Okay, let's take a purely hypothetical situation—something that would never happen here on Mudcat.

Let us say someone starts a thread having to do with, say, a foreign country passing a law making blue eyes a capital offense. Many people join the thread, ageeing that this is absolutely outrageous, that it is not just an example of civil rights violations, but a humanitarian issue—nothing less than a pogrom.

But then, a couple of people jump in and, although they don't outright support the law, they talk about how most, if not all, people with blue eyes have filthy and disgusting habits, they spread disease, they exploit and pervert the young, and should be generally ostracized from any and all societies.

All reputable scientific studies, however, have long established that none of this is true as a general rule for blue-eyed people; certainly no more prevalent among blue-eyed people than in the population as a whole.

The couple of people who are obviously opposed to blue-eyed people deny the validity of these scientific studies and cite articles on the web sites of various groups who have long been known to regard blue-eyed people to inferior, perverted, dangerous, and a blight on society as a whole. Because of the vitriolic nature of this viewpoint and vehemence of the way in which it is expressed, and because it actually encourages those who would like to see such laws passed in all countries, many people on the thread object. Harsh words are exchanged.

And sooner or later that dreaded word "bigot" appears!

By any and all definitions of the word, it is accurate. And very much to tthe point. But still, no matter how accurate, some people blanch in horror at its use in this or any other context—with the possible exception of when blatant racism is involved. But even there. . . .

At that point, there are those who immediately put on their superhero capes, leap into the fray, and chastize those who use the word for merely using it.

Without taking into consideration the expressed beliefs that prompted the use of this word.

In the spirit of "Evil triumphs when good men do nothing," one wonders what the moral and ethical position is of those people who object to those who, indeed, are attempting to speak out against evil.

Think about it.

Don Firth

P. S. Interesting to note that the use of terms like "asshole" and "fuckwit" and the rest generally come from those who object to being labelled—accurately—as bigots (which, incidentally, is a fairly precise term, whereas the scatalogical epithets are generally not).