[inertiatic]

I'm a male software developer that cringes hard when hearing things like that, and I can't imagine using that sort of language in the workplace. In fact I'm part of an all male team at work and things like that get thrown around all day long, and I find it annoying at times. At the same time I detest the forced political correctness. And most of the time, all of those terms aren't actually hateful, but used in an playful ironic way.

I'm somewhat torn between what I would personally enjoy (all workplaces clean of the "boys" culture) and what I fundamentally believe is right (people should be free to express themselves in whatever way they choose to, and this way of communication clearly works for certain groups of people).

[morgtheborg]

> people should be free to express themselves in whatever way they choose to, and this way of communication clearly works for certain groups of people

Sure. In non-professional capacities. But in professional areas, we expect a bit of blandness so everyone feels welcome.

While some groups might be comfortable mocking or using language that people deem derogatory towards minorities, women, different cultures, different sexual orientations, etc., we've decided that their preferred communication type does not trump the right of a person to feel safe and respected at work. If they'd like to be foul with their own sort outside of work, whatever, people who don't appreciate it can avoid them.

Quitting my job to avoid feeling attacked, on the other hand, is an unreasonable burden placed on someone just so some dude can say bitch, fggot, and/or ngger or comment on someone's physical appearance.

[noelsusman]

They are opposing goals, and personally I come down squarely on people not being free to express themselves however they want all the time. Work is a special place with special rules because we're forced to be there and we generally have little control over who is around us. There's a very high barrier for somebody to be able to walk away compared to just being out at a bar or something, so the behavioral standards should be more strict to compensate for that.

Basically, I think women should be able to work wherever they want without having deal with coworkers commenting on their tits. I'm extremely fine with limiting people's speech in the workplace.

[vertex-four]

Perhaps in theory people should be free to express themselves how they want, but we should question why on earth people want to express themselves in these ways and work to solve that.

In the meantime, however, we live in an imperfect society where people are terrible, this does have consequences, and there does need to be some counterbalance against that - otherwise we’d be living happily in an anarchist utopia already.