that’s not really a double meaning for it to be a double meaning, it would need to be contemporaneous double usage unless you think there were some number of fans in the recent past that were devilishly using the chant in some coded racist context
The vast majority of people, Black or White, were not offended by the chant until someone told them to be offended by it.
Doesn't that mean everything though? If it's only perceived as racist to 0.00000001% of the population, isn't it probably just not racist? Words mean what society says they mean. Gator bait became racist when some authority arbitrarily declared it as such.
The difference is the Nazi symbol has been primarily associated as a Nazi symbol, since... well... the Nazis. You ask any random Joe about "Gator bait," and they are a Hell of a lot more likely to associate it with the "Florida Gators" than they are with some racist connotation. It's the same reason we don't say "dogs are bad" because Hitler owned a dog. Just because something has been loosely associated with evil in the past, doesn't mean that association defines it or should define it.
That is not accurate. There are no such qualifiers. Dictionary Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more noun noun: double meaning a word or phrase that is open to more than one interpretation. "the title of the movie has a double meaning"
You are using incorrect verbs to sensationalize your point. Nobody “told” people to be offended. What happened was that many people were not aware of the term’s past and once they were made aware, many felt it was inappropriate to continue to use.
I think you are only accounting for and concerned with a certain demographic’s opinion on the matter.
You're describing being told to be offended. You think the people who raised the issue didn't have an agenda?
We have different understandings of what the phrase “told to” means. When was the direction to “be offended” given? It wasn’t.
No, but apparently according to you, only one demographic’s opinion on the matter seems to count for anything. And that’s the demographic which happens to agree with you. You agreed it wasn’t offensive to over 99% of people until someone tied it to evils of the past. That says everything about the true meaning of “Gator bait.”
Why do you think “the history” was raised? You think they just thought it was an interesting piece of history to randomly highlight or do you think they were advocating for some sort of change in this context? If they were advocating for change, it seems pretty clear they were trying to associate Gator Bait with an evil and racist history, effectively turning it into this “offensive” thing. So… they were effectively telling people to be offended by it.
I mean the intention of raising the issue was obviously to highlight the issue as being offensive. Obviously.
That’s a mischaracterization of my thoughts. First, I don’t necessarily care whether the term is used or not for football. I understand both meanings and can personally separate the two. What o disagree with is when someone denies that the other meaning exists and therefore deems it irrelevant.
You can’t change the definition of “told to” to suit your narrative. The information was presented, and people can make their own judgements.
Long time WSJ reader. The editorials are mostly conservative. The general reporting is not conservative.
As a long time reader, I can assure you that there absolutely is "woke" reporting in the WSJ. It comes out in the political and social reporting. The editorials are mostly conservative. I'm a long time subscriber and if I thought the whole thing was "woke" I would cancel.
They deliberately associated it with racism. Not much room left for independent judgment after that. Racism is just that evil and rightfully seen as so. And race hustlers know that and use that to manipulate the masses. Not saying that’s necessarily what happened here, but this is certainly how it would look.
