Oh, Fanthings....

[said_scarlett]

I'd forgotten how indignant some people can get over the smallest perceived slight. And how some people can be remarkably dense and...well...silly.

Once more, I ended up getting raked over the coals by some random internet person over word choice. The last time it happened, it was someone bitching me out for using slightly racist terminology in dialogue. Dialogue spoken by a character who is canonically more than a wee bit racist, and has said much, much worse than 'oriental'. (It was a Venture Bros fic, dialogue was between Jonas Venture Sr. and Colonel Gentleman. Horace 'Bitches Need a Good Smack in the Mouth' Gentleman. Yeah.)

This time? Apparently it's an insult on par with skinning puppies to use 'queer'. As in 'the white stone floor gleamed queerly in the haze of the oncoming storm.' No, seriously, that's the exact line from the fic. At first I was just 'buzzah', until after a brief e-mail exchange I realized....

This person had no idea that queer is a synonym for strange.

This boggles my mind. The textbook definition of queer is 'strange or odd; unusually different'. When I pointed this out, I just got a 'you still shouldn't use it, it doesn't mean that anymore' reply.

*headdesk*

Oh fandom, how I missed you. On the plus side, at least I know there are people out there reading!

Comments

[musikologie.livejournal.com]

I saw that on twitter last night and boggled. When I shared it with my mum, she boggled too. We're pretty sure it's a standard SAT word, if nothing else...

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

I KNOW! I mean, it's been a damn long time since I took the SATs, but... WTH?

[aigooism.livejournal.com]

Oh, my! That's gotta be frustrating : /

I can't believe people would quibble over that.

. . . Some people needs a life.

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

The sad thing is, I've seen internet fights over even less. :/ I mean, I can at least understand the initial complaint, sort of...except that in context, 'queer' as a term for gay wouldn't make any sense at all.

Seriously.

[ragdoll.livejournal.com]

Oh for fuck's sake. I wrote an HP fic a few years back and had someone (Hermione, I think) saying something like "You're acting rather queerly." and I had several people (including one Brit) giving me grief and insisting that British people never EVER use that word in any context other than gay.

Sometimes they really make my brain hurt. (We won't even go into the word "niggardly"...)

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

I'm both relieved and frustrated that something similar has happened to someone else. And wth? That's a perfectly IC word for Hermione to use! Argh! PEOPLE! And I have read plenty of British books with 'queer' in them! For strange!

[ragdoll.livejournal.com]

It totally blows my mind at how ignorant people can be sometimes. And yes, it seemed like a good Hermione word to me too. The British person argued with me that it was 'too old fashioned for any HP character to use' -- um, I don't see them using street lingo anywhere in the books.

"Queer" by Garbage wasn't that long ago (1995?) -- people forget so easily.

[trialia]

As a Brit, that's just fucking stupid. Yes, we do use it in the other context, though not everyone, so your flamer was generalising rather badly.

[13thleprechaun.livejournal.com]

I learned queer was a synonym for 'strange' before I learned it could be derogatory for 'gay'. ):

These people really need to calm the hell down.

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

Yeah, same here. It wasn't until...man, I think the first time I encountered queer as a term for gay (I don't consider it blanket derogatory, as a lot of folks self-identify as queer) was 'Queer as Folk'.

Yes, yes they do.

[blinkinghell.livejournal.com]

Well, as they say, nowt as queer as folk.

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha, I was just mentioning that the first time I'd encountered 'queer = gay' was the series Queer as Folk!

[blinkinghell.livejournal.com]

I head the saying gorwing up, but it was probably secondary school where it came to mean 'gay'. That having been said, the south probably uses Queer/Strange a lot less than the North. Queer would immediately be pinned as 'gay'.

[trialia]

Whoever that was, they're a dumbass, clearly. *hugs you* That they don't know any better is not a reflection on you.

Though I do have to admit that "strangely" actually scans better in my head with the rest of that line.

[cross-the-sky.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know. I'm more boggled and amused than anything else. And kicking myself for missing a chance to use my 'sense: this makes none' icon. ;)

I will readily admit that I probably use 'queer' way too often, but I blame it on reading truckloads of George R.R Martin.

[cassiopaya.livejournal.com]

That's one gay stone!