[ExI] Sheer Idiocy

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 02/05/2023 14:28, Ben wrote:
> >…Spike, I think you're right. Everything seems to be classed as 'hate 
> speech' now, even the most innocent things. Actually, rather than 
> 'neo-Victorian', I think a better term might be 'neo-McCarthyism'.
> …

And what could be more innocent than childrens dolls?

Well, the idiocy has infected Blighty too:

I just read on the BBC news that a pub has closed down because of the 
harrassment they've had from suppliers and members of the public since 
the news broke that police had confiscated some 'unacceptable items' 
from a display that had been there for 10 years, and had been inherited 
from the proprietors grandmother. What were these evil, dangerous, 
hate-mongering items?

Dolls.
'Racist' dolls.
Yep, good old Golliwog dolls. I remember them fondly from my distant 
youth. There were even images on them on jars of Robinsons Jam Until 
Robinsons got nervous and stopped putting them on the labels (this was 
before Kleenex withdrew their "Mansize Tissues" because, you know that's 
demeaning to feminis... I mean women. I mean people with wombs. Or 
something.).

Golliwog dolls were iconic. Jolly-looking things that never hurt a soul. 
My sister had one when she was a kid, and inexplicably, it completely 
failed to turn us into members of the Klu Klux Klan.

But, a couple have been essentially forced out of their livelihood 
because of these *dolls* that had been on display in the pub for /10 
years/ before someone decided to be offended by them, and called the 
police, who compounded the idiocy by actually confiscating them, as if 
they were a health hazard or a stash of class-A drugs. Then a bunch of 
people including the companies that supplied the beer, and random 
outraged members of the public persecuted the owners until they've now 
given up and are moving abroad.

I'm expecting museums to be targeted next, and then Al Jolson, and the 
Black and White Minstrels to be removed from music history books.

So watch out, if you have any old heirloom dolls, don't let anyone see 
them, lest they take offence, call the police to confiscate them and 
make your life a misery. I mean who knows what someone might find 
offensive now?

How is AI going to cure this kind of insanity? I suspect it will make 
things worse, instead, as long as we can give them 'guidelines'.

Ben
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