@pinkdrunkenelephants Look, I commend and admire the power of thought-terminating cliches, they are useful (and this is part of my point as well), but still, I'd like an honest an answer:
Where Do You Think The Root Of All Authority Is?
I have my answer (or at least what I think describes the answer the best), but I'd like to hear from you.
@pinkdrunkenelephants No, no...
The dictionary is the source of authority for YOU.
What's the source of authority for the dictionary? Where's the root of all authority? Whom will you trust with this job?
@pinkdrunkenelephants Yes, but it's important to remember that dictionaries are not god's gospel. It's not some kind of revelation about Life, Universe and Everything. And it's not even a naturally occurring phenomenon. It's still just a book (or rather, a database) some dudes or lasses wrote some time ago using their accumulated experience. It still comes from humans. It's still just a fragment of someone's consciousness.
And being, as we (hopefully) know, determines the consciousness. And being is an immensely complex and ever-changing thing. So no dictionary is accurate, ever. So we have lots of them, and all context-dependent.
So it is useful to re-evaluate the definitions you think you know.
Take the same makeup, for example. If someone wants to ban it, they'd better fucking give everyone a clear idea what do they mean by that. Suppose, I'm going to a football (or soccer, depending on who you ask) game and paint my face in the colours of FC I'm a fan of. Am I a criminal now?
@pinkdrunkenelephants Also, you've only proven my point that "the definition game" has no concievable end. So...
@pinkdrunkenelephants Let's do it the way I proposed in my message here: https://mastodon.ml/@drq/111177928748371050
and take the practical approach to this.
Whom would me defining every word you throw at me benefit? Who will be better off?
Me? No. You? Well, it will satisfy your facetiousness, and short term, yes, maybe. But in long term, you've learned nothing and never wanted to. Us together? Nah, you're clearly going to turn this into a competitive situation. Society? Nobody cares.
So, I will have to decline.
@pinkdrunkenelephants Hmm... How to put it simply.
The entirety of connections between different entities surrounding an entity in question. I'd put it this way.
@pinkdrunkenelephants Somewhat common context and somewhat overlapping experience (both personal and third-party). The overlap is never 100% though. Ask three people, what something is, you'll get four answers. No matter who they are.
@pinkdrunkenelephants Y'see...
A lot of things we don't do because we can do them, but because we can't not do them.
Given time and population, you'll build some kind of country, whether you want it or not.
As for "meaning of words we can look up in a dictionary"... My dear, you haven't worked with language long enough to see what I've seen. And let me tell you, dictionaries have more contradictions than any text you can dig up. And that's completely normal. Because this is also what we can't not do, because there's a giant hole at the bottom of all definitions, because the world is an incomprehensible mess, and always will be.
Shit, we can even barely answer basic questions like "what the fuck the colour orange is?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX0xWJpr0FY
What we can do, is define words from context to context and hope to navigate those contradictions.
What matters in the end is, if we're at all better of for the way we navigate, or worse. It's the only thing that matters, really.
@Sprite Foundation of what?
I do know a lot of trans people as well. And they DO want to alter their appearance to feel better. And they do exactly that. Who are you to tell them otherwise? I'm not trying to make "your" trans people to wear makeup, why should you ban makeup for the "mine"?
What's weird is attempting to ban alteration of one's appearance. This is overbearing, futile, and simply not reasonable.
For fuck's sake, will you ban performance art like theatre and cinema as well?
That is not okay, you should not be given power.
@pinkdrunkenelephants Okay, whatever, looks like you don't want to think about it, which is also fine, it's kinda tough question.