There was a sequence of events that led to this post. On a podcast, there was a mention of the English language being gender neutral. In constrast, most languages are not. For example, in Spanish, there is no way that anyone could be called "latinx". It is either latino for male, or latina for female. There is no other such grammatical construct in Spanish that would permit the use of latinx for gender neutral. It doesn't work for latinos. Most other languages are the same. English is the outlier in that respect.
That reminded me of a scene in the 90's movie "Falling Down". The only reason I ever heard of that movie was that Rush Limbaugh talked about it on his show. I was curious and watched it. Since then, I've watched it a few more times. Anyway, there was a scene in which there was something about the gender neutral grammatical construct in English as it applied to specific persons. The character named "Nick" asked the character named "Officer Torres" why she wasn't called an "officer-es", because of "you know". That is to say, she was female. Why wasn't the word officer constructed to reflect the fact that she was female?
The way that this is taken in our modern day, and has been so since at least the 90's, that to mention that is somehow "sexist". I had the thought that it was a legitmate question. It was taken to mean that she had no business being a police officer. That is a different issue. But it was obvious in that scene that Nick wasn't just talking about grammar.
There was something else I found interesting. Someone said in reaction to the movie that for "Nick" to be murdered was somehow "ok" because he was a bad guy. Interesting to me that someone could think like that. Just because you find someone objectionable in some way, it is somehow okay to kill him? When did that become permissible?
Going further into these type of movies, there were a few that I haven't heard of before. I can see where this could lead if you were to watch enough of these. Could that be why people might want to ban certain kinds of speech? What was once objectionable, like Nick's behavior, is now worthy of death. If you normalize that kind of thinking, where does it lead you?
It is now out there that killing people that you don't like is socially permissible. That's the point. Also, that movies may have a bit more influence that people may wish to admit. It may be a First Amendment issue, but it is also permissible to shut down people who say things that you don't agree with. What happens next? Murders just because someone may be seen as a racist like Nick? Everyone is now judge, jury, and executioner. Do people get these attitudes from popular culture, like the ones shown in movies?
Nick may not have been a sympathetic character. Perhaps in some way, he may have had it coming to him. But for the character that murdered him, there was a total loss of sympathy from that point on. The character "DFENS" in that movie recognized it in himself. He had crossed a line. There was no turning back. You can't take back a murder. Once it is done, that's it.
Be careful out there. You never know when somebody might think you should die for just being who you are.
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