Today I am offended. I am.
Not at something that affects me personally, or that has any actual impact on the way I live my life or feel about myself – but because I take offense in the amount of offense people are taking in life right now. Cancel culture, if you will.
You see, my pet peeve about this whole thing – is that it makes. No. Sense. It doesn’t. Not to me, at least. I’ve been brought up my whole entire life knowing that sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. Actively. It was knowledge shared with me from a young age. Imprinted into me all throughout my school life, and often underlined during my professional career.
So the fact that people these days manage to take so much offense at words, phrasings, song lyrics or internet rants on the virtual www is a complete mystery to me. And what boggles me even more is that, in our current age, they actually feel like their personal offense has power. Weighs in with the weight of the world. And grants them the human basic right to apparently have it changed. The offense of the few suddenly outweighs entire cultures, years of tradition, and about 99% of the rest of the world population. HOW?!
It’s insanity. A song for a yearly kids-event here is currently under fire for containing a word that in the SLANG of an ENTIRELY different language (Indonesian on Bali) than is spoken here – means sex. Yes. You are hearing me right. People are on the stands to ban a Dutch children’s song – for containing a word that on the COMPLETE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD…..means sex. LE GASP!
Ik ben hier en jij bent daar (I am here, and you are there)
De jiggyjig doen we met elkaar (the jiggyjig we do together)
And to make matters worse – there’s actual schools that yielded to this insanity – and proceeded to ban the song from their celebrations. Whut, the, flying, fuck.
I think people are managing to take things way too far without taking into consideration what they’re actually doing. They’re taking too much pleasure in the fact that they CAN, to really ponder whether they should, anymore. We’ve become such a self-important bunch in our world of luxury that we use up the little time we have to obsess about things that shouldn’t even play in our mind. Because we have…nothing…better….to….do.
We have evolved so far onto the scales of Maslows pyramid that we no longer have to worry about silly things like food, and water and surviving as much – and are now slathering ourselves in the self-righteous quest for self-actualization. Over the bodies of the world before us, if we have to, I suppose.
Can you imagine someone from the Middle Ages worrying about the fact that the words ‘dewy rose‘ in the song of a bard might refer to their cheating wives’ nether region, to then proceed to have that song banned?
No. They were too busy worrying about what food they’d find to put on the table for their 12 greasy kids and dealing with their teeth, hands and feet rotting off from various uncureable diseases to worry about such meaningless bullshit. Hell, If you told those people that we’re actually banning words these days they’d be like ‘What?! You can do that?!’ like the true paupers that they were. Instead of instantly trying to get the word pauper banned themselves for referring to their decrepit state as poor little mongrel.
It’s not a thing. It shouldn’t be a thing. And no matter the case that CAN obviously be made for some (now banned) words and aspects. And even with the validity of possibly some of the complaints being blatantly clear – the fact that they have opened doors for our current day cancel culture sickens me.
What’s even worse is that I even find myself obliging most of the time – because I’ve found it easier to comply than to engage in fruitless discussions with people that are in tunnels so deep that they only see the ass in front of them that they think they’re licking. Possibly hoping it’s their own, for increased pleasure. I mean – have you ever tried talking to one of these cancellers who is fully convinced of their own ‘right‘? I’ve had more meaningful conversations with walls, honestly. And more chance of budging those with reasonable arguments, as well, I think.
So when I call a housekeeper an ‘interieurverzorgster‘ or ‘domestic worker‘ even though what they’re doing IS in fact housekeeping, because the previous makes them sounds ‘cheap‘ and makes them feel like they’re of lower class? I feel offended. Or when someone mentions the janitor in our company building as ‘director of facilities management’ (they actually fucking do that) I cringe. And when someone in my vicinity suddenly becomes very outspoken on the importance of banning ‘Zwarte Piet‘ (From my vocabulary) or push for deleting kids-songs containing Urban Dictionary-worthy terms while listening to Cardi B songs in their free time – I unfriend those motherfuckers.
You WILL still find me dressed up as a cowboy or an indian during carnaval and I will still eat the over 200-years old European delicacy we Dutch call ‘negerzoenen‘ without jumping on the hype-wagon and just calling them ‘zoen‘. And the moment the company that produces ‘Jodenkoeken‘ actually yields to popular demand and rebrands these delicious cookies – I will learn how to bake them my damn self.
Because if words that have been in our language so long that they’ve lost all true offensive meaning (because the people that once meant them as offensive have died so long ago that their descendants don’t even realize they were meant as such anymore) are suddenly rebranded as offensive? I refuse.
To put it more in terms that will REALLY get ya’ll activists fired up: Check your privilige – you’ve not earned the hardship to even be offended by it. And the people that were – are long gone.
If concepts and traditions that have brought people together for centuries, regardless of their once horrendous-origin-now-completely-lost-to-history, suddenly need to pave the way for inclusive maniacery? I refuse.
If songs and poems and blogs and writings must be banned for their icky topics? I will make sure I start writing them – because conformity and peer pressure is what made all of these horrible things normal in the first place.
If we cancel everything – we’ll have to start taking offense at other things. And if they move on to body language and banish the eyeroll? I’ll be doomed.
Sorry if that offends you.
Wait. No. Not even slightly.
Zoewiezoe 
What The F
Is An Ocean
That
Doesn’t
Make Waves
Boooooooorish
For it Is
Dewy
Roses
That
Make THorns
Feel Better Than Desert
FLoWeRinG
Oh The Rise
Now And
Fall Of Waves
Understanding
This too Is Waves
Freedom Will
Breathe
Some
Way
Never
Cancelled
In Deed Zoe Corsets
In Chasity Bleed Freshly Still…
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YES!!! God help us, I’ve been pulled up and “corrected” many times by soul destroying do-gooders who think they know the cultural law of the WORLD ffs!!! Very destructive and dangerous behaviour lately and it infuriates the Hellfire out of me.
Even my nickname Shaz the Spaz has been criticised. Well Shaz is obviously short for Sharon and I have muscle spasticity in my left leg so, it’s British humour 😀
Great piece Zoe 💜
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Nice rant. Amused me
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Agree on all points, except we native peoples (Indians) are in fact, still here. We’re not your costume. That being said, I don’t get offended over my culture being treated like a mascot, but I will make fun of you for it. All we can do is laugh at it, ya know. (No offense, obviously, but when we were jailed & killed for being ourselves & STILL have to fight to express our culture, it’s a bit annoying how our sacred objects are demeaned to costumes.) But don’t worry, I love your blog & won’t be cancelling you or anything. 🙂❤ Great post. 👍
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I live in Washington State, USA and have several friends that feel this way. I’m not Indigenous American, but many of my lifelong friends are. I used to joke, “I see dead people.” Because for a long-time the Canadian government had listed my friend’s tribe “extinct” until 2016, when they were declared, not extinct. The fight to be recognized just for existing is a bitter one. There are several tribes that were split into groups with half living in Washington State, USA and half living in British Columbia, Canada.
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Spot on. C
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I wanted to go off about how it’s conpletely logical that people take offence BC the first thing that came to.mind when I read your intro is about how transgender people constantly get told that sticks and stones shit about being misgendered….. But when I read on this is about the same shit I posted on Facebook about today 🤣
Extremist Christians are a nuisance. Wish they’d finally get tired of their game of looking for nails on low tide 🤪😜
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The sports video games of my prime video game playing years (the late 1980s and early 1990s) usually had made-up names of teams and players. The technology had not yet reached the point where the characters in the game could look like real players (or even look different from each other), and video games did not yet have the kind of big money to be able to afford to pay to use actual players’ likenesses. (Believe me, this story is going somewhere…) In addition to the old Marios and Zeldas of that era, Mark and I played a lot of sports video games as a kid. He played baseball and basketball all his life, and our family social life revolved around watching sports. Even though I wasn’t an athlete, I enjoyed watching sports too.
There was a game for Nintendo called Baseball Simulator 1.000. This was the first game we had that included the capability of making your own teams, choosing the team colors and names as well as naming the players and specifying things like their speed, batting average, and power hitting ability. (The game was also awesome because there was a mode where you could give the players super powers, but that isn’t part of the point I’m eventually getting to.) One of the custom teams Mark made, he wanted to give them a really stupid name… so he called the team “the Baseballs.”
Go forward 30 years, and in real life, the Washington Redskins football team decides to change their name because Redskins is interpreted by some as a derogatory term for Native Americans. (That one you could actually make a better argument for changing than some of the other things people get all worked up over, although actual Native Americans have mixed opinions on whether or not they find the name offensive.) But what’s hilarious about this is the new name they came up with…
“Washington Football Team.”
How is that any less ridiculous than the Baseballs?
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What a fantastic post 👏 good on you for voicing that… I agree with you wholeheartedly. People will take offense to literally everything.. 🤦♀️
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Well said! I sometimes feel like I’m walking on eggshells when I’m writing, in case I use an ‘offensive’ word. And don’t get me started on the things we’re not allowed to laugh at these days.
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Interesting take. I feel that way about people who leave their trash in parks, on the bus, the train, the mountains and beaches. Maybe we could do a collab.
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Feeling entitled to be offended is a thing. A strange thing, but a thing.
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Wow!
You put your finger on the sore spot!
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Damn! You got me up on my feet and cheering over here.
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Reblogged this on The Reluctant Poet.
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I like the sarcastic takeaway that you packaged this write-up in. Come to think of it, my greyish-black Iris may offend one of these creeps not too long from now.
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Beautifully put, Zoe. We’ve returned to the era of censorship all over again in the name of protecting feelings. It’s a scary place to be when emotion trumps logic, and the hoarde continues to collect more blind followers who just want to be part of the hype without thinking for themselves. But this is where writers retain their power; by not allowing themselves to be crushed and pushing back against the madness with the same thing these cancellers seem to be so afraid of: words.
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Great post and great points! I almost couldn’t get past the “Dewey Rose” paragraph lol. I did not know that and No I’m not offended but found it hilarious and wondered how I lived to be this old and not know that, especially with all the reading I do ! hahaha
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I’m staring out through the window,
hearing the sunlight grumbling in breezy glimmers of sunlight against the sky,
growling at me
for not dying right this instant for the cause.
Problem is,
I don’t know what the cause is…
and I’m not ready to die for it.
Live or die –
or something ever so subtly slipped inbetween-
I need to do so softly,
between all the righteous headlights being shone in my face…
and rediscover something that makes me want to get off this couch again.
But the poisoned, whispered sunlight
and the word police…
they don’t even come close to translating me.
(or something… I dunno) 🦉🐧🦉🐧🦉🐧
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Have you ever watched some of JP’s stuff on youtube? He also facetiously mentioned that we had to “cancel” everything!
I have so many comments about all you mentioned there isn’t nearly enough space here!
The bottom-line: I agree with you 1001% When did the human race’s perceptions about nitty-gritty things become so completely absurd?
On this side of the world, a famous comedian apologized for his potentially offensive content in the 80s.
Many people rallied behind him and came to his defense, saying it was part of the zeitgeist.
And that he always respected people, despite occasionally having fun with a few tropes.
Those few people gave me some hope again!
And you, of course!
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Terloops, ek praat Afrikaans! Dis effens die selfde as Nederlands… mos! We often generate words that often offend so easily! And yeah, there is a huge disparity between punishing the offense, and not even bothering to research some of the origins for certain words, and concepts.
Ok, I have to stop now!
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You bring up a lot of excellent points. I do support causes that promote equality in the world, but it’s important to remember that people are behind these causes and emotions run high. Two different people can support the same cause and one person can be highly offended about something and the other won’t. I do think the people who do get offended super easily are toxic people anyway. If you look closely enough, you can see that. Some lingo gets overused a lot too and it’s like that line in the Princess Bride of, “You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.” One of my friends said that unfortunately, the people who yell the loudest become the majority view. I agree with that. One example I have of not cancelling something is that I absolutely love the movie Blazing Saddles. I have friends of different races who love it too because it’s pure genius! And we know that we aren’t going to go make racist comments because we love the movie. We just enjoy a comedic masterpiece together
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Well said…like other people have said you make some great points.
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Very well put. I am not in charge of what offends other people, I should only have to worry about living according to my own morals. The self-righteousness and virtue signaling are so real nowadays.
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There is political correctness and then there is idiocy. People seem to get the two confused.
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It’s insanity…
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The world is going cuckoo!
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🤣😂🤣 yes it is!
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We have arrived here because both church and state have been usurped. Actually, faith, morality, etiquette, tradition, heritage, culture, race, history, logic, facts, science, common sense, rationale, humour, satire, parody, objective reality and the ten feet in front of your face have been superceded by a new universal culture called Political Correctness.
And now it has a Church of the Woke.
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People that have no power or real business in their own lives make cancel culture their life’s work.
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Bam. SO ON POINT!
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Do you remember the position of most folks when we were kids and something said offended out parents? At least for me, it was My Parents’ problem, not the problem of the person making the statement.
We have so many cultures and different people that anyone that does what we do are never going to appeal to everyone. So I always feel like this. If I say something that offends you, you have a choice. You don’t have to read me. Go read someone else. When did it become the problem of the speaker, within reason, to censor everything so we don’t offend anyone. Forget that noise.
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