The word gay has been hijacked!!! By gay people...er homosexuals!!!
Those bastards!
But I thought the media was liberal on cultural issues! Howie keeps telling me so!
Don Farmer is a retired ABC News political and foreign correspondent and a former CNN news anchor. He can be reached via e-mail at marcodon@aol.com.
UPDATE: Inspired by Jesse, I sent Mr. Farmer an email:
Dear Mr. Farmer,
I remember having a similar experience as your grandson when I was a child. I was reading a book by J.R.R. Tolkien (The Hobbit, I believe) and was quite disturbed by a particular passage which described how the characters were gleefully "throwing faggots on the fire." I must have been about 9 or maybe 10, but this behavior was quite disturbing to me. It seemed bizarre to me that these otherwise noble and likeable characters would do that to people simply because they were gay, I mean homosexual.
Opening up my dictionary I'm quite shocked to discover that many many words have multiple meanings. Some meanings are apparently "archaic," which I think means that have fallen out of common usage, and some have preferred, secondary, and even tertiary meanings. Some word meanings differ by region within the U.S., and there are even words that mean one thing in the U.S. and something entirely different in the U.K. It's quite fascinating how flexible the English language is, and how quickly it evolves. As a person with a distinguished career in media - including a stint as a foreign correspondent - I'm surprised that this might be new to you. But, I suppose it's nice that there are still new things to learn.
In any case, my mother was also concerned that a word had been 'hijacked' - but her concern was that it had been hijacked by bigots and used as slur. She also wanted to shield me from its bad association and usage - which wasn't with homosexuality per se, but with people who think that it is "bad."
Perhaps the word 'faggot' could be the subject of your next column.
Best regards,
Atrios
