| 9:10a |
Linguistics; rudeness in e-language; is the comment rude or isn't it, that is the [current] question
One of the things that has surprised me in this discussion -- given the fact that comments in e-language appear only in written language -- has been the collective consensus with regard to rudeness that you [youall] "know it when you see it." I believe you; I would just very much like to have more information about how you know it when you see it.
I agree with you -- for sure -- that all of the examples on the list below, in written language, can be presumed to be rude, even though it would be possible to use them in spoken language in a way that would make it clear that no rudeness was intended. [For all our sakes, I'm putting them in a "generic" format; my assumption is that if they're put in all caps, in bold type, in larger type, or otherwise embellished to indicate loudness and intensity and the like, they're even more rude than in their generic form.]
1. "Bigot!"
2. "You bigot!"
3. "You're a bigot!"
4. "You're a stupid bigot!"
5. "All you bleeding-heart leftwingers always..."
6. "All you narrow-minded rightwingers always..."
7. "Of all the stupid ignorant things I've ever read, what you just wrote is the most stupid and ignorant!"
8. [Someone] is a stupid bigot, and so are all the rest of you creeps that keep defending [Someone]!"
9. "[expletive] [expletive] [expletive] [obscenity] [expletive]!"
10. "This is the stupidest LJ I've ever seen!"
11. "Everybody knows that all [some group: progressives, Baptists, linguists, piano tuners, whatever] are stupid!"
12. "Oh, yeah? What's your evidence for that?"
13. [Any obvious and explicit English VAP... like "Even a linguist should know better than to say a stupid thing like that!" Or "Why do you always jump all over people who are only trying to have a logical discussion?"]
I feel the same way about examples like these when they occur in written language as I do when I encounter them in spoken language.
But suppose you get beyond things like the examples on that list -- suppose you get beyond utterances that are the written equivalent of people stamping their feet and banging their fists on the table and throwing things and spitting. Suppose you're looking at comments posted by people who have a reasonable degree of skill in the use of language and are willing to use that skill. Then, I wonder -- even though tone of voice and intonation and all the rest of body language are missing from the comment -- can you still tell whether it's deliberately rude? Are there characteristics that you recognize as reliable evidence of deliberate rudeness? |