hirvinen comments on The Nature of Offense - Less Wrong

86 Post author: Wei_Dai 23 July 2009 11:15AM

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Comment author: Yvain 25 July 2009 07:03:23AM 8 points [-]

Racist statements don't seem to automatically imply lower status for the offended group. For example, many people found this "joke" offensive, even though the only claim seems to be that black people eat lots of watermelon. Similarly, a statement like "Jews control the financial system" could easily offend Jews, even though if anything it assigns them high status.

Comment author: hirvinen 25 July 2009 10:50:50AM 2 points [-]

Stereotypes imply lack of individuality, which is usually low-status. As does grouping them as a single entity, especially if that grouping is made with a hint of sinisterity as would often be the case when talking about financial system -controlling jews.