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

[cheshire-bitten.livejournal.com]

Oh hell yes, also

http://www.asofterworld.com/index.php?id=478

[fierceawakening.livejournal.com]

Eh, if we're talking about, say, kinks (as opposed to something like, say, gender or race, where others will label you in ways that matter even if you "don't label yourself"), I don't think people should have to claim a one-word blip for something that describes them. Blips can be handy, but necessarily fail to tell the whole story.

That said, if something like "I don't think either the word 'submissive' or the word 'bottom' fits me" is code for "I don't know what I want and like the idea of making you terribly uncomfortable guessing" that's a very different animal from, say, "I don't think either of those words fit me, because although they're almost right, to me those words imply $foo or $bar, and I'm actually way off over here $fweegleing."

If "don't LABEL me!" means "Actually, it's better if we have a conversation, because it's complicated," that may be a good thing. If it's code for "I don't want to tell you what I want" it sucks profoundly.

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

My own approach to labels is: they're fine to use, but it's important to explain what you mean when you use them, because they always seem to mean different things to different people. And if you don't know of a label that fits you for whatever subject you're trying to discuss, don't use one that doesn't fit just because you "need a label." Instead, learn to discuss what you think and feel and perhaps the ways in which that differs from the established labels you've come across.

[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.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I think I get what you're saying, but I only partially agree.

The way I think about it:

Language is an imprecise way to describe reality. Categorization is a human activity which we impose on reality and does not have an external existence in itself -- "categories" don't exist, not really.

However, as humans, we NEED to categorize, to put into words, and to label in order to deal with things.

The thing is: "the map is not the territory." The word is not the thing; the label is not the labelled.

Nonetheless, those labels, categories, and language are necessary in order to conceptualize, and to simplify things to the point that we can deal with them. We need to make simplified models of reality in order to comprehend them, and these are all ways we can do that.

The problem with labelling is that it can lead us to forget that the label is only a simplification. That can lead to problems when we affix a label to something, because that label fits that thing better than any other option -- but the thing itself doesn't have ALL the characteristics associated with the label.

If we are all always careful to remember that labels are generally only approximations, then they make up a very useful shorthand which can greatly speed up and facilitate APPROXIMATE communication. And most of the time, "approximate" is good enough.

But it's important to remember that "approximate" is all that labels CAN get.