Is this passage offensive?

I've read the OP's posts through twice and I still can't find any statement either way about whether he was putting words in the mouth of an ill-informed or wrong-un character, or genuinely attempting to 'educate' the reader. Therefore I think its too soon for assertions that he is indulging in revisionism, or that these ideas are the 'manifest truth' to him, or that the passage should be exempt from his editor's attention. Do we actually know this is the OP's manifest truth that he strongly believes in, not some clever-dick line he gave to a character?

Having said all that, the answer to the original question is: Yes, the passage is obviously offensive, unless the very next line of dialogue is, '"What a load of horseshit! Where the hell did you read that?" said his companion.'

I sincerely hope the above commentator hasn't accurately got your number, because if that is what you genuinely believed happened @Giacomo then, well, you shouldn't and God knows where it came from.

But assuming that you knew it wasn't true here is part of the reason it sounds inadvertently offensive: Because you have written it up to sound like an entry in a children's encyclopaedia, not dialogue: "Those colonists were promised salvation from the untenable situation they faced in their Old World." I don't believe people often talk like that. It certainly doesn't sound like someone we are meant to assume is wrong-headed.

 

@Mogador this was the part of Giacomo's second post that made me, and some other commenters, take the MC as not being naive, or inadvertent. I've underlined, so it's my emphasis but it's still all in situ above. I had kept an open mind on the passage up till the writer made his intent explicit. And still must.

 

That explains pretty much everything, actually. Especially the editing out part.

 

Fair enough. I didn't read that quite as clearly as an endorsement of the view; characters can be knowledgeable and still wrong. But on reflection you're more right than wrong, @evild4ve, and I read too fast. I disagree about shutting down the debate (not that it matters either way, because the mods have already explained the rules) but I can see what you're getting at.

 

@Giacomo

Please reply to my post as I’m the only person that critiqued the written passage you wrote. Everyone else took issue with the wider context because of your opening question.

I’ve an opinion on @Giacomo and I maybe way off here, but let’s see. New member Nov 10th with 8 messages. His first message was a question regarding dialogue tags. Doesn’t reply to any of the responses. His next 7 messages are all to do with this thread “Is this passage offensive?”. His last reply on the 12th and his last login date. Nothing else, just two days of activity and then nothing.

The OP to this thread felt like clickbait. By asking an indirect question was mis-direction. What actual question or questions is @Giacomo wanting answered?

1. Is this passage offensive?

2. Was my editor correct that I was apologizing for slavery? (in a text that’s since been altered here)

3. What is your opinion on this altered text below?

This thread got nearly 1,000 views compared to most with 200 or so. It’s a lot of views. I doubt we will see @Giacomo again or I get my reply. I think he was trying to provoke a reaction and am not sure to what end. I thought @big soft moose handled the whole thing very well indeed.

MartinM

 

My own suspicions parallel yours @MartinM

It always raises red flags when someone makes highly provocative posts and then refuses to answer many of the responses.

 

There is still the school of thought that intent simply doesn't matter to these questions. I don't always agree with that, but in the case of @Giacomo, adding the subsequent clarifications together with the original text, I felt it applied.

I agree it's possible he may have been trying to provoke a reaction, but given we credit him enough to consider his intent at all, I think quite a few other possibilities are presented:-

i - he might be on a writing site and have an editor and be seeking critique (including sensitivity-based critique) because he wants to get his story published
ii - he might be writing the book so that the "reader would be able to learn that bit of history from the speaker"
iii - he might value the platform for its own sake
iv - he might have wanted to start a debate
v - (ad absurdum) it might be a 'false flag operation' for the ends of 'subjugating the white race'/or 'keeping Trump out of the white house'/or 'forcing all writers to conform to an approved narrative' (I include this for completeness)
vi - he might have wanted to test the forum to see if his worldview would fit in or find apologists

On the third of these points, if a post is clickbait and there was never any manuscript, it might only take a minute or two to write and it can generate hundreds of views. If someone did have a political goal of teaching people a "bit of history", they might amply satisfy it and within a few minutes be on some other forum repeating the exercise. Active writing forums are probably quite a valuable platform, since all the users are in some shape or form content creators - an idea planted here might be magnified.

The fourth point I think is imputed to the OP - and I do find that peculiar in view of the second point, and also peculiar in view of his departure. But I suppose if something does meet legal standards of decency and is admitted to be a fit and proper topic, it must also be allowed that its writer can start the debate and then watch it from the sidelines without participating further themselves. Given that @Giacomo is a forum member in good standing, it seems uncharitable - and perhaps even uncivil - to imagine him lurking at the sidelines with popcorn.

The fifth point I hope doesn't require to be unpacked too far. It often crops up in political comments boards, leftwards as well as rightwards, as a reversal of the "ad hominem" principle: it's a way of appearing to disown the speaker whilst signalling endorsement of what was spoken. In the company of others who are also sharing a persecuted or extremist worldview it only needs to be hinted at: the intended audience can colour in the outlines of the conspiracy from their own inner monologues.

Lastly, if someone is testing the water, it's probably open to them to jump back on with another username but now some advance idea of which types of message might find support and in what quarters and at what user-levels.

Sensitivity-based critique is critique, including because all critique is free to set its own parameters of inquiry. I fear that to discount sensitivity-based critique invites a suppressed premise along the lines that sensitivity itself is something unwholesome (or communist, or counter-Trumpian) that invalidates all critiques it is attached to.

 

@evild4ve

Look what happens to the thread after his subsequent clarifications. He was goading both you and the forum. Now the replies to this thread are not directed at the OP, but at his reply. That now becomes the issue. Watch the replies start attacking his knowledge of the subject and his actual opinion on that matter.

@big soft moose first post “I think the issue is whether this is the opinion of a character or the opinion of the book.” Is spot on, but nobody is listening confusing the character with the authors subsequent clarification. That’s all @Giacomo needs…

He wanted either to be accused of racism or have someone band or have himself band… Brilliant feedback for his editor you’d agree. @big soft moose controlled the situation really well, with a lot of members becoming agitated.

Do me a favour, and answer the three questions only nothing more.

I might be wrong on this opinion and I would love for @Giacomo to say I was wrong here. And I’ll accept that whole heartedly…

MartinM