Newsletter

April 2015

University’s ‘words can hurt’ effort nixes ‘lame’, ‘fat,’ ‘homo’, ‘man hater’, ‘exotic’

Jennifer Kabbany

What
ever happened to “sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt
me.”

Pacific Lutheran University is another campus admonishing students through its
“Words Can Hurt” campaign to use nice language, and not say anything that might
offend anyone in the least.

The
private, Tacoma, Wash.-based school’s website explains:

The
first posters, which appeared in 2012, featured students tearing up phrases
including “That’s so gay,” “Lame,” “Retarded,” “Ghetto,” “Fat” and “Illegal.”

“We
then decided to expand the words,” [Diversity Center administrator Angie]
Hambrick said. “We really wanted the campaign to be about individual
choice—words that they’re hearing and words that they’ve chosen not to say.
They’ve heard those words—maybe even used them—but they now understand these
words have impact even when the intent is not to hurt. We have to take
responsibility for the impact on others, and on ourselves.”

A memo on the school’s website explains the campaign originally launched through “a
generous grant from The Pride Foundation, a Queer philanthropy and advocacy
organization in Seattle in 2012.”

“The
words and phrases of the campaign continue to expand— Dumb Blonde, Lame,
Passive, Angry, Exotic—since at the heart of the campaign is each participant’s
personal responsibility and choice,” the memo adds.

The
campaign has beenplastered on billboards in the region thanks to a Clear
Channel Communications donation. The campaign is also spreading to nearby high
schools.

“Now
those original posters—along with newer ones featuring more students, more
I-won’t-say-these-words plus faculty and staff—are showing up on 112 billboards
throughout the Puget Sound region, in Tacoma Public Schools, on the PLU campus, on
social media, on the PLU website—and in a brand-new K-12 downloadable teachers
kit,” the school’s website states.

Pacific Lutheran
University is not the only school actively admonishing students on what they can
and cannot say. The University of Michigan recently launched a similar
campaign that warns students not to say similar
so-called mean words. The University of Maryland launched a similar campaign
three years ago as well.

The College Fix, February 12, 2015.