I have the same experience, all my gay friends call everything gay and it's crept into my speech. Just like how I never heard of FOB until I got a lot of Asian friends or mojado until I married into my wife's (Mexican) family. They all use these terms and it is almost impossible to not use it in my daily vernacular. Does that make me a bigot because I use the same terms as all my ethnic/sexual identity minority friends and family?
Had I just been hanging out with straight white people and married into a white family, I wouldn't have ever been exposed to these terms that people find so offensive.
Am I the only one who doesn't get offended when people say things? I mean seriously, life is too short to get so hot and bothered over what other people say. This pervading and perpetual need to always be politically correct is so wearisome.
I'm LGBTI, and Logan's asides have never bothered me in the slightest. Words like: 'gay', and 'queer' were actually in use in early 20th century British society(andliterature), the trouble is over time their meaning has become misconstrued.
You're generalizing, and projecting your perspective.
Of course I am. As are you. This isn't a scientific debate with hard numbers to refer to, nor are there any wide sweeping studies I'm aware of regarding the use of those words to fall back on. All I have is my personal experience and observations of people around me, on TV, and on the internet. It's certainly not a double blind study, but you do tend to notice trends. Now of course those trends wont apply everywhere and to everyone, but by and large, as a culture, I think it's fairly accurate.
I've always had the opinion that words are exactly that, just words, and it's the intent and context behind them that is important. Whether you say "shoot" or "shit", you are conveying the same sentiment, so I never understood the substitution. The only exception are words that were invented as derogatory terms. The N-Word for example. It has only one meaning, at least for someone who is as painfully white as I am.
As far as using "Guys" to refer to a group of people that may include women, I think it's pretty benign. Similar to referring to our species as "Man Kind", which has been called out as being sexist (though, it's actually a shortening of "huMAN Kind"). It's strikes me as knit picking, as the term is generally used asexually when referring to a group of people. Sort of like the phrase "Whatever blows your dress up". Men use it towards other men in a non-derogatory fashion, and I've never seen anyone take offense to it. It's an asexual statement meaning "Whatever you like to do" at this point. That's just how language and slang work.
But, at the end of the day, you can be offended by anything you want to be offended by. Hell, I've seen people offended by the use of the term "Black Friday" because they feel it's racist, or the use of the phrase "Happy Holidays" because it doesn't specifically mention Christmas. To each their own I guess.
gay is an English word borrowed from French, it means "happy" basically. Gay is used a lot in gamer lingo in the same way as "bad" or "badass" is used, to indicate the exact opposite basically.
queer is an English word borrowed from German, it means "cross" like in perpendicular.
Logan uses also yiddish/german lingo from time to time, like "verklemmt" (constipated) or "spiel" (frivolous excursion). That doesn't mean he's Jewish or Amish or something.
All of these terms have no pejorative connotation whatsoever outside of a wider context that is so wide that it could give a pejorative connotation to anything.
Y'all shift your eyes and ears to tolerant mode, and the problem ceases to exist... there are people that are so intolerant that they see intolerance in everything. That's just too queer for me, I'd rather have everybody just be gay and verspielt...
Ohhh....bona, this dolly old eek is all gayed out. Time for me to troll along the dilly for bona mangarie, and stop mincing about (Polari, old British Gay Slang)
I'd rather be locked in a cold dark room being screamed at rather than beaten with a baseball bat but hey! that's just me maybe those words might make your brains get smashed out of your skull! XD
I would prefer to be hit by baseball bat once, then being locked/tied and screamed at whole day :). On serios note, under same conditions, obviouisly, ppl would prefer verbal attack to the phusical.
But look those torture techniques, most of them are grounded on mental torture, since it is more destructive in the long run, and more effective.
Would you rather be beaten by a baseball bat or have someone start a rumor about you that gets you fired, prevents you from getting a job, alienates you from your friends and family and prevents you from marrying? There are different comparisons where the opposite is true as well, like death. Words have power because people give them power, that's easy to influence on a personal level but nearly impossible to engineer on a social level.