Quote:
Originally Posted by Autumn
I definitely feel a difference in tone when someone says "gays" versus for example, "people who are gay," or "Mexicans" versus "Mexican people. I think there's something linguistically about replacing a person's personhood with a category. Adding "the" puts things over the top. Saying "The gays" or "the blacks" or "the mexicans" seems to make an even stronger statement of otherness, or lumping them into some thing of which they all must be a part. Maybe it's just because it's the terms that prejudiced people typically use? Or is there something in the linguistics that changes the tone of it.
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Very well said, for me it is a tone thing. It comes off to me as carrying some distain for that group when it is said that way.