Metro Uses The Word Poof and not in reference to the magic dragon (updated)

It’s bad, but I don’t think it’s as bad as the ‘n’ word. There aren’t centuries of ownership and slavery tied to it, after all. There are centuries of electric shock therapy, oppression, dehumanisation, etc. but it’s not on the same scale as slavery.

They could have easily made the same joke with the word ‘gay’ in it’s place too. I’ve made the same crack to mates before. You get turned down, and when your mates ask what happened you say ‘Lesbians are everywhere these days,’ or something similar. It’s not clever, and it’s not particularly funny, and everybody’s heard it.

Hmm, should humourists be held accountable for mirroring society?
I don’t find this funny to be honest but I do worry about censoring the media and the impression it gives. Also, a panel is missing, I can’t entirely see the context of that reference but it seems to me that she is using the word ‘poof’ to mean ‘gay man’ and I have heard as many gay men using the word poof as I have heard black people using the word nigger. I get offended when people I don’t know call me ‘mate’ I don’t want to sound astonishingly ignorant but isn’t that a similar thing?
I think I’ve made some semblance of sense but as it’s 3:30 am I can’t be entirely sure that I’m not going to be ripped apart when everyone else wakes up.

Surely the progressive view would be to take this word and any words that mean ‘gay man’ to mean, simply, a man who is gay rather than allowing them to become insults. It seems to me that in this context the woman is simply saying ‘perhaps that man is gay’ but that would be a rather long comment to make and it is more of a joke at her expense.

If someone finds context, please link it.

I must admit, I have to mostly agree with Dylan. Whilst it might be offensive to some - perhaps more than that - if we aare offended by anything it is normally a sign that we are unhappy with the label when in truth, it is an accurate description or recognised stop-word which we only find offensive due to our own insecurity about our individual identity.

We would be horrified by calling a person fat when they are 20st or so, or ripples of the stuff trying to eeek out through the gaps in tee shirts etc. But yet, it is a fact - by average standards (note I do not use the word normal) that individual is fat and is truely described that way. In addition, the word Poof or Gay, not only describes our people, these are words we use ourselves. They are not offensive. And as such, why then should we condemn those who use the very words we want used just if the the circumstance cuts slightly close to the bone?

So back to Dylans point about the free press etc. Would we then prefer the phrase “a gentleman who is not predictably likely to spawn or breed however, that might be the case but not by average standards and one who is more likely to engage in sexual pleasure from another human being who happens to have a similar anatomical configuration” ?

I prefer Poof! - Its a fun word anyway and it usually raises a smile these days - when I was a kid it is what I was known as so what the heck - I just told the other boys that they were jealous cos they had to wait to see girls before they could get a rise !!(changing roomas after footie practice)

So perhaps we should slow down the intellectualism and just enjoy the cartoon for it’s art and not get too tied up in it’s politics. There are more important things to get ourselves wound up about. xx

Ok I think there is a bit of confusion about the reading of this strip. My reading is:

Nemi is very drunk and comes onto man and wants to have sex. Man turns her down being a gentleman and she calls him a poof.

Nothing about subtext of his sexuality, it would be different if he had his arm around the man or they were outside a gay bar. He turns her down and her rebuff is calling him a puff. This is why I think its offensive.

Well`… it’s rather a lot of stupid pointless unfunny gay references for 2 months and in my opinion they’re not offensive on their own. But it’s just a tired set of old jokes pandering to tired stereotypes, and society needs to move on.

I have to admit my thoughts on the matter are completely the opposite to Morgan’s.

Stereotypes don’t bother me in the slightest, some of them (if we’re being honest) are actually based on an element of truth (speaking as part of the only male contingent in cinema screenings of Mamma Mia, and Sex and the CIty, and yes, gay). These seem to me to be, unequivocally, an affectionate poke in the ribs, rather than an assault.

Poof does bother me, though, because it is a term of abuse. I don’t really care how lovingly someone says it, it says ‘I’m better than you’. And from my understanding of how people use it, ‘poof’ doesn’t mean ‘homosexual’ as much as it means effeminate and weak.

Just read the letter from the metro, it is rather nice.

‘He turns her down and her rebuff is calling him a puff.’

That’s the gag. She’s suggesting that he turned her down because he’s not attracted to women.

We’re probably straying from the point now and considering the time spent on this already, just on this one site, it puts into perspective the fact that one word can create quite a fuss - but only if we let it!. If, in the cartoon, the guy had responded to the comment ” U poof” by saying ” ahh, whatever” we would not be having these endless scribes. Personally, I get tired of trying to squeeze a dry sponge when it comes to these kind of issues and if I understand Matthew correctly, I agree - move on!!

Moving the cartoon to reality, it is quite commonplace to use these words as a stop gap, in fill - when we are looking for a metaphor which might not insult but enforce our thoughts at the time. I have called my hubby a “poof” on occasion - say when we might be getting ready to go out or a certain comment had been made. The response is usually “why thank you” with a flutter of the eyelashes (LOL) and is received as a term of endearment rather than an insult. If, in the cartoon, we were able to hear the inflection in the voice, would it be possible that she was flirting with the guy? and pointing out to him her disappointment that he wasnt up for it with her - but still wanting to maintain positive relations with him ? (Hey, this is me again - pot is half full mr optimist. My mother always taught me to see the good in folk)

We were away a few weeks ago and an obviously hetero guy had cause to pass comment about us on the beach. Hubbys response was kurt and generated this guy to inflate like the proverbial frog and utter ” …you,…you,..you funny looking man!!” at which we walked on giggling. So perhaps society is learning afterall…………………….?

I’m gay, I’m French & i think we can laugh about’everythin’…
But, you, politicaly correct, are shocked with that !
My question is … what should be your reaction if a gay mag published that ?
Be serious ! False debate…

Math’

I understand that this might seem like we’re taking the comic strip and going over the top with political correctness but when people say “oh it’s only a small joke, we use it, it doesn’t hurt anyone really” we are suggesting that in certain situations its ok to use language that could be deemed offensive.

The use of words like this is a very grey area and because we should all care about each other we should just not use words like because of the potential to hurt! Yes, you might not mind the word but it suggests homophobia and whilst its not as extreme as other terms if we say this word is ok whats to stop other forms of homophobia becoming frequently used and therefore acceptable!

By letting the small things through we create the potential to let the big things become acceptable - I’m not going to make references but we can all see when this has happened iin history! Let’s progress not digress!! (sorry - I’m a little bit perky from excessive diet coke at work!?)

Completely understand that, it ws the translation so nothing to with lovely Lise Myhre, it was The Metro who let it go to print though, they should have chosen better wording.

Love the Nemi.

‘My question is … what should be your reaction if a gay mag published that ?’

This is irrelevant. It’s like claiming there’s no difference between Ice Cube spitting ‘nigga’ and the head of the KKK calling someone ‘nigger’. There is an enormous difference.

Would anyone say having read the metro, say that Nemi, the character, is homophobic?

The cartoon is not about that, its about the cross purposes of two people, and how peoples actions can be misinterpreted by the bias of another persons perception. He thinks hes being all noble, and doing the honourable thing, where as Nemi, being drunk interprets it as rejection, and throws up a meaningless kneejerk defense reaction to make herself feel better. Substitute the word ‘poof’ for something else. Substitute it for ‘Extraterrestrial’, on the grounds that the point nemi is making to herself is that the reason she didn’t get to have her way with the guy is that he is obviously mechanically incompatible with her rather than choosing not to.

At the risk of getting lynched, (and I am not condoning the use of the label for any group as derogatory), battles need to be chosen. By jumping all over this, youre assuming that everyone that reads it is an idiot who will translate it as anti gay, and that assumption is arrogant and will foster anti gay feeling. And it goes against human nature to deny people the right to deal with something they may be uncomfortable or unfamiliar with, by looking for humour in it. Is the Metro not doing more to promote homosexuals as part of everyday life by just throwing them into the mix with everything else, than you are by setting yourself apart by taking exeption to every reference to a vaguely defined stereotype, with no real weight, that people use to easily describe different lifestyles. People work on stereotypes. Its a way of storing information, of ordering the world into a manageable condition. You are only reinforcing the ‘better watch what you say around them folk’ distrust that is the basis of fear, that in turn is the basis of hate. If society can embrace the gay community without having to mind its p’s and q’s, then the day will come when page 3 in a tabloid will feature both a woman and a man, scantily clad and presented for our delectation. And then gay people will be just as everyday and mediocre as everyone else.

The price of equality, unfortunately, is equality. There are no medals for not being mainstream. Positive discrimination is as insidious and divisive as any other.

If a media is actively saying hateful things about a group, or orchestrating a campaign against them, challenge them. But in a media that has no gain, in the world today, to be prejudicial against a group, think about Nemi’s kneejerk reaction to misintepreting the intent of another in a cartoon strip we all know?

The definition of free media, especially if you include open access, and the intertubes, means that anyone Can say anything they want about anyone. And therein lies the problem. You can’t dictate what people take as the meaning of a word, and by reacting to to many instances of misuse of a word (and I dont refer specifically to your good self here, I am debating general strategy, if you will) then you get into a position where you are chasing after nailing down the precise and appropriate usage of every word. Which is futile, and counter productive. If you restrict use of the word ‘poof’ so it is only acceptable when used in an ironic and affectionate sense by consenting gay adults, the process of the world outside the politically correct rulebook will find a word to replace ‘poof’, and additionally reinterpret the meaning of the word to mean, specifically, and without regard to lifestyle and sexual orientation, to mean ‘one who will, when everyone else has moved on to the business pages, because the bus is taking forever, get upset about the use of the word ‘poof’ ‘. And that way lies madness. And the undermining of your cause.

Language is important, and people use derogatory terms across the board as part of language. And a derogatory term used in a piece of fiction to illustrate a characters motivation or thinking is a different matter to a derogatory term used to compare a group of people to a negative or insult. More power to you on that battle. Although I would suggest that even then, not everyone that uses the phrase ‘thats gay’ as a negative descriptor of something makes a concious association with homosexuality. Words, as you know, are reinvented, take on new meanings. Look at rap slang - star, blood, look at wicked, bad, the words gay and queer themselves havent always reffered to homosexual.

Also, I am cynical enough to suspect that a lot of people in the media who take up issues do so to score political brownie points. And most importantly, trying to hammer home an issue like this using the language of political correctness is ineffectual at best, and counter productive at worst. You can make people aware, but you cannot force them to speak, and think in a particular way, but there is the risk of convincing a populace that is only ever concious of a group when it hears of it complaining about its inequal staus, that there is a reason for it to be seen as different. Political correct policy does nothing in the real world other than drive its target underground.

I don’t disagree that words can harm, and that some issues should be confronted, but don’t dilute the message by trying to counter everything that Could be taken as a misrepresentation. Instead confront the serious issues head on, using the authority and cause that it IS YOUR issue, not just another fussy government PC inspired directive, and give people the chance to take a cartoon in the metro in the context, and spirit it was intended, and to use their experience and perspective to maintain their own, on average, fairly accomodating world view. Its not the majority that are looking for something to hate, and the minority that are have more worrying platforms for their propaganda, and in general, the mass media doesnt give them coverage.

Ok, we may not, but you are advocating it become less free?

My argument is that if you Do want to start limiting free speech then you have to carry on and limit everything that could be considered by anyone with any agenda to be potentially harmful, which gives a fuindamentalist the grounds to shut down this site, for instance. I’m saying that people are more sophisticated than you seem to think, and that they are more likely to reinforce a negative perception of a gay person if he/she is telling them they are not allowed to read the word ‘poof’ than by reading it in a newspaper, or any other media. And I’m saying that there are more blatant trespasses -the BNP using logical fallacies,primed by badly administered government policies, to actually get people to vote for them, for instance - that you should save your fight for.

This is nice, by the way, I don’t often get to use my brain on a Sunday

Neither should the public transport itself, but enforce that one.

I will concede the watershed thing, but still maintain that someone who reads it who is of age or whatever is capable of reading the cartoons in question, or other such media, and maintaining their integrity without being nannied, and that hypothetically, to publicly mount a campaign that will be looked at no deeper than being anti comic strip by the majority of people would undermine the credibility of a group that later campaigned against injustice such as homophobic bullying. Although I understand that thats not actually why we are here…

I found this discussion while looking for definitions of the online accronym, poof. The general concensus is that poof is the sound of a disappearing object the moment after a magician says the magic words. It is used typically in chatrooms to indicate that a person has either just left, or is about to.

Indeed, when I read the strip that this debate is all about, I took the view that the girl (Nemi) was drunk and begging the dude for some at home attention. When he declined her by saying “I’d rather go home with you when you are sober” (sic. I’d rather you be sober enough to actually remember it), she said poof as to bid him begone for not giving in to her advances.

The real humor here is that the stereotypical male often prefers the girl to be too drunk to say no, and doesn’t care if she even enojoys the outing, let alone actually remember it.

Being a hetero male, I have never heard the word “poof” used to describe non-hetero males, so that point was completely lost on me. Or perhaps, it is only because some of you have heard it used that way, that you completely missed the juxtaposition and thus the humor.

My 2p.
Wee-Lamm