Inverted Posted July 13, 2018 Posted July 13, 2018 1 hour ago, Harry said: Free speech is such a politicised term. But I feel like its being eroded in the workplace in a way that is detrimental to society. People that say things that offend any one person are treated as if they’ve committed a crime, and are cautioned not to say thing X no matter what it is and how reasonable or not it was to say in the first place. I see many good people made to feel like crap over trivial stuff and have their reality upended with some person trying to coach them to get with the times. Today it was me. I honestly believe this is having a detrimental effect on society as it feeds into this narrative that everyone needs to be wrapped in cotton wool and we al need to be fearful we’ll say something that offends someone. All the while those who feel offended by one term or another will become further hypersensitive and direct their focus elsewhere. I’d argue that has a far more significant collective impact on the health of society for everyone to be living in fear than being a bit more comfortable being themselves. I think it’s a sign of how drastically the idea of free speech can warp to our own personal expectations, that people have any expectation of freedom at work when it doesn’t really exist for most people. The workplace is already an area which for most people in the world demands they dress in a very particular way (if not in uniform), speak a certain way, do their hair the right way, wear the right expression on their faces, go to the bathroom at a certain speed etc. I get what your saying but it’s also true that we only perceive ourselves as having freedom within the workplace, up to the point where we personally fall victim to the reality that there isn’t really such a thing. How much is it really a new phenomenon that people aren’t free to do and say what they like at work? But yeah that particular example isn’t about free speech, that’s just someone being an idiot. I don’t think any employer would take that complaint seriously.
The Artful Dodger Posted July 13, 2018 Posted July 13, 2018 2 hours ago, Harry said: So I had a dispute today with a female colleague at work.... She pulled me aside to tell me she was offended about an email I had sent an hour before.... I sent an email to 3 male managers and cc’d her discussing a pure work topic. 100% serious. 100% banter free. She was not the recipient of the email but I wanted her to have visibility of what I was saying as it was relevant to her work as well as mine. Hence the cc. Her issue was that I opened the email “ Hi Gents”. She deleted the email and refused to read beyond that line. She took issue with me not using a gender neutral greeting, and that I didn’t know any of them well enough to even know if they actually are gentlemen. She understood the email was not addressed to her but still took issue with it a offensive. I’m totally baffled by the whole exchange and to be honest pretty peeved off that I’ve been made to feel like a misogynist simply by addressing three men as “Gents”. Is that something I’m not meant to be doing now? Do I seriously just have to apologise and suck it up? Do I heed her advice and not do it again? And if so, what is the gender neutral version of Gents anyway? I.e. Not a cold term but that actually has some warmth about it. Sounds made up.
Subscriber RandoEFC+ Posted July 13, 2018 Subscriber Posted July 13, 2018 What an utterly retarded debate. You send an email to three blokes and started with Hi Gents. Nothing to see here, if she thought the email was addressed to her and didn't realise it was a CC then she is still a cunt for not just putting it to an innocent oversight but I at least see where she's coming from. Imagine actually taking life so seriously that something like that makes you think you have to take someone aside and have a word with them. Ten times a day my students accidentally (or trying to be funny) answer the register "Yes, Miss" instead of "Yes, Sir". Maybe I should start handing out detentions and go to the head to demand that all pupils should answer the register in a gender-neutral manner from now on. Get. A. Fucking. Grip.
Harry Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 6 hours ago, RandoEFC said: What an utterly retarded debate. You send an email to three blokes and started with Hi Gents. Nothing to see here, if she thought the email was addressed to her and didn't realise it was a CC then she is still a cunt for not just putting it to an innocent oversight but I at least see where she's coming from. Imagine actually taking life so seriously that something like that makes you think you have to take someone aside and have a word with them. Ten times a day my students accidentally (or trying to be funny) answer the register "Yes, Miss" instead of "Yes, Sir". Maybe I should start handing out detentions and go to the head to demand that all pupils should answer the register in a gender-neutral manner from now on. Get. A. Fucking. Grip. I sent it to 3 guys. And ccd to one guy and 1 female. This is the way things are at my work though. And i would say common in a lot of corporate workplaces in Australia. Huge rollout of LGTBI awareness in the past two years inc 3 hr training covering everything from explaining what each term means through to suggestion that we should try to refer to everyone by gender neutral terms because it can be hurtful to make assumptions about people's gender and sexual preferences. e.g. You shouldn't assume a man wearing a wedding ring has a wife. It could be a husband. Or even that he considers himself to be a man on the inside and wouldnt rather just be seen as a person. Below is a screenshot from part of our annual employee survey. It's changed a lot in the past few years in the area of asking whether you're male or female....
Harry Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 12 hours ago, Cicero said: I agree. Deck her I feel I've painted her in a harsher light than she deserves. This is someone I've worked with for two years. Am friends with and have a good working relationship. She didn't tear strips of me just calmly related the feedback when just the two of us were around and then when i kept digging to understand it became clear she was quite seriously offended by it. (In this convo i was 100% polite other than coming across as genuinely confused why she would be offended and trying to understand) Earlier in the day a meeting she was in got wrapped up with the facilitator saying "Thanks gents", which she took issue with and understandably so in my opinion as implicit in that she's either been ignored completely or characterised as a man. Neither of those is cool and if I'd done that i'd be the first person to apologise.
Harry Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 12 hours ago, Inverted said: I think it’s a sign of how drastically the idea of free speech can warp to our own personal expectations, that people have any expectation of freedom at work when it doesn’t really exist for most people. The workplace is already an area which for most people in the world demands they dress in a very particular way (if not in uniform), speak a certain way, do their hair the right way, wear the right expression on their faces, go to the bathroom at a certain speed etc. I get what your saying but it’s also true that we only perceive ourselves as having freedom within the workplace, up to the point where we personally fall victim to the reality that there isn’t really such a thing. How much is it really a new phenomenon that people aren’t free to do and say what they like at work? But yeah that particular example isn’t about free speech, that’s just someone being an idiot. I don’t think any employer would take that complaint seriously. Well said. I agree the workplace has its confines. I would argue there are things outside of the mainstream that can be said, but with that being a continually evolving thing which changes over time, with a bias towards a more liberal direction (at least where I am). Political correctness is the main thing of what is ok in the workplace, which is a mixed bag of things. But what seems common is the person who complains about something is right, the other person is wrong, and needs to be re-educated to be more in tune with the modern day workplace cultrure.... even in the situation I outlined above I’d feel I cant speak out as having been treated unfairly, and if a complaint was made I’d just have to keep my mouth shut and bite it down. Nothing good will come from a white male speaking up about having been accused of doing the wrong thing with regards to gender equality.
Bluebird Hewitt Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 4 hours ago, Harry said: I sent it to 3 guys. And ccd to one guy and 1 female. This is the way things are at my work though. And i would say common in a lot of corporate workplaces in Australia. Huge rollout of LGTBI awareness in the past two years inc 3 hr training covering everything from explaining what each term means through to suggestion that we should try to refer to everyone by gender neutral terms because it can be hurtful to make assumptions about people's gender and sexual preferences. e.g. You shouldn't assume a man wearing a wedding ring has a wife. It could be a husband. Or even that he considers himself to be a man on the inside and wouldnt rather just be seen as a person. Below is a screenshot from part of our annual employee survey. It's changed a lot in the past few years in the area of asking whether you're male or female.... Had that as part of a staff survey this year. Just laughed at it really, especially the first question.
Harry Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 1 minute ago, Bluebird Hewitt said: Had that as part of a staff survey this year. Just laughed at it really, especially the first question. I've spent a lot of time wondering what would qualify as "other" to question 3...?
Bluebird Hewitt Posted July 14, 2018 Posted July 14, 2018 2 hours ago, Harry said: I've spent a lot of time wondering what would qualify as "other" to question 3...? Or non-binary for that matter.
Subscriber RandoEFC+ Posted July 14, 2018 Subscriber Posted July 14, 2018 Imagine expecting the rest of the world to accept life choices that fly in the face of everything that has ever existed in humanity, science or what they've ever been exposed to in their lives, expecting public places to cater to your need for gender neutral toilets etc. etc. and then getting offended because a confused colleague addressed you with an incorrect pronoun. Don't get me wrong I have no issue with people identifying as non-binary or trans or whatever they fucking want as they should have the freedom to do so, but what bothers me is the epidemic of people having a "right to be offended". Everyone is guilty of it, not just the sections of the LGBT community that I mention, but when you get the odd person who does enter the area of gender peculiarity and expects everyone to be fully accommodating and understanding of what they're going through and their difficulties, but then shows a complete lack of understanding and gets offended by an innocent third party saying the wrong thing, it winds me up. I'd like to stress I am in no way levelling this accusation at an entire community or group of people, just the odd one or two that fits the criteria I've laid out.
Inverted Posted August 7, 2018 Posted August 7, 2018 https://news.sky.com/story/trump-forever-masked-protestors-storm-london-socialist-bookshop-11462286 Seems the Right is now trashing bookshops. But yeah, keep worrying about those left-wing uni students, folks. Edit: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/aug/06/socialist-bookshop-support-after-rightwingers-attack-bookmarks If anyone wants to try and feign some shock that it's turned out UKIP were involved in this then I'm sure it'd be a bit of a laugh.
Dr. Gonzo Posted August 7, 2018 Posted August 7, 2018 Right-wingers attacking bookshops and literature that they disagree with, whoever could imagine something like this happening?!?! But better not make the obvious comparisons... because then they'll probably just become more like what they're being compared with, while simultaneously blaming people who made that obvious comparison. Because that's fucking rational. Quote “They were very shouty, bellowing in your face, saying incoherent things. The books they were holding up and what they were saying about them made no sense. They grabbed hold of a book called Posh Boys, which is about how public schoolboys still run Britain, and accused us of being paedophiles for selling this book, saying, ‘You like boys, don’t you’. That sort of nonsense." Sounds like about what I'd expect from these types of fucking morons.
Subscriber RandoEFC+ Posted August 7, 2018 Subscriber Posted August 7, 2018 I read an article in The Guardian(?) at the weekend which I can't be arsed looking back up expressing some concern about how predominantly right wing people are being allowed to use the BBC and other major media outlets to broadcast their views without being properly challenged by interviewers on the controversial ones. Some hypocritical ex-Muslim who's associated to Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson was doing an interview about the latter and his release coming out with some shit about how some of the things Tommy Robinson did in the past weren't racist against his ethnic group. I don't know if it's about left wings and right wings in that particular instance but it has been worrying how much support there does actually seem to be for Tommy Robinson whereas in the past not half as many people would have popped their heads over the parapet in fear of inciting the "snowflakes" or "political correctness gone mad" or other catch phrases used to try and justify ignorant points of view...
Danny Posted August 7, 2018 Posted August 7, 2018 5 minutes ago, RandoEFC said: I read an article in The Guardian(?) at the weekend which I can't be arsed looking back up expressing some concern about how predominantly right wing people are being allowed to use the BBC and other major media outlets to broadcast their views without being properly challenged by interviewers on the controversial ones. Some hypocritical ex-Muslim who's associated to Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson was doing an interview about the latter and his release coming out with some shit about how some of the things Tommy Robinson did in the past weren't racist against his ethnic group. I don't know if it's about left wings and right wings in that particular instance but it has been worrying how much support there does actually seem to be for Tommy Robinson whereas in the past not half as many people would have popped their heads over the parapet in fear of inciting the "snowflakes" or "political correctness gone mad" or other catch phrases used to try and justify ignorant points of view... Tbh we've had nearly two decades now of blatant racism being challenged "floodgates are open, they're taking our jobs, chicken shops and kebab houses everywhere", I think it's just a case of people's racism not actually stopping and just being hidden because "you can't say anything anymore, it's too PC" etc etc, and now finally we've had Nigel Farage who has been able to openly target foreigners and Muslims for political gain, a majority of newspapers who have backed that sort of rhetoric and that's opened the door for someone like Tommy Robinson to gain mainstream exposure rather than be shafted by the mainstream like he was before.
Guest Posted August 15, 2018 Posted August 15, 2018 On 24/05/2018 at 20:30, Dr. Gonzo said: It's not like they're raising their middle fingers at the flag. They're taking a knee - kneeling for something is generally pretty respectful. In fact, when Kaepernick or however it's spelled first started this shit - he just didn't stand up for the anthem. And then people gave him a lot of shit, so he asked his friend, who was a veteran what a better way to protest without offending people. And that lad suggested he take a knee instead. People say it's disrespectful to American veterans. But isn't it more disrespectful to assume that veterans find it disrespectful - especially when a lot of those soldiers fought for the right for Americans to have the right to peaceful protest. So in my eyes, those Americans who are super offended at these players kneeling are really just broadcasting that they're okay with America's systematic racism. It's either that... or they're hypersensitive little snowflakes getting offended by a harmless peaceful protest. See i do kind of agree with them not being able to protest at a sports event. But what bothered me was that trump said if they're not proud of America they should leave the country. If he had said sport events was not the time that would be different but he just said they should be proad never mind the social inequality
Inverted Posted August 17, 2018 Posted August 17, 2018 On 08/08/2018 at 00:19, RandoEFC said: I read an article in The Guardian(?) at the weekend which I can't be arsed looking back up expressing some concern about how predominantly right wing people are being allowed to use the BBC and other major media outlets to broadcast their views without being properly challenged by interviewers on the controversial ones. Some hypocritical ex-Muslim who's associated to Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson was doing an interview about the latter and his release coming out with some shit about how some of the things Tommy Robinson did in the past weren't racist against his ethnic group. I don't know if it's about left wings and right wings in that particular instance but it has been worrying how much support there does actually seem to be for Tommy Robinson whereas in the past not half as many people would have popped their heads over the parapet in fear of inciting the "snowflakes" or "political correctness gone mad" or other catch phrases used to try and justify ignorant points of view... When it comes to the right wing I feel like mainstream media types take the attitude that their job is purely to be an outlet for their beliefs. Like they're scared of being accused of bias, so they let far-right figures speak pretty freely and refuse to challenge them, even on blatantly factually incorrect assertions. Even things like calling him "Tommy Robinson" rather than Stephen Yaxley-Lennon or whatever the fuck his real name is, is a massive sign of deference to him.
Subscriber RandoEFC+ Posted August 17, 2018 Subscriber Posted August 17, 2018 11 minutes ago, Inverted said: When it comes to the right wing I feel like mainstream media types take the attitude that their job is purely to be an outlet for their beliefs. Like they're scared of being accused of bias, so they let far-right figures speak pretty freely and refuse to challenge them, even on blatantly factually incorrect assertions. Even things like calling him "Tommy Robinson" rather than Stephen Yaxley-Lennon or whatever the fuck his real name is, is a massive sign of deference to him. Yes, maybe I'm being slightly biased but when you compare stuff like that to the ongoing smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn which finally appears to be putting his position as the Labour party leader in doubt, and it's pretty concerning.
The Artful Dodger Posted August 17, 2018 Posted August 17, 2018 Corbyn's job isn't in doubt, in fact the polls have swung towards Labour this week. It's brilliant watching snivelling toads like Stephen Pollard combust further and further as they realise public opinion cannot be manipulated by the papers like it used to be.
Dr. Gonzo Posted August 17, 2018 Posted August 17, 2018 2 hours ago, The Artful Dodger said: Corbyn's job isn't in doubt, in fact the polls have swung towards Labour this week. It's brilliant watching snivelling toads like Stephen Pollard combust further and further as they realise public opinion cannot be manipulated by the papers like it used to be. I don't know, there's a pretty large number of people who think that Corbyn legitimately hates all Jewish people. People are easy to influence with the media and I don't suspect that will ever change - it's just different media being consumed that's doing the influencing now.
Subscriber RandoEFC+ Posted August 17, 2018 Subscriber Posted August 17, 2018 Saw YouGov claiming the other day that the majority of the public and the sub group of Labour voters in the last election both had more people saying Labour should change their leader than not, that's what I was basing it on.
Inverted Posted August 18, 2018 Posted August 18, 2018 The only thing that worries me is that although people might see through the mostly centrist bullshit that gets peddled about Corbyn, they'll in the process start to discount almost everything that the media say. Its a bit of a Boy Who Cried Wolf situation, and I hope we don't suffer for it in the future.
Cicero Posted September 4, 2018 Posted September 4, 2018 Lot of controversy with Kaepernick being named the official Nike fronts-man. Even though he hasn't played in the NFL for like what, a couple years?
SirBalon Posted September 4, 2018 Posted September 4, 2018 On 18 August 2018 at 09:25, Inverted said: The only thing that worries me is that although people might see through the mostly centrist bullshit that gets peddled about Corbyn, they'll in the process start to discount almost everything that the media say. Its a bit of a Boy Who Cried Wolf situation, and I hope we don't suffer for it in the future. Corbyn is the MP for my London borough but he isn't half crap. He really does lack so many vital points other than speaking in public to make him a possible credible Prime Minister. He's good as opposition when the medium is live and that's about it! Any main opposition party that can't beat the worst government in living memory really has to be bad and it's all down to him that Labour isn't miles and miles ahead. Blaming the media isn't enough in the case with this particular government.
6666 Posted September 4, 2018 Posted September 4, 2018 51 minutes ago, Cicero said: Lot of controversy with Kaepernick being named the official Nike fronts-man. Even though he hasn't played in the NFL for like what, a couple years? He's still associated mostly with American football and it's great because this move also angers delicate, little, racist flowers.
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