Stock Rants #4: Labels

[kiya]

When you tell me you don't believe in labels, what I hear is that you don't believe in communication.

"Label" is a fancy word for "noun or adjective", and it's not even all that fancy.

You just want to be, man, without all of these words harshing your mellow. That's very nice for you. I hope you never, ever have to communicate outside of your smug bastion of solipsistic privilege in which "just being" is something you never have to explain, never have threatened, or never actually need to care about. You are not a category, you are a free person! You are colour-blind! You don't see gender! Your response to referring to someone as the wrong religion is, "But these labels, they separate us! Why can't we all just get along!"

If you respond to someone trying to make sense of distinctions with "Why define? Just be!" you are saying that precise and specific information exchange is irrelevant. I can only hope that you never wind up in a situation where you actually need to explain something you find important in a manner that requires the use of actual nouns.



The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning. -- Mark Twain

(This rant brought to you by a conversation the other day with oneironaut in which he asked if there was a "labels" stock rant yet, and "Why define? Just be!" posted as an answer to a "What's the difference between..." question on FetLife.)

Comments

[jmkelly.livejournal.com]

Labels are rarely precise; hence they inevitably distort the truth they are purported to carry. Which is why people get frustrated and want to eschew them, which, as you point out, doesn't help.

Example: on a group bicycle ride today, I saw a big chunk of wood lying across our path. We always call out hazards, but I was momentarily tongue-tied: our call-out vocabulary is restricted to very short phrases like "Hole!", "Grate!", "Car up!", etc. I didn't know how to label this chunk of wood; "Chunk of wood!" was too long and didn't convey the sense of danger I wanted. Fortunately the rider in front of me called out the proper label, "Obstacle!"

"Obstacle"? That could be anything, no? But in the context, it was exactly right.

Which brings me to a point I want to make about labels: they are shaped by the labeler's agenda, and sometimes that goes beyond omission and inaccuracy right into the realm of falsehood. For an example, listen to Rush Limbaugh.

I guess what I'm trying to say is: while not believing in labels may be the same as not believing in communication, it does not follow that believing in labels is the same as believing in communication.

[artan]

it does not follow that believing in labels is the same as believing in communication

This reminds me of my brief experience doing high ropes courses and climbing many years ago. Anything falling was "rock". It didn't matter what it was, if someone yelled "rock" that meant a heavy object was moving downward and caution was needed. Labels also change their meaning and context depending on situation, which is probably part of the problem - people looking for absolute correct descriptors, rather than being willing to toss out something generally functional that can be clarified if context is required but otherwise worked with in the immediate situation.

[ibnfirnas.livejournal.com]

And at the same time, if someone is hitting you, and you say, "Stop hitting me!" the response, "Look, man, stop labeling my actions, I don't believe in labels," is really irritating, you know? Likewise, as called out here, when I as a woman of color am turned down for a job and a less-qualified white man is hired, and I point that out, if he says, "Look, don't call me white, that's a label, and I don't see color" is profoundly unhelpful.
Labels are imprecise, imperfect, and shaped by context, because they are words and that is the nature of words. But we also have words for a reason, and I think what's being called out here is the impulse to say "stop describing what's going on" because the description is unsettling.