How important is it to call things by their right name?
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@diesch one good example might be saying Free Software instead of Open Source, or GNU/Linux instead of Linux. Another is using the right names for people, like Inuit or Roma. Or using the right terms for difficult social issues, like CSAM or death by suicide.
@diesch another might be using up-to-date binomial names for plants. Or the precise names for data structures.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
@evan cough klaatu verada nikto cough
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@diesch another might be using up-to-date binomial names for plants. Or the precise names for data structures.
@evan When shopping for groceries, you likely won’t get very far if you use up-to-date binomial names of the vegetables. -
@evan love your polls. I feel like this one is super important. I selected 'somewhat important' because, while I believe it is absolutely important, I think the audience is more important than the speaker. If the proper name isn’t useful to the audience – the taxonomic name of a plant may carry no intrinsic meaning to the listener – using something more colloquial is critical.
@kaleb hey, thank you so much. It's really nice to hear that you love my polls. I do too. They're one of my favourite parts of the Fediverse.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
@evan I said "very important" because I believe that understanding a "right name" is an important part of understanding the named thing. My exception, and not enough to change my vote to "somewhat important," is cats which have a right name, and many silly nicknames, and it's okay to call them by any of those. My sister's cat is silly nicknamed "Serves Twelve" at this moment and her "right name" is Miss Woo.
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@evan As always, an hour after I write this I have more thoughts:
The big exception to the "communication" is when the name itself is meaningful, such as a sacred or traditional designation, and by not using that name, you're supressing or obfuscating other cultures and histories.
Though I miiiiight be a pedant and say that's a communication problem too, that renaming something is cutting off someone's communication to impose your own message.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
Depends what those things are. Organs during a surgery? Very important! Background characters in an anime? Not so much.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
Politicians and mass media are constantly mis-using words, characterizing people and events using words not appropriate to the situation. Their messages are often in direct conflict with what we can see with our own eyes. If we want news we can trust, I say "very important". Otherwise, we're stuck with whatever the propaganda machines wants us to believe. This is a global issue.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
I can't tell if this is accidental Confucianism or subversive Confucianism.
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I can't tell if this is accidental Confucianism or subversive Confucianism.
@chewey that is an important name to discover!
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
@evan Very few things, if any, have only one name and names themselves come a variety of types. Sometimes names have overlapping potentially contradictory meanings (I’m looking at you “fruit”). I’d say it’s important to use the right name in the right context for the right purpose but there’s usually a lot of wiggle room in there. The big thing is to avoid confusion.
That said when it comes to proper names of people, the right name is the one they choose to use, period.
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How important is it to call things by their right name?
@evan what is this "the[ir] right name" (singular) of which you speak? What makes you believe that there is ever only one right name for a thing?
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@evan what is this "the[ir] right name" (singular) of which you speak? What makes you believe that there is ever only one right name for a thing?
@jdlh well, do we agree that there are better names and worse names for things?
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@jdlh well, do we agree that there are better names and worse names for things?
@evan only from given political or cultural frames (points of view).
Was the survey worded to call attention to the inherent plural nature of naming, by leaving out that answer on purpose?
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@evan only from given political or cultural frames (points of view).
Was the survey worded to call attention to the inherent plural nature of naming, by leaving out that answer on purpose?
@jdlh I don't know if I have a heart generous enough or a mind flexible enough to say that calling someone a racial slur is better from a white nationalist point of view. There is an absolute scale on which that kind of name is worse precisely because of the POV it's used from. I realise it's an extreme example, sorry.
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@jdlh I don't know if I have a heart generous enough or a mind flexible enough to say that calling someone a racial slur is better from a white nationalist point of view. There is an absolute scale on which that kind of name is worse precisely because of the POV it's used from. I realise it's an extreme example, sorry.
@jdlh and, no, the question is not phrased as a gotcha!!
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@jdlh I don't know if I have a heart generous enough or a mind flexible enough to say that calling someone a racial slur is better from a white nationalist point of view. There is an absolute scale on which that kind of name is worse precisely because of the POV it's used from. I realise it's an extreme example, sorry.
@evan in that example, it seems to be that more important than the rightness of the name, is the wrongness of slurs and of white nationalism. It's a different topic.
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@evan in that example, it seems to be that more important than the rightness of the name, is the wrongness of slurs and of white nationalism. It's a different topic.
@jdlh a slur is a name, though.
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@jdlh a slur is a name, though.
@evan true. Many things in this life are related to other things. But IMHO the "slur" aspect of the slur is more relevant than the "name" aspect.
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@evan true. Many things in this life are related to other things. But IMHO the "slur" aspect of the slur is more relevant than the "name" aspect.
@jdlh OK. I guess I'd just say, answer the question the best you can. If you don't think there's such a thing as a "right name", that may affect how important it is to use the right name for things.
