There have been multiple accounts created with the sole purpose of posting advertisement posts or replies containing unsolicited advertising.

Accounts which solely post advertisements, or persistently post them may be terminated.

Botanists vote to remove racist references from plants’ scientific names

Plant names are only a part of the taxonomic controversy, however. Naming animals after racists, fascists and other controversial figures cause just as many headaches as those posed by plants, say scientists. Examples include a brown, eyeless beetle which has been named after Adolf Hitler. Nor is Anophthalmus hitleri alone. Many other species’ names recall individuals that offend, such as the moth Hypopta mussolinii.

The International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) has so far refused to consider changing its rules to allow the removal of racist or fascist references. Renaming would be disruptive, while replacement names could one day be seen as offensive “as attitudes change in the future”, it announced in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society last year.

Carighan ,
@Carighan@lemmy.world avatar

Me, coming into this thread: “Great idea, but I bet this is over comparatively minor shit. Are we renaming the cat race Maine Coon now?!”

…

Hitler Beetle. The fuck.

Dufurson ,
@Dufurson@sh.itjust.works avatar

proper name Maine trash panda

thefartographer ,

Maine trash panda, Maine trash duck, Maine trash resident… If you know they’re from Maine, adding the word “trash” is just repetitive

kbal ,
@kbal@fedia.io avatar

That word did not originate as a racial slur, but became one in 20th-century South Africa, according to Wikipedia.

In Arabic, the word kāfir ("unbeliever") was originally applied to non-Muslims before becoming predominantly focused on pagan zanj (black African) who were increasingly used as slaves.[2] During the Age of Exploration in early modern Europe, variants of the Latin term cafer (pl. cafri) were adopted in reference to non-Muslim Bantu peoples even when they were monotheistic. It was eventually used, particularly in Afrikaans (Afrikaans: kaffer), for any black person during the Apartheid and Post-Apartheid eras, closely associated with South African racism, it became a pejorative by the mid-20th century and is now considered extremely offensive

thefartographer ,

I don’t know personally, but a number of other lemmings outside of USA and UK have mentioned that it’s essentially their version of the n-word

best_username_ever ,

Funny because in France it’s a word used as the N-word for white people, like “crackers” in the USA.

pastermil ,

Totally a great use of everyone’s time!

stevedidwhat_infosec ,

Because everyone has to be doing the “important” stuff as you see fit.

Culture is a thing like it or not, and this stuff is important to people. Why do you care so much about people removing some amount of power from shitty people

njm1314 ,

How much time are you spending on this exactly?

pastermil ,

Three minutes top.

Xeroxchasechase ,

Including lemmy?

ryan213 ,
@ryan213@lemmy.ca avatar

I’m guessing they were named before those guys became infamous?

snooggums ,
@snooggums@midwest.social avatar

Some might have been intended as a slight aginst the person, or celebrating them, but it would always be after they were famous/infamous.

reddig33 ,

Not oniony.

SpaceNoodle ,

Did you not read the final sentence in the summary?

“We can’t replace Hitler, what if we decide he’s super cool later?”

SuckMyWang ,

So they’re not changing names? The headline says they voted to do it, then it kind of says later that the vote failed?

SpaceNoodle ,

It’s not quite clear, but either way that quote is surreal.

Zorque ,

I assume lone botanists formed up to say they want changes, while a presiding body decided not to.

Two different groups with two different positions.

RobotToaster ,
@RobotToaster@mander.xyz avatar

That isn’t what they’re saying.

Renaming would be disruptive, while replacement names could one day be seen as offensive

They’re saying if we rename the Hitler beetle the Bob Ross beetle, it could one day come out that Bob Ross committed genocide or something, so then they have to rename it again.

I’m not saying that’s a good reason, but it’s a slightly better one.

SpaceNoodle ,

They certainly stop short of saying that.

MajorHavoc ,

rename the Hitler beetle the Bob Ross beetle, it could one day come out that Bob Ross committed genocide or something, so then they have to rename it again.

Yep. Which is just their justifying their shitty choice.

“We might have to do further paperwork, if we fuck up again.” Boo fucking hoo. Cry me a river.

What they mean is that they’re unwilling to do some extra paperwork to make a meaningful statement about who we hope history remembers.

I can’t change their choice, but I certainly don’t respect them for it.

chiisana ,
@chiisana@lemmy.chiisana.net avatar

It’s not “what if we decide he’s super cool later” but instead “what if we decide later the new name is also bad, so we end up repeatedly changing something that we’ve deemed shouldn’t be changing”.

Somethings in the scientific community should not change — I.e. what we consider as 1 gram should always stay the same so experiments can be reproduced consistently. I’m not sure I agree with them that names should be one of them… but I’m not a scientist studying plants, so the heck do I know?

MajorHavoc ,

So ICZN is hedging their bets, in case the Nazi’s come out on top?

FireTower ,
@FireTower@lemmy.world avatar

I think it’s just advocating for stability in nomenclature. They probably don’t want a situation where future people can’t find information we currently have because we’ve decided to change the names.

MajorHavoc ,

That’s a good argument.

But it’s not the argument they made. I find that telling and worrisome.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • [email protected]
  • random
  • lifeLocal
  • goranko
  • All magazines
    •