MORAL STATUS OF THE RECLAMATION OF SLURS

• Authors: Cepollaro Bianca
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

While prototypical uses of slurs express contempt for targets, some reclaimed uses are associated with positive evaluations. This practice may raise concerns. I anticipate this criticism in what I dub the Warrant Argument (WA) and then defend the legitimacy of this kind of reclamation. For the WA, standard pejorative uses of slurs are problematic for assuming unwarranted connections between descriptive properties (e.g., being gay) and value judgements (e.g., being worthy of contempt). When reclaimed uses of slurs express a positive evaluation of their targets—the WA goes—reclamation fails to challenge the unwarranted link between descriptive properties and value judgements, and merely reverses the evaluation polarity from negative to positive. So, the WA concludes, reclaimed uses of slurs evaluating targets positively for belonging to a certain group make a similar moral error as derogatory uses of slurs (sections 2-3). The WA could lead us to condemn reclamation. To resist this conclusion, I draw a parallel with affirmative action, arguing that it can be morally permissible to balance an existing form of injustice by temporarily introducing a countervailing mechanism that prima facie seems to violate the norm of equality: even if the WA were right, it wouldn’t constitute an argument against the moral permissibility of reclamation in the case of most slurs (section 4). This line of argument in defence of pride reclamation may also serve to debunk the myths of reverse racism and reverse sexism (section 5).

Keywords

EN

POLARITY REVERSAL; RECLAMATION; REVERSE RACISM; REVERSE SEXISM; SLURS; WARRANT ARGUMENT

• Publisher: Institute of Philosophy of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and Institute of Philosophy of Academy of Sciences of Czech Republic
• Journal: Organon F. medzinárodný časopis pre analytickú filozofiu
• Year: 2021
• Volume: 28
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 672 – 688

Contributors

author

Cepollaro Bianca

• Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Via Olgettina, 58, 20132 Milano, Italy

Identifiers

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2021.28309