What do you think of Jugurtha?

[Bumbleconfusus]

What do you think of Jugurtha as a boy's name? It's listed on Mumsnet's Baby Name Finder.

This isn't really what do you think, I just wanted to say how annoyed I am at someone putting comments on the name Jugurtha like they have. I can't believe someone put nick name as 'piss face'. Does anyone know how I can report this to MNHQ so they can remove this remark which I think is completely unacceptable!

Oh, and narrow-minded xenophobia accounts fo much sniggering over names which have not come straight from mainstream UK culture.

Sniggering about names may or may not be racist, but it certainly seems to run in parallel often enough.

Antilocution: The majority group makes 'harmless jokes' about the minority group.

In order for any kind of 'joke' to be considered racist, there has to be knowledge, therefore, that a particular group is being targeted. There is a specificity of target implied here. There is absolutely no evidence that a majority of any kind has specifically targeted the Berber people in the troll's handiwork. A random troll made what you really have to assume (because you lack any evidence to the contrary) was a random attack on a random name.

'Pissface' as an insult could be applied to anyone. There is absolutely no link between the term pissface and the name Jugurtha. If the troll had typed 'Berber pissface', then that would have been a clear indication that racism was at play. If the troll had typed 'pissface' on the entry for the name Conor or Conchubar, there would be exactly the same lack of evidence of racism. Now 'Irish pissface' would be different.

Here's an interesting article on the history and uses of 'racial' classification up to the present day movement towards rejection of racial division as a useful theory. I am inclined to agree with the assertion that race as a concept is believed in because of its social functions, and there are many ramifications of that for all concerned.

I like the way you missed out "often thought to be" from the harmless joke comment!

Stop thinking for trolls. Just because you can't make the link, doesn't mean there is no link. As it's been said on several occasions - the intent doesn't have to be there.

Scurryfunge - Mathanxiety is not thinking for nor defending trolls. And I think you know that, really.

No, she is trying to place the focus on the troll's actions, not what could be perceived as racist....read back through the whole thread. It really doesn't matter what the troll intended. It's a diversion from the issue by suggesting the troll made a random attack on a random name.

I have read through the whole thread, thank you.

I stand by my previous comment.

OK, Wikipedia may not be a great source across the board, but you can find all the different theories from my link separately if you wish. All the links are in the admittedly long article for your convenience. The Wikipedia link gathers them together in this case.

"Often thought to be" requires a poll of all the people who might conceivably be affected. Does that mean one person has the thought often, or that several people have the thought? And if several, how many? Two? Three? Two hundred thousand?

What you're saying is that I am perfectly reasonable in calling you a racist, and because I call you a racist you are a racist, for using the name Jugurtha or even considering it, or thinking it's a great name with only positive associations, when it's clear to me that the name recalls the Irish Famine of the 1840s, no matter what your intentions are or by how long the name predates the Famine. I feel it's racist, therefore it is. Is that unreasonable? Is that in accord with the Race Relations Act? Yes and yes. It's been said on several occasions that there doesn't have to be any intent, but it still doesn't make "I'm being oppressed!" anything but ridiculous.

In what sense is trying to place the focus on the troll's actions misleading or unreasonable? It's not a diversion from the issue, it is the issue. It is vital to try to understand what the troll intended before jumping on your high horse and casually throwing the term racist around. In order to understand it is vital to look at the facts, and that requires attention to the troll's actions.

Fact: A troll vandalised the BNF extensively.
Fact: He did not just vandalise the Jugurtha entry, but many entries (see the MNHQ post further up the thread)
Fact: He used the term 'pissface' in the line for suggested nicknames.

And from that, you have deduced that the troll is a racist, a hater of the Berber people and their culture and history, who has incited children to bully Berber boys based on their ethnicity, that I and others am a racist if I don't think the troll is a racist, but an ignorant knob.

Well through it again then! lol

Scurryfunge - if you're comment is meant for me, I don't need to - I got it the first time through. And putting 'lol' afterwards doesn't actually make a comment funny.

Oh it makes me laugh lulu.

Mathanxiety, you are still missing the point though. I'm not going to repeat myself any more, you either understand it or you don't. It is not vital to understand what the troll intended. You don't have to be a racist to be an ignorant knob but the two go hand in hand usually and compliment eachother beautifully.

I do not casually throw the term racist around.

What makes you laugh? Telling me to read it again? Why is that funny?

I get it though, Scurryfunge. You just like the last word.

The last word normally means I've killed a thread though lulu.lol

Add to the discussion or dip out.

The terms ignorant knob and racist are not interchangeable. They do not mean the same thing. They may well go hand in hand, but one does not equal the other. Adding two and two and making five is wrong no matter how many times you do it.

I think it's absurd to use the eye of the beholder as a means of defining anything like racism, though. "I know it when I see it" doesn't even wash for identifying pornography. Yes, for the drafters of the Race Relations Act, when faced with the difficulties of defining racism, it may well have boiled down to placing it in the remit of the aggrieved individual to feel attacked racially, since motivation and intent are hard to prove legally. Lazy drafting does not make for good or sensible laws though, and the net effect is to debase the offence.

What if a Berber boy called another Berber boy named Jugurtha 'pissface'? What if only one person in an ethnic group who perceived an insult as racist, and everyone else disagreed?

Doesn't matter mathanxiety...you are clutching at straws now.....who better to decribe the effects of a racial incident than the victim? Your last sentence illustrates your lack of understanding.

Who better to describe an insult's effects than the victim? Yes, a victim gets to say whether they have been insulted.

But I disagree that racism exists if an insult victim says it does. And I especially disagree that the work of a random troll should rightly be called racism.

The straws are all in your tight little grasp and you've been waving them around with great vigour on this thread. The straws are the tenuous links you have discerned between the one fact you have decided is important (while disregarding the rest) and the conclusion of racism.

Mathanxiety - I think it's pointless to waste any more of your time and effort here. After being instructed by Scurryfunge to 'add to the discussion or dip out' (I think Scurryfunge might have control issues) I decided not to add to the discussion as it is clear that s/he will not listen to any other argument if it opposes his/her own. I don't think that this discussion is about racism or trolls anymore. It seems that Scurryfunge is flexing his/her muscles for some reason. lol

ditto luluf, that thought crossed my mind too about you.....you give good advice, don't waste your time...passive aggression seems to be your ploy.

lol

I'm pretty sure scurryfunge is an agent provocateur for the BNP, to be honest.

lol

lol

methinks bruxeur is talking out of her arse....funny comparison with anti racist views and BNP, though!

I hate to give up on reason, though, LuluF. It's the only thing that stands between us and a world where we're all holed up in our respective caves nursing the wounds we fondly imagine were inflicted upon us.

Appealing to the best in human nature, to reason and other virtues, instead of tit for tat finger-pointing and labelling was the way the British Abolitionists and their American counterparts, and later the Civil Rights movement made progress against the deeply entrenched unreason of racism. Dr King never came across to me as a 'professional victim', which this thread strongly suggests to me.

I know - but giving up doesn't mean you're wrong.