🧵 Renaming Racist Birds
Anonymous at Sun, 20 Oct 2024 23:02:45 UTC No. 16441826
I found an article in the Nature Conservancy of Canada and it is talking about an effort to rename birds like "Bonepart's gull" because of their racist colonial origin and to further "reconciliation."
I was thinking of writing the magazine. Am I justified in being butmad, or do I sound like a chud?
1 - thinking a name of a bird is racist because of a taxonomist's race is absurd.
2-adding confusion to taxonomy- a field that is already constantly being revised- is an unnecessary additional hassle, at is already hard enough to figure if 2 books are referring to the same species
3- some "good names' that refer to characteristics or habitat are situational. A "brook silverside" can be found in lakes. Only the male "cherry barb" is red and only during spawning times.
4- The implication is that a guy who risked his life and health on a sailing ship for 400 days counting the rays of the dorsal fin and measuring the distance between the anal pore and the caudal peduncle who has the audacity to name a silverside after himself aught to be ashamed, because of his "colonial" racial background, regardless of their personal ethos or behavior during their life.
With the cherry barb- should we rename it because the masculine bias of the name is sexist and problematic?
The other issue is that some organizations don't understand the history of science- the institutions and standardization of science, the organization into a global community of scientists, the naming conventions - all of these, along with other philosophical methods- are pragmatic, and the effectiveness of science specifically came out of this "empirical, rational, IMPERIAL, European, scholastic sociopolitical environment of the last 200 years of western civilization. Science literally wouldn't be the effective philosophical framework it is without the context it arose in.
Thoughts?
Anonymous at Sun, 20 Oct 2024 23:08:18 UTC No. 16441833
RIP Porchmonkey Dove
Anonymous at Sun, 20 Oct 2024 23:55:39 UTC No. 16441906
>>16441826
They’re only changing the “official” common names, so it has no impact on taxonomy. Still stupid unless you’re going to do it for every species there’s not much point, especially since if people continue calling it by the old name it’ll always remain a common name
Anonymous at Sun, 20 Oct 2024 23:58:12 UTC No. 16441910
>>16441826
Niggertoucans on suicide watch
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 00:01:01 UTC No. 16441917
>>16441826
Still not as bad as the attempt to change the name of asian giant hornets to northern giant hornets to stop Asian hate because the word is associated with a pest species, as if that ever even crossed anyone’s mind. It’s not like regular Asian hornets, European hornets, African black beetles, Mexican fruit flies, Argentinian scarabs, etc are also all pest species with geography in their name
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 00:12:55 UTC No. 16441937
>>16441906
>>16441906
Ok. I'm not saying I'd be too dumb to look at the genus and species name and figure out "OH they're talking about the Bonaparte Gull"
But yes new birders will look at new books and they will learn new names and then they will go to old books and see "Bonaparte Gull" and unless they look at the genus and species name, (which can be annoying to pronounce if you aren't already familiar with using Latin names) they might not know which gull exactly they are reading about. A lot of literature doesn't even bother adding the Latin names.
The old terminology will die with those who were "birders" before 2020.
To me, it just represents a moral highground attitude of internalized resentment towards western civilization. No one who doesn't have that internalized resentment would see the name of a bird and get so discouraged that they stop being interested in birds, or toss and turn at night thinking about the racist name "richardsonii" for a species of racist pondweed.
At the end of the day, who cares. History moves on without me. I hope Napoleon isn't rolling in his grave worrying about the name of this gull.
>>16441917
Well I've heard them called Japanese giant hornets and our love of Japan as weeaboos is also problematic, now isn't it? uwu
I doubt that they are called either of those names in the place they naturally lived. This reminds me- should our dictionaries reflect our USAGE of language, or should they DICTATE it? So long as we know what the other is referring to, its OK.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 03:16:44 UTC No. 16442095
>Bonaparte's gull
>racist
in what damn universe? The guy was just a naturalist who happened to be Napoleon's nephew. People who write these articles don't even know which Bonaparte the bird's named after. wtf
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 03:37:42 UTC No. 16442113
How about we just ask the birds what they want to be named instead giving them our loaded names and titles. I'm sure they would appreciate it.
Imagine being a Female cock of the rock and trying to convince their mates they're not interested in secretly pegging them.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 04:14:37 UTC No. 16442150
>>16442095
The name sounds white though
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 05:30:37 UTC No. 16442184
>>16441826
1 - The idea is that naming species after racists is glorifying their actions, which we would prefer not to have associated with taxonomy.
2 - It isn't hard enough to figure out what documents are referring to which species, as there are centrally maintained lists and databases of all synonyms and taxonomists in certain groups frequently meet to make sure the majority agree on taxonomic changes.
3 - This has nothing to do with the proposed changing of names of racists etc. in fact, it supports the changing of common names as you yourself are admitting that common names don't generally have any significance to the species they refer to and thus changing them shouldn't be a big deal
4 - We shouldn't really be glorifying any zoologists regardless of their beliefs because they are all morons that don't even have a standard taxonomic structure or code, let alone follow one. Look at insect species naming and it is an enormous clusterfuck, with plenty of examples where insect taxonomists "coined" species or genera names that were already in use for plant or fungal taxa for decades
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 08:40:05 UTC No. 16442293
Instead you should popularize racist names for every animal.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 08:49:11 UTC No. 16442299
Retards make up the very fibre of this thread. It doopid.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 08:57:07 UTC No. 16442309
>>16442299
I agree. It's made by a retard, in reference to something retarded, and retards respond with their retardation. It's normal to see this type of thread.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 09:10:20 UTC No. 16442317
>>16441826
You should write in, because it takes small efforts like this to improve the world.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 09:12:36 UTC No. 16442318
The birds names are fine and are in delicate balance with good phonology.
Anonymous at Mon, 21 Oct 2024 19:34:25 UTC No. 16442983
>>16441937
>at the end of the day, who cares?
You'll care, seeing as this seething resentment manifests itself in other ways throughout our entire society.