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Culture War Roundup for the week of June 19, 2023

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More to the point, I think it's very valid to describe "cis" and "cisgender" as a slur, insofar as a slur is something you call a group of people who don't want to be called that

I don’t think that’s a very good definition of a slur. A slur is better defined as a word that in practice is mostly used to convey invective.

The term ‘colored people’ is very dated and not what most African Americans prefer to be called. But, it is not considered a slur because the typical African American reaction to being referred to that way is very, very different to being referred to as a nigger.

And it seems like whether cis fails that test is just a bit more debate able. Obviously we’re mostly familiar with shrieking internet trans activists using it as a synonym for ‘devil’ while hurling invective against anyone who disagrees with them, but the same can almost be said for ‘white’, and I’m given to understand that spaces with lots of… differently gendered… people cis is regularly used for disambiguation. I have no idea what the actual distribution of those two uses is, and I think the distinction of ‘you can’t call someone cis when they don’t want to be’ is probably fair, but the idea that it’s definitely a slur in the same way as ‘nigger’ or ‘tranny’ needs some more justification.