The R Word

The word "racist" has been used a lot of late.

I would just like to say a few words about that - and other - nouns.

In German there is no word for "Heroin Addict" - the best it can be translated is "Heroin Seeky".

I like this way of looking at people. Someone is not an Object/Noun ("Addict", "Racist", ...), they are a Person with an Adjective modifying them ("tending to seek a drug", "having a behavior").

The whole disturbing trend of using the "r-word" is not much better than the other-consonant-word. When you do that you objectify the person - you turn them into a noun that identifies them as something other than a person.

I remember a good Canadian friend telling me, when I was in my 20s and had just moved down to South Carolina from Toronto, that she was a "bigot bigot" (iow - "intolerant of intolerants"). I had a desire to agree with her - so I did, out loud - but I was beginning to learn that the "bigots" that I had expected to meet in SC were usually people who I got to know and like before I discovered their "bigotry". Even then I was having a hard time reconciling my view of these nouns called "bigots" and the people I was getting to know and appreciate in their complexities.

Words matter.

"person" is the noun. Other words describing a person need to be adjectives. People can often choose to change their adjectives.

-chris