To challenge casual homophobia on the dreaded fb?

[chundercatsarego]

A friend just posted: 'Just stalled my car in town.....gay!!!!:

Err...what? Is that OK? I think not.

YANBU. Definitely pull her up on it.
What are you planning on saying?

Not sure...in real life I'd do a significantly raised eyebrow and say something like 'Bit a casual homophobia eh?' in a way that mad it clear I disapprove....difficult to pull of on fb tho.

Eurgh, who would even think of posting that? I'd delete and block her...

I think saying 'bit of casual homophobia eh?' like you suggested is perfectly fine. Even for fb. It gets your point across.

I like the Simon Amstell line "...and if you don't like it you can Jew off and stop being so black". People use gay without thinking for a second how offensive it is, and will carry on unless challenged.

Posted....wonder how long it'll take them to block me

Good for you! We should all be this brave.

I did this recently OP. The person 'liked' my comment which I took to mean they realised their error

If you google 'I want to say gay' it comes up with a handy flowchart, I post it as a picture comment.

YANBU

Well done OP. I have de-friended a few nobs on FB for this very reason.

On a similar type of post, I commented "Oh wow. I didn't realise we were still using 'Gay' as a pejorative. Not cool." Person apologised and removed their comment. I think it's really important to not let these (seemingly small) things slide.

YANBU - I would have said something too. Just googled the flow chart - great!

I don't know. I am facing worse. My FIL just "Liked" a post which claimed Islam is "not a religion but a politcal and totalitarian movement and Mosques are converting young men to extremism"

Gay used to mean happy and sweet. Be nice if it still meant that.

Eurgh, who would even think of posting that? I'd delete and block her...

Bit of an over reaction.

A simple word on the side or in private PM would suffice.

The use if the word 'gay' to mean lame is fairly recent. It used to have another meaning (as pointed out by ellieding) Nobody owns the language. Homosexuals would have more of a case if the hadn't appropriated the word in the first instance.

That said, were I on Facebook, which I'm not becasue I'm a grown up I'd block anyone who used the term "gay" in the context described by the OP. Not because I feel I need to take offence (real or imagined on behalf of those people who find their own genders sexually attractive) but because the person in question is very obviously a bellend!

Even a private word is pretty ott. If you don't like the way certain people behave don't associate with them, but all this zealous indignation gets a bit tedious. The phrase is vulgar, that should be reason enough to be annoyed by it.

That flowchart is awesome.

And YANBU. It's not on. Good for you.

I pulled up someone on FB who posted that gay men are "sodomites" who are likely to abuse little boys.

"all this zealous indignation" is how prejudice gets stamped out, imo.

Eh? What's offensive about it? Gay in this context means embarrassing. I don't get it.

Prosopopia that's exactly the point. Why on Earth should gay equate to embarrassing or stupid or any other word which leads to it being derogatory?

Prosopeipa what if the status was 'just stalled my car.....white!!' Hopefully that will put it into context for you

There was even a Mumsnet campaign on this problem last year. Here

JubJub Why not?

Nobody owns the language. It's different where terms have established meanings (the word "marriage" for example) but where a word has been adapted to mean one thing rather than another, it's quite likely that there will be further subsequent iterations.

The above post was made (forthe most part) to annoy that holier-than-thou/right-on section of Mumsnet. You know who you are.

My point stands though.

OsMalley That doesn't really work though, as the term "white" (even if someone did try and adopt it as shorthand for "shit") which they'd be perfectly entitled to try and do in some parts of the world is too broad.