing or removing an implication can be thought censorship (which has strong implication), but for language taboos, that is limited to politeness censorship.
• literal/metaphorical - Dog breeders often use the term 'bitch' simply for 'female dog'; people who are not dog breeders rarely.
• written/spoken - speaking a taboo term is much stronger than just reading about it. But then again, writing is much less temporary and can be repeated several times to many people, and the spoken version is only heard by those at the time.

These dichotomies can be used to help evaluate the strength of a taboo, but if you start with some taboo, there will always be some hint of taboo left.

Answer 2

The question that inspired this one has resulted in an "enough with the politics" remark. I understand, it's human nature to want to analyze situations from every possible angle. At the same time, I'm surprised this stack hasn't addressed this very issue once and for all.

As someone who has visited for the last 8 years, I've always felt that quoted references should be considered safe. They are part of a learning process. The same words appearing in another stack might quickly be edited out or an answer fully deleted, but here, one would expect that examples of language usage is very much on topic.

As you phrased the question, "Does cited material merit special consideration when the content is potentially offensive or unwelcoming?" I'd suggest that, in the same manner the supreme court once stated "I can't define pornography, but I know it when I see it," I don't doubt that there are times a quotes can actually be offensive and worth deleting, but, to that point, that's what DVs are for, and flags, and Mod's judgement. While my approach would be that from the question that spawned all the recent discussion, most quotes would be acceptable. The truly offensive ones, the inevitable exception.

What's especially difficult is the moving target that's English. We agree, N-word is bad. Can I ask the question along the lines of "In Twain's day, was the N-word as verboten as it is today, and he still put it in his writing, or was it just another word that had no negative/insulting connotation?" That would be the kind of contextual question that might reference a quote, or a book of a different era and trying to understand the nature of the language.

In other cases, context for the word itself is everything. The member that objected to 'colored' also objected to 'girls'. To my mother in law, 'the girls' will always be her daughters, now in their 60s. To my wife, 'the girls' are her female friends, the same age range. I cite the member's objection to this word as an example of how even the word 'girl' can be something to be offended by. And to that, I'd say that this whole discussion points to a very slippery slope.

The general rule should be the same as on other stacks, "Be nice", and the system that's in place should continue to be used to handle the tiny fraction that crosses a line. The simple response to the Lou Reed quote? (If one feels compelled to remark at all) "Yes, I know that song. 46 years ago, it was a classic, just be aware, that word in that context is offensive today".

It's difficult to talk about an issue while standing so far away that we can't repeat the words that offended a member. I'd suggest that citations hold a certain level of immunity. A student walks in and says "Max just called Ms P a dumb b**** and got sent to the principal." I don't reprimand the student for bad language. That said, if a member is noted to purposely find otherwise offensive citations where they are starting to appear gratuitous, I'd call that out.

Answer 3

This is part of a piece by Robert Henderson, Peter Klecha, and Eric McCready 2017 in which they address the handling of linguistic material involving the n-word, as an inroad into a general discussion of how to handle the treatment of slurs in general and the putative distinction between use and mention. It may throw some light on this question:

"[...] Slurs are generally words which have a history of being used to inflict serious emotional distress. Setting aside how it is that they come to do that in first place (which surely must have something to do with both their literal meaning and with their issuers’ hateful intent), they come to have a perverse second effect, as we understand it: they viscerally remind their victims of the hurt they have experienced due to prior use of the word, as summed up by the Langston Hughes quotation excerpted by Geoffrey Nunberg’s post, or by Ice Cube in his recent discussion with Bill Maher: “When I hear a white person say it, it feel like that knife stabbing you, even if they don’t mean to.” And importantly, what we have read and heard from people who have been victimized by these words suggests that any depiction can be such a reminder, whether it is use, mention, quotation, or even just phonetic overlap, as in the very obvious case of an idiom containing a slur, or less obvious cases like similar-sounding but historically unrelated words.

As an analogy, consider someone who has been the victim of repeated axe-violence — someone who has been attacked with axes over and over again over the course of their life, and has been threatened with such attacks even more often. If such a person were to come into contact with even just a depiction of an axe or axe-violence, it would be responsible to assume that the person may well become upset, and maybe even re-traumatized. And importantly, this is independent of anyone’s intent — it wouldn’t matter if I showed such a depiction to such a person with the virtuous intent of wanting to rob these depictions of their power to hurt the victim, for example — it would still very likely cause pain. There would be no reason to expect that that pain would be in any way a function of the depicter’s intent.

Likewise, any depiction of a slur creates the risk of causing hurt to those people who have been historically victimized by the slur, regardless of speaker intent. In this way, the slurring effect of a slur is more like Grice’s (1957) natural meaning than his non-natural (communicative) meaning; it is something the hearer derives from the utterance independent of grammatical convention or of their recognition of the speaker’s intent. See also this discussion of research on the physiological effects “mere words” can have.

[...]

If you take the standard linguistic analysis of slurs, though, the word’s power does not come from mere taboo (i.e., a social prohibition on using or mentioning the word as we see with expletives like "shit"). The word literally has as part of its semantic content an expression of racial hate, and its history has made that content unavoidably salient. It is that content, and that history, that gives this word (and other slurs) its power over and above other taboo expressions. It is for this reason that the word is literally unutterable for many people, and why we (who are white, not a part of the group that is victimized by the word in question) avoid it here.

[...] There seems to be an unfortunate attitude — even among those whose views on slurs are otherwise similar to our own — that we as linguists are somehow exceptions to the facts surrounding slurs discussed in this post. In Geoffrey Nunberg’s otherwise commendable post on July 13, for example, he continues to mention the slur (quite abundantly), despite acknowledging the hurt it can cause. We think this is a mistake. We are not special; our community includes members of oppressed groups (though not nearly enough of them), and the rest of us ought to respect and show courtesy to them.

The sad fact is that linguistics as an academic field has severe diversity issues. These problems are not helped by the strategy above which, while in the abstract might have its merits, in practice is only hurtful, and only serves as a barrier to those who might find its use painful or insensitive. Certainly, the taboo-ignoring strategy [...] is not going to be helpful in solving the problems our field has with lack of diversity. These problems are further evidenced by the fact, mentioned above, that we, the authors, are white, so we cannot directly understand what it feels like to be affected by the slur under discussion. Writing this [... piece] discomforts us in light of this fact, but we feel that we have a responsibility to try to further this discussion, and acknowledge that our understanding of the actual harm that comes from the n-word is indirect. For all of us who are not targeted by particular slurs, understanding can only really come from listening to those who have been harmed by them. We strongly encourage everyone to do so.

[...]

[O]ne of the main points of this note is that speaker intention is not always relevant to these matters."

Answer 4

I think the law of diminishing returns applies here. The more we go down this rathole, the less light we are going to see.

Some in the community, aided by The Powers That Be, have chosen to delete a highly upvoted answer to a question that had nothing to do with race, simply because the user who wrote the post responded to a comment of mine by quoting the first use he could think of which used "go" as a synonym of "said" (and refused to change it).

The user stated his reasons for refusing to change his answer to accommodate Tim Post's threat to remove his post:

I do not intend to go into lengthy debate over this. You may lie to yourself that this is not censorship, but it is. I did not address anyone, so if anyone is offended, it is purely for political reasons. I did not choose to make this a political issue, but if it must be, then it's an issue of free speech vs. censorship. Choose your side.

That is a clear statement. Tim Post made his position similarly clear:

Yeah, see, I don't see decency as being a political issue. The words you wrote are hurting people. Hard stop. I think it's best that we just remove your answer.

I rather admire michael.hor257k's fearless stand in this, but my approbation is immaterial. This game room we call English Language & Usage is owned and operated by people who have the final say in these matters. That they can be wrong is also immaterial. The person who holds a gun may be wrong, but can still shoot you. Tim Post called this an issue of "decency" and called up his grave responsibilities, as representing his company, to his communities and shareholders. And he used that to remove the post in question.

So TPTB have outed themselves as being willing to champion the offended for even the slightest infraction. I can't think of many slighter infractions than the Lou Reed lyric, but I'm sure they exist and if someone attempts to use them in an answer for whatever reason you have seen a demonstration of what will happen.

The Japanese have a saying: 出る釘は打たれる (the nail that sticks out gets hammered in). You have been warned.

TL;DR: All this discussion is beside the point, because it isn't going to change a goddamn thing.

Answer 5

I love it when shit like this happens after many criticised an answer containing the line “the colored girls go doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo” and a Stack Exchange director deleted the entire post.

Today a new contributor (just a coincidence or a provocation? Who knows.) posted a question about punctuation, on the usage of ellipsis at the start of a quotation.

"...The witness for the state, with the exception of the sheriff of Maycomb County, have presented themselves to you gentlemen, to this court, in the cynical confidence that their testimony would not be doubted, confident that you gentlemen would go along with them on the assumption---the evil assumption---that all Negroes lie, that all Negroes are basically immoral beings, that all Negro men are not to be trusted around our women, an assumption that one associates with minds of their calibre.”

Is it okay if I used ellipsis like this? (@OP)

This one is an interesting example, because the speaker in the quotation is not defending those racist views, they actually define them as being "evil"; however, the first lines that jumped out to me, a casual visitor/reader, were the lines that contained "negroes". And those were the lines that made the greatest impact on me because they are totally disgusting, although someone else might not find them so volatile or insulting. In eight hours there have been no comments criticising the content of the quotation.

1. Is the term negro less offensive and insulting than colored? Or are they equally offensive?
2. The quote contains racist material but the speaker denounces those views. Should the quotation be allowed to stay?
3. Does the example actually relate to the OP's question about punctuation (ellipsis) in a meaningful way? Does it contain an example of its usage?
4. If any of the answers to the above is "no" then should users intervene (edit) and change the quote, or should the entire post be summarily deleted?

There is another option aka passing the hot potato

5. Flag the post.

P.S.

OMG I've just realised my "answer" is also problematic. Do I use asterisks in place of the offensive terms? But wouldn't that risk making it sound even more offensive if I did?

For example,

...that all ******* lie,

Or leave the first letter alone and then use asterisks

…that all N****** are basically immoral beings

You know what? It looks much, much more offensive and unwelcoming now.

TL;DR

• Does the community leave it alone?
• Does it edit or replace the quotation?
• Do we downvote it and if we have the necessary rep, vote to delete the post?