It’s totally okay to say based.

Nazis haven’t stolen “based”. People getting worried about that sort of thing are, imo, being silly. “Based”, in my experience, is used plenty in light-hearted conversations between young communists online and offline. It usually just means “I agree with this politically” thus people of all ideologies will use it when they agree w/ something.

Getting upset over it reminds me of when I was kicked from a communist Facebook group for using “Nazi arrows”, aka

using >greentext style formating

and called a closet Nazi for doing so. It’s literally no different than

>using redtext like this

>for emphasis

but because of its association with 4chan, people have this kneejerk reaction against using a popular, easy to understand, at-its-core omnipolitical meme format.

Not to shout down any comrades with grievances related to certain words, but in my experience the people in forums and on social media freaking out about words and actions no-one but them deems actually offensive are just power-hungry online weirdos who want the chance to police people’s language and look for an excuse to direct attention in conversation towards them and their woker than thou ivory tower.

There are obviously words that we as revolutionaries should understand the impact of and histories behind and refrain from using, like slurs, unless one is ‘reclaiming’ them. The N word, the F word, etc. Misogynistic terminology should also be avoided like btch and whre. A lot of words a very select group of people get upset over (usually on behalf of the actually marginalized) are fine imo. I’m sorry to the anarchists, but “idiot” and “moron”, despite horribly ableist histories, are not leaving the modern lexicon any time soon, and they bear nowhere near the impact that something like the R word does in the modern day.

I would just recommend using your best judgment. A couple of things that are less obvious is the aversion to putting “-oid” after anything, like “westoid”, as it is parodying Nazi race science - “mongoloid”, etc. Based, I think, is fine.

AFAIK, the word “based” as used in slang comes from the rapper Lil B, more commonly known as Based God.

So, with this particular discussion, it’s one about AAVE, African American Vernacular English. So then, this is up to our black comrades.

Personally, I think the only issue with using AAVE as a non-black person is when you ruin the word (using it wrong, overusing it, making it something It’s not, trying to sound black for racist “comedic” effect, trying to profit off black culture, etc.) But again, I’m white, so take my comment lightly.

Edit: as for the comment in the first screenshot, I disagree with them saying nazis took it over. I feel like “based” is really widely used atm, even in non political discussions.

I will note I appreciate especially comrades attempting to avoid using the B-word, the sexist slur that is. It’s used far too freely by men to objectify and denigrate women and I see far too many comrades who would jump down anyone’s throat for using other unacceptable words like the f-word or r-word or n-word just casually tossing it and slurs involving sex slavery/prostitution around because it like misogyny remains omni-present in culture such as music.

That said. I will note regarding the whole objecting to people saying “based” that’s kind of absurd and I must point out that feds and other wreckers absolutely love instigating things like that.

Not fights over real slurs like I mentioned above which we need to strive to avoid using to make our spaces welcoming but these silly little slap-fights over trivial and invented matters, things carefully twisted (often with insincere academic language and using gish-gallop tactics to fling large words and issues into the arena which take a hundred times longer to unpack and go over than it does to casually fling them into the arena to stop business and create drama) into an issue where none existed to create tension, drama, division, splits, and bog us down in annoying debates over invented issues.

Look no further than the chapo lifeboat site, they require trigger tags for posting about meat because a militant vegan vanguard among them decided that’s a totally normal and reasonable thing to do. I’m sorry but getting triggered by meat (not even pictures, just mentioning it too) is just absurd. It makes a mockery of actual triggers survivors of real trauma have to deal with. It’s also curious they require trigger warnings for that yet none for discussions of brutalization and violence against human beings by empire. As if that’s normal and shouldn’t be upsetting and something everyone should be able to view calmly and discuss but somehow meat is exceptional and valid to be so upset it drives you to close your browser and freak out.

I don’t think you need to be too strict on your language as long as you’re not being an ass. Playing word police seems like a waste of time (for the most part, again, just be kind, if someone is uncomfortable with something, apologize and don’t use it around them). Also try and understand the context of the conversation. As long as you do that then you can basically say whatever (unless its inherently racist or something but those should be pretty obvious to avoid).

Slurs are derogatory words or phrases, such as sexist, racist, homophobic, and transphobic words. Avoid slurs. I think most slurs are removed automatically and replaced with ‘removed’. You might write some slurs by accident, not knowing they are slurs, but the auto-removal will remove the word, so you do not need to worry too much about this. If the slur does show up, someone will tell you, and you can avoid that word in future.

We should be careful policing words because we might end up stereotyping people and this might lead to an inverted kind of racial abuse. A black user who faces daily racism but uses “based” (acceptably) might feel unwelcome on Lemmygrad if everyone of their posts receives a downvote. They might not know it is because someone has taken offence to the use of “based”. They might assume (if they have mentioned that they are black in another post) that they are just facing more of the racism faced outside of Lemmygrad.

Thinking about this topic, I came across Ernestine Johnson on ‘sounding white’. I’ll post a link because it is a good poem and I’ll let the YouTube bot do its thing: https://youtu.be/ShrWgdHEwHs.

The quoted comment in the OP’s screenshot about automatically downvoting posts using the word “based” reminded me about David Starkey’s career-ending racism. He said that a British, black politician ‘sounded white’. (The connection is in the sense that automatic downvoting seems to assume that one can tell whether a user is black or white, but that’s not possible unless someone tells us.)

Note: David Starkey’s remarks got a lot of publicity. If anyone reading this is tired of seeing racism, don’t google his name. His interviews, etc, are infuriating. But know that this fuck-head: lost his honorary fellowships; had a prestigious historian award revoked; had three honorary degrees revoked; was the subject of a letter signed by over a hundred historians saying that he made methodological mistakes that first-year undergraduates would not make; and was told by his long-time publisher that they would never publish his work again.

Based is cool to say. Lil B started it, The Based God Himself. And I know rightie conservatives that say it and when asked why they say Based, they just say “it’s a meme” but if you know where it’s from, then that’s cool, you’re just reciting the holy words of Based God. After that the righties said it less knowing that it makes them sound like posers

Thank you very much my beloved comrades for your good and great answers, I am very happy and thankful for your help for guiding me with your replies,

I know I didn’t do it right but I did not meant to make fun of anyone or make anyone feel bad or to offend anyone else I am very sorry it was not my intention , I completely promise not to use any phrase or word of that type , and I am also sorry if I made other comrades feel bad for the word I have used , I didn’t mean to offend or make anyone feel bad or make fun of anyone else, I am really sorry for saying that phrase I didn’t know what it means until now .

I hope you all accept my sincere apologies my beloved Comrades. ❤️

I feel like this topic isn’t just a one post thing, but something you will experience in other conversations. Writing a list of do and don’t say without context for those points is not really useful IMHO. So don’t worry about it until you’re in the moment and be open to dis ussion about language

deleted by creator