The Generalisation Police

Buroschaf

There was a thread locked in after hours about women having bad taste in music. I don't believe a thread should be locked simply because a generalisation is made.

In this instance I think it is quite obvious that there is a difference between men and women's taste in music on average. I think anyone with a shred of intelligence should know that generalisations don't apply to every single person, but they serve a purpose in that they can help highlight patterns.

Some of course should banned but Indon't believe a thread should be locked based simply by the fact that a generalisation was made.

P. Breathnach

The thread header was Why do women in general have terrible taste in music? Not something neutral like Why do women and men have different tatstes in music? It was a clear invitation to make a negative judgement about women.

Buroschaf

P. Breathnach wrote: »

The thread header was Why do women in general have terrible taste in music? Not something neutral like Why do women and men have different tatstes in music? It was a clear invitation to make a negative judgement about women.

Taste in music is subjective, I agree he could have put "imo" in the title but it's clear the OP believes that the music women gravitate to more than men is terrible music. It's a valid point to make and worth exploring why so many more women gravitate to the likes of one direction and girls aloud.

Dades

Subjective. You've just used the word and yet have completely failed to apply it to your own logic.

Just because you agree with the OP doesn't mean he has a 'valid' point.

Tom Dunne

Buroschaf wrote: »

I don't believe a thread should be locked simply because a generalisation is made.

"All Irish are drunks who do nothing other than cause trouble and fight"

"All priests are pedophiles"

"Northsiders are scumbags"

"Boards.ie Administrators are sad loners who vindicate their miserable existence by coding Wordpress plugins and oppressing users of the site"

Yeah, I could see each of the above leading to lucid, articulate and objective discussion.

Well, apart from the last one, maybe.

nesf

Buroschaf wrote: »

There was a thread locked in after hours about women having bad taste in music. I don't believe a thread should be locked simply because a generalisation is made.

You are absolutely correct. Threads shouldn't be locked simply because there is a generalisation in the title, they should be locked when that generalisation is so inane that it is obviously objectively false even to a simpleton.

Buroschaf

nesf wrote: »

You are absolutely correct. Threads shouldn't be locked simply because there is a generalisation in the title, they should be locked when that generalisation is so inane that it is obviously objectively false even to a simpleton.

Taste in music isn't objective though.

Buroschaf

Tom Dunne wrote: »

"All Irish are drunks who do nothing other than cause trouble and fight"

"All priests are pedophiles"

"Northsiders are scumbags"

"Boards.ie Administrators are sad loners who vindicate their miserable existence by coding Wordpress plugins and oppressing users of the site"

Yeah, I could see each of the above leading to lucid, articulate and objective discussion.

Well, apart from the last one, maybe.

The OP didn't say all women have terrible taste in music, it was clearly a reference to a trend that exists in reality whereby more women like music such as one direction and girls aloud.

I do think it would have been better to say "on average" or "tend to" in the title.

When the majority of group A have X characteristic whereby group B and C very rarely have X characteristic it's worth exploring why a much bigger proprtion of group A has X characteristic.

GerB40

Everyone who makes generalizations in an eejit..

Penn

But liking One Direction or Girls Aloud doesn't constitute a "bad taste in music" because it's too subjective. Again, the title as it was phrased comes across as "women's taste in music is worse than men's taste in music", which is obviously a negative sweeping generalisation based completely on subjective opinions

Buroschaf

Dades wrote: »

Subjective. You've just used the word and yet have completely failed to apply it to your own logic.

Just because you agree with the OP doesn't mean he has a 'valid' point.

I don't believe I said I agree with the OP, I think I said he has a valid argument.

I don't see how I've contradicted my own logic.

Buroschaf

Penn wrote: »

But liking One Direction or Girls Aloud doesn't constitute a "bad taste in music" because it's too subjective. Again, the title as it was phrased comes across as "women's taste in music is worse than men's taste in music", which is obviously a negative sweeping generalisation based completely on subjective opinions

Yes, and people should be allowed there own subjective opinions, if the OP thinks women generally have worse taste in music than women then I think they should be entitled to express their opinion. It's clearly the case imo that women tend to have different taste in music to men on average.

Saying all of group A have X characteristic is completely different to saying generally speaking group A have X characteristic.

When group A contains billions of individuals it's clearly ridiculous and lockworthy to claim all of group A contain X characteristic. However it is not lockworthy imo if a claim is made that in general group A have X characteristic as elatively small sample size reference experiences can have strong predictive powers of the general population.

nesf

Buroschaf wrote: »

Taste in music isn't objective though.

Indeed! You could replace taste in music with any personal preference or taste that tends to be highly individual and/or faddish and the generalisation would remain as inane as before.

Rephrase it as: "Why is there such appeal amongst some women for such terrible music as 1Direction?" and you might be starting somewhere but as soon as you attribute a particular preference (known to be highly individual) to all of one group (doesn't matter if it's women or culchies or whatever) you end up with nonsense and no decent conversation can come from it.


Edit: You'll probably have much better luck having a reasonable debate online if you drop the women bit and just ask something like "Why does anyone like this kind of music?" or similar. The word women in the title is going to generate a lot of noise because some people will assume you're being sexist regardless of what's in the OP.

Gordon

The OP of that thread was (probably unintentional) flame baiting, and would have caused arguments left right and centre. Those threads never end well, it's all fun and games until someone loses an access privilege.

edit - Why does it not surprise me the the OP of this thread is a serial re-registering troll. Banned.

Wishiwasa Littlebitaller

nesf wrote: »

You are absolutely correct. Threads shouldn't be locked simply because there is a generalisation in the title, they should be locked when that generalisation is so inane that it is obviously objectively false even to a simpleton.

Like these?

Grown Men who can't drive. Do you find them weird?
Are Irish men the ugliest in the World?
Have Irish men turned feminine?

nesf

Wishiwasa Littlebitaller wrote: »

Like these?

Grown Men who can't drive. Do you find them weird?
Are Irish men the ugliest in the World?
Have Irish men turned feminine?

The middle one is a crass generalisation. The first one isn't at all. The last one is a question about trends, it's not generalising as it's not making a statement of fact. "Irish men have turned into feminists" would be more like the middle question.

Tom Dunne

Penn wrote: »

But liking One Direction or Girls Aloud doesn't constitute a "bad taste in music"

Thank you.

Vindicated. Finally.