Sir/Ma'am? Hon? Sweetie? Girl/Boy?
 

So I've seen several threads that took one part or another of this. I'm interested what people find the most offensive and, if you care to discuss it, why you are offended by any of these? Personally, I care more (which still isn't much) HOW the person calls me anything rather than what they call me. Someone can call me by my first name, and say it in nasty enough of a way that I'd much rather they had used some other term. Overall, I'm shocked by how easily people are offended these days. Especially when someone does not have the intention to offend. *shrug*

This post, while I realize it is attempting to summarize, seems entirely redundant. My personal belief (expressed in many of those threads) would be on a checkbox that is not available: NONE. None of these labels offend me, because I do not exhibit the "bad" charateristics typified by the labels. If you want to call me Mr. Cocksucker all day long, thats fine-- as long as you treat me fairly as a human being. This is certainly my personal belief, and I realize that some more sensitive than others, so I've recently departed from using these types of labels (when they'd be taken offensively).

NONE.

no words offend me on their face. Only people who use words in condescending manner offend me.

Yes, slightly redundant, but I'm still curious... and NONE wasn't an option because you don't have to vote for any at all... *shrug* ^_^

Don't Call Me Dude

by Scatterbrain


Here's my story, sad but true
About a girl that I once knew.
She broke my heart, I became unglued,
It all started when she called me dude
Well today I leave the psycho ward
Cause my sentence did conclude:
I had killed a man with my bare hands
Because he called me dude
The jury said that I was insane.
Temporally insane - brain strain.
But now the doctors say I'm A.O.K.
So I start my new life today.
This story starts some years ago
As I vacationed by the sea.
In the California sunshine
Just me & my baby.
I was in love feeling sky high
When a big blonde lifeguard walked by.
He looked at her, she looked at him -
I knew it was good bye.
He took her by the hand, kicked sand in my face.
She looked & laughed & said, "Later Dude!"
They were gone without a trace
And the waves echoed her laughter
And her words...Yo Later Dude.
Later that night I was in such a bad mood
Sittin' in a bar drinkin' hard, getting stewed
Thinkin' 'bout that girl & how 'bout I'd been screwed
When some guy walks in sits next to me & says
What's up dude!
I heard the word dude & I became unglued.
Slowly I turned, step by step, inch by inch
And put my hands around his neck, and I squeezed...
DON'T CALL ME DUDE!
So that's how I got where I am
But this ain't where it ends.
The doctors said they cured me
I said good bye to my crazy friends.
I was smiling as i left that place
My life had been renewed.
The guard at the gate, he stamped my pass
And he said, "Yo Later Dude!"
Slowly I turned...

I agree that it is the intention that makes a word annoying. I was mildly surprised when one of my 20'something employees called me "hon" yesterday. Granted, we're a pretty casual outfit, but I'm tempted to sign his next paycheck with "Hon" in bright red ink so the teller will catch it. No, I'm not evil. I'm just misunderstood. :D

Please oh please STOP calling me and anyone else within earshot dude.

Amen! and amen againb ecause it wasn't enough characters

Slowly, I turned..... :D

Actually, NONE needs to be an option because if you click vote now without selecting an option, it tells you to go back and select an option.

So yeah, NONE would be my pick. Words need context.

Wait, wait, you work with teenagers, too?

This reminded me of one of those dating reality shows from a few years ago. Three young women were meeting the guy's parents, and each was given a challenge with a reward if she could pull it off. One of the girls had to begin every single sentence with the word "Dude" for the first ten minutes she was there.

I have students who do that without thinking about it. I'm always tempted to respond to the boys who call me "Dude" by calling them "Missy".

I actually prefer that most people call me Ma'am, Miss, or Mrs.

Now that I sit and think about it, calling a girl "dude" is actually kind of weird. But then again, one of my female friends says "dude" all the time, and we can never tell who she's referring to.

Or as my old French teacher says "I hate it when people refer to a group of people as guys. It bugs me when i'm with a bunch of ladies, and someone comes up and says hey guys!"

Funny how something as simple as "hey guys!" can get someone so worked up.

Doesn't matter what you call me. Depends on how you treat me and how you say it.

That would be hilarious!

I *Hate* when somone uses the term "Boy" to grab my attention.

Its just down right disrepectful and you will NOT get any attention from me when done so. This applies to if I am at work as well, treat me with respect if you want to be treated nice your self.

I am 22, the term boy ran out many years ago.

None really. I voted for sweetie though, because no one should be calling me that except close family and my husband....I guess baby would fall into the same category.

Funnily enough, I call my sister dude all the time, and she does the same to me. I don't call anyone else dude though.

I am the only female in my office, and the rest are all men who are slightly to bunches older than I am... They tell me I violate the sexual harrassment policy on a daily basis because I refer to them collectively as the boys... :) (I do it so often that the customers refer to the engineering staff as the boys) They all get a kick out of it...

They are also pretty well mannered group of boys -- when I am in th eoffice, if there is a meeting, it's always hey Guys and Mal.. That irks me... I wanna belong.. :)

Ah, French linguistics humor.

The irony here is that in the French langage, the third person plural pronouns are gendered. There is a feminine "they" for females, and a masculine "they" for males. When referring to a group of mixed gender, regardless of the relative number of females and males, the correct usage is the masculine "they".

So in French, a mixed gender group is a group of guys.

:crazy: Perhaps I would know that if I payed attention in French class.

You should put "kid" up there.

I picked four of the ones on there... Dude, Boy are two things that get on my nerves. Just the other day I got a remark from someone older (20 or so years) that I was just a lost BOY. Oh, did that ever piss me off. And the last two is babe or sweetie, these two just make me uncomfortable if it is not my girlfriend calling me that. Also, it makes me think that someone wants to get something out of me.