Herald sun



Almost as bad as Baa Baa Rainbow sheep.

I guess that school won't be showing The Flintstones any time soon.

Gah.

If anything, I think this achieves the opposite effect. It teaches the kids that "gay" has negative connotations, and that they shouldn't say it.

I mean, sure, they shouldn't throw it around as an insult, but it's not a word to avoid.

I'm with lioness here. This has nothing to do with political correctness, and a lot to do with ... I'm trying to think of the right word, here, but all I can come up with is "stupidity".

It is important to pay attention to the words we use and their potential to hurt people, which is the reasoning behind political correctness. This kind of willy-nilly banning of any words which have meaning is just silly, and in my opinion does a lot of harm. Reasonable people will hear about this, roll their eyes, and next time they come upon a valid suggestion about word choice will lump it in with this nonsense, and resist.

What would they do with this old poem, I wait with bated breath.

Mondays child poem

Mondays child is fair of face,
Tuesdays child is full of grace,
Wednesdays child is full of woe,
Thursdays child has far to go,
Fridays child is loving and giving,
Saturdays child works hard for his living,
And the child that is born on the Sabbath day
Is bonny and blithe, and good and gay.


My son was born on a Sunday

I found these usages of the word "gay":

adj. gay·er, gay·est

- Showing or characterized by cheerfulness and lighthearted excitement; merry.
- Bright or lively, especially in color: a gay, sunny room.
- Given to social pleasures.
- Dissolute; licentious.

The above is from refdesk.com.

Then there is the fact some women have the first name of "Gay" or "Gayle". What about people who may have the last name of "Gay", "Gayton" or something along those lines?

There are times when being PC goes too far. Changing a poem is one of them.

I'm a Wednesdays child and am not full of woe. I am full of contrariness.

I'm a Sunday baby and I am all those things except dissolute and licentious - honest!

Schoolchildren bandy "gay" around as a general insult that has nothing to do with sexuality, but they generally grow out of it as their vocabulary blossoms. Banning or replacing the word will indeed give it more power than it deserves, just as records which the BBC bans almost invariably leap to number one.

I had a schoolfriend called Gaynor. I doubt the current generation of parents will be naming their offspring Gay, Gayton, Gaynor and Gaylord in a hurry.

I agree. They will select "Apple", "Tangerine", "Persimmon" or even, perhaps, "Kumquat".

Perfect. Meet my daughter Melon and my son Mango.

Do you think I should go and lie in a darkened room for an hour?

I see they've been bowdlerizing that old Rodgers & Hart song about a taxi-dancer, “Ten Cents A Dance”, as well.

I heard it on the radio recently and was annoyed to find that Hart's ingenious internal rhyme;

“Sometimes I think I've found my hero,
But it's a queer romance”

had been altered to “but it's a strange romance.

Obviously the Mary Whitehouse sort of dirty mind goes with a tin ear.

I love Kookaburra and it's a shame they're going for the gusto in censorship. The irony in all this is that now the word queer is being used for serious academic depts in universities in the English speaking world.

Taking a valid principle and then using it to catch many areas beyond itself is a combination of ignorance and abuse of power. There are plenty of older songs with far worse words in them (I am not about to mention them but would be banned at the drop of a hat now) but when written were totally innocent. But to say 'gay' or 'queer' are as bad as the 'n' word which was also in some older songs shows the way some authorities are determined to quash the freedom of people in any way they can.

But to take other banned words like blind, blackboard and spastic, the people who are apparently being protected have almost universally never taken any offence to such words, as I'm sure no homosexual would be to this pair. It's just a symptom of a wider malaise inherent in most left wing authorities to remove every diseased word as if that will change the way people think. The fact they decide which words are wrong rather than being pressurised to by the actual victims means a patronising and insulting attitude to those genuinely affected. I expect like most excesses of power this one will quietly vanish over the years when something else becomes noticed that needs 'fixing' while everyone else carries on with their lives totally unaffected by any of it.

On the contrary, a lot of people who describe themselves as deaf or blind take offence at being described as somehow impaired. You might have tinnitus, or have lost your ability to hear high notes, or not be able to hear a thing. "Hearing impaired" doesn't protect anyone and it doesn't convey any useful information either.

In the same way, "visually impaired" doesn't distinguish between someone with a bit of astigmatism, and someone else who has no vision at all. Blind as a bat and deaf as a post may be as politically incorrect as spastic, but they don't leave you in any doubt as to their meaning.

They shouldn't mess with that song, they may get sued for copyright infringement!

And whoever heard of a homosexual kookaburra, anyway? The meaning of 'gay' in this song is perfectly obvious to all, except, it seems, the PC neurotics and wowsers.

I did not realise 'blackboard' was on the hit list, either. I know a couple of people- one has the surname Black, and he is white (can I say that?), and the other has the surname White. He is a black aboriginal. Perhaps I should call them both Mr Grey from now on.

When did "blackboard" go on the PC hit list? My university's online learning centre is called Blackboard.

Blackboard is more or less outlawed over here by some organisations- some people say it's an urban myth, but while many have been replaced by white or green ones etc now a woman at college mentioned about writing something on it and was called outside by the tutor who said 'we don't use that word any more'. The black students (who were the majority) said they had no objection, but of course they didn't make the rule so it stayed.

Here are some more examples, it seems more a British thing than anywhere else (I'm sure the French wouldn't ban a single word unless it was an English one) but we seem to be leading the way in the thought police. Many examples are accused of being hoaxes until someone actually attempts to use a banned word at a workplace setting and soon finds out the actual situation. Hopefully it'll go the same way as prohibition and other examples of excess restrictions, but some become part of the system.

banned words

It's fine to ban the odd one which is no longer anything more than an insult, but should be a rare exception and not become a general rule. The stuff we sung in the school playground would probably have got us all a criminal record nowadays had we been old enough to be eligible, but maybe they'll fix that as well?

Good article, David. Don't these people have anything important to think about?

It didn't mention the recent panic about watermelons and fried chicken being considered racist, or London council workers being castigated for having pens shaped like bananas because they would cause offence.

Just a little thought. I've heard lots of people say they're the family black sheep. "I'm the rainbow sheep of the family" really doesn't have the same effect.

And something else that'a irritated me for a long time: that blackboard is a forbidden word but whiteboard is OK. How did that happen?

That's one I did check up already, the theory states 'Any potentially pejorative term is considered so only when relating to the minority race. No such terms are considered racist or pejorative when applied to the indigenous one'.

That's told us.

Aha - so it's indigenous, not superior? And there's no implication that it's OK to say white because white is good, and not OK to say black because black is not good and it's better not to remind black people of their status? Well, that's a relief!

I remember visiting a house to purchase and the real estate agent told me it had a large closet then, I said 'Oh a walk-in closet?' and she said that was on a list of words to avoid as it excluded those who could not walk into the closet. I swear!

Now, one of the reasons the word 'blackboard' is going out of style is that more and more classrooms have white boards instead! I mean you use a marker pen and wipe it away with noxious fumes. More and more kids do not remember the chalkboard and the eraser clapping chores. But now, they call it a whiteboard. Is that a white supremacy board then?

Ah,the joys of dealing with those
lovely people who live for for the
joy of taking offence for other people.
I am offended by them.

I wonder what will happen to French speakers who are late?

Huge for wdstk.

I'm with you there George, and wdstk. I always liked the idea of going to France and buying some batteries, but then again I would...

It is sad how originally good intentions can get twisted and hijacked though to be used as weapons by people and seem far more interested in controlling others than any actual benefit to the supposed potential victims. I may have been tempted to push the estate agent in the cupboard and say 'you mean fall in then?' but would have got me arrested.