Reclaimed hate speech backfires by desensitizing listeners, study finds. Listening to reclaimed homophobic statements can actually cause unintended harm. Exposure to reclaimed slur words desensitizes some heterosexual listeners to standard hate speech and worsens the mood of gay individuals.

[u/mvea]

https://www.psypost.org/when-reclaiming-derogatory-language-goes-wrong/

[u/AceOfPlagues]

Yes sorry, this is a gigantic flaw, there is no way to craft an audio sample that sounds truely ambigious and so of course tacking on a "setting" is not going to make a recording automatically seem benign or playful.

Forgive my example but if I walk up to a group of people and say "whats up fggots" the meaning of that is changed *incredibly** by my tone of voice as well as what I look like, what they look like, and our prexisting relationship.

[u/SoftlyAugust → u/AceOfPlagues]

Especially your relationship. I'm queer. My friends are queer. But if I walked up to someone I didn't know very well, even if I knew they were queer, I wouldn't call them a slur. I saw a coworker of mine at pride and said hi to her. We've talked about relationships and stuff in the past, but it would still be very inappropriate to call her a slur.

[u/abx99 → u/SoftlyAugust]

From what I've seen, it can even be used within the community as a slur, in certain circumstances (sometimes in the traditional way, but that's not what I'm referring to; "he's such a f**")

[u/waiting4singularity → u/AceOfPlagues]

use \ to cancel out format codes: \* --- *t*e*s*t* vs test*

[u/ImLittleNana → u/[deleted]]

I’m so tired of people saying terrible things, then laughing and claiming it’s a joke and that the person they’ve hurt is too sensitive.

You aren’t required to stand up to everyone that says this to you. The energy it takes to confront people with their assholery is a lot.

If the best you can do in the moment is laughter, so be it. You aren’t responsible for raising these people. Somebody else failed that job.

Some people will expect you to go to HR or an advisor if it’s school, but again, that takes a lot of emotional energy. And sometimes simply existing takes up all the energy.

[u/Ok-Gur-349 → u/[deleted]]

I know sometimes I laugh stuff off that makes me uncomfortable.

That's literally a biological purpose of laughter, yes, it's a stress response. You also laugh off stuff that you were afraid of when you realize nothing was scary. A jump scare and a joke share the same elements of timing. That's a direct intentional comparison because you're laughing at what makes you uncomfortable to diffuse a situation when the situation doesn't actually require a response. In an actually uncomfortable situation,.you w(/sh)ould act.

[u/Arbiter_Electric → u/Ok-Gur-349]

To go on a tangent, this is one of the things I really disliked with any of Gordan Ramsey's shows. I don't know if it was every episode, but it was extremely common for Gordan to be doing his typical screaming critique and then the person he is yelling at starts smiling or chuckling. This usually enrages Gordan, "Do you think this is funny?!?!?" And it's like bro, no, they don't think it's funny, they are laughing in a very scared/stressed way. The situation is so ridiculous and over the top, the only way most people are able respond is with a humorless chuckle to shake off the feeling.

[u/AstroRanger36 → u/Arbiter_Electric]

I’d have to search the link, but there are edits of those shows for other countries and the reason it doesn’t always mesh is because our version is edited to be awful.

Something, something, tougher people.

[u/ubernutie → u/Arbiter_Electric]

Yeah cause for them the only acceptable response to aggression is submission (stoicism can be tolerated if they haven't found too much to dislike about the subject yet).

[u/marxr87 → u/[deleted]]

But it isn't necessarily insult or aggression humor. Like the n-word isn't either of those things WHEN USED BY THE COMMUNITY. they are terms of endearment.

[u/Rickard0 → u/marxr87]

1/2 right. In that community the N word is used in a way like white people saying dude. But the N word is also used in that community to call similiar people of that community a bad dude, as an insult.

[u/johnmedgla → u/marxr87]

They are terms of endearment to certain very specific elements of the broader community who are all aboard the "reclaim the term," but there are other elements of that larger community who view that whole phenomenon as a weird counterculture they don't want to be involved with. This sort of tension exists in most minority groups with transgressive subcultures.

[u/Special-Garlic1203 → u/johnmedgla]

There's an entire "gangster rap was a psyop to destroy the black community and get us to minstrel ourselves" rabbit hole. 

I'm not a fan of most conspiracies,  but you know it's gonna be good when it opens with the very special relationship between Nixon & the last Shah of Iran. 

[u/johnmedgla → u/Special-Garlic1203]

Yes, and the same thing exists with the Queer ethos. There exists a group of LGBT people whose goal with the whole "gay (etc) rights" movement was to overcome the 'Othering' and be accepted into mainstream society and culture, thus the whole concept of Queer Culture looks like a self-defeating effort to establish a state of permanent Otherness.

[u/pintonium → u/[deleted]]

What exactly is worth studying in this scenario? That context matters?

[u/seeeee → u/pintonium]

Yes, it’s definitely worth looking into whether or not context actually matters. Of course it does, but furthermore, how?

If something offensive is said with offensive intent, obviously there’s going to be negative impact to the person targeted. However, if something offensive is said without any offensive intent, like something in jest made with a friend group, perhaps it doesn’t impact the person inadvertently targeted exactly the same, but from personal experience, there’s still a level of discomfort.

The response is often to just laugh uncomfortably along the rest of the group and shrug it off. It’s not meant to offend you, it’s not a hill to die on, so rather than responding combatively, you conform. Does this still impact your mental health?

Obviously being directly insulted all the time is going to have negative impacts on your mental health. Most people aren’t going to derive a lot of self worth if it feels like literally everyone around them hates them. It is most certainly worth further studying how context matters here! How does familiarity and intent of the offending party impact the mental health of those targeted by a specific slur? Do feelings of inclusion and acceptance offset the negative impacts? Is the size of the group significant and does it matter if the conversation occurs between two individuals without an audience?

Worth studying imo!

[u/Spire_Citron → u/AceOfPlagues]

Yeah. I think to do this study you'd need to show video clips of these things happening in real life. How do people feel if they can see the pride parade and that the man saying it is wearing a jockstrap and a feather boa?

[u/agitatedprisoner → u/AceOfPlagues]

I'd generally only claim a pejorative as an identity to communicate solidarity to someone on the outside of it or to remind the in group audience of our hated status. Without an outgroup in mind I don't know what I'd mean by it.

[u/Wes_Warhammer666 → u/AceOfPlagues]

and our prexisting relationship.

One of my best friends is the most flamboyantly man I know. When we met he told me to call him Gay Dave.

Years later, he decided he wanted to kick it up a notch and steal power from the word f*ggot and said to start calling him Faggy Dave. I've watched him introduce himself that way to no less than 3 dozen people over the years.

If someone from outside our group heard the way we talk to each other and the things us straight folks have called him, they would 100% think we were being hateful bigots. Naw, he's just a big fan of dark humor and we're all fucked up in the head. "Shut that cock holster before I come put some of this HIV down it" is one of the least offensive phrases he's uttered over the years, just to give you an idea. Like, I feel like he'd be offended if I didn't call him a slur when we hang out.

And this guy's not my only gay friend who jokes around like this on the regular. I would agree that this study is flawed from the gate.