Reply #146: do you think it'll go away or fester underneath?

[ant]

Someone made a comment in the other thread about displacing the attitudes, and that made sense to me.

Here's the thing: I'm one of those people who's taken the work back, so I think being called a bitch is a good thing. The reason it bothers me when people call Rice or Coulter a bitch is because I feel they're reacting to the aggresiveness of these women rather than their words/actions, and I think that's sexist. Simply banning the means with which people express that attitude towards aggressive women isn't going to change the attitudes. Instead, it's going to push it underground and remove any opportunity to discuss it. When someone uses the term in an offensive way (another reason I oppose an outright ban is that context does matter), that's an opportunity to talk to them about it.

Banning the word will not only eliminate that opportunity for discussion, it'll create more division and make people less likely to listen. Which is NOT to say we need to tread softly in demanding equal treatment, just that we need to understand the mindset we're up against and construct effective responses for the long term. Banning the word, to me, seems to simply sweep the problem under the rug and hide it from view. Let's have it all out in the open where we can challenge it on a regular basis.