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WHEN WORDS UNINTENTIONALLY WOUND: A DUTY TO SELF-CENSOR1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 September 2014
Abstract
Based on Robert Baker's metaphorical view of damaging language, I argue that morally responsible individuals are obligated to refrain from using the word ‘gay’ as a negative adjective directed towards that which the speaker dislikes. According to the metaphorical view, while a speaker may understand her use of the word ‘gay’ as devoid of homosexual connotations, the hearer – particularly a young person still coming to understand his own sexuality – is likely to conclude that his ‘gayness’ puts him in the same hated category as all of those other objects, events, and persons who are negatively called ‘gay’.
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- Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2014
References
Notes
2 Neu, Jerome, Sticks and Stone: The Philosophy of Insults (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 153–154Google Scholar.
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4 Baker, R., “‘Pricks’ and ‘Chicks’: A Plea For ‘Persons’”, in Vetterling-Braggin, Mary (ed.) Sexist Language: A Modern Philosophical Analysis (New York: Littlefield, Adams and Co., 1981), 162Google Scholar.
5 Ross, S., ‘How Words Hurt: Attitude, Metaphor, and Oppression’, in Vetterling-Braggin, Mary (ed.) Sexist Language: A Modern Philosophical Analysis (New York: Littlefield, Adams and Co., 1981), 204Google Scholar.