Are we looking for problems where there aren't any ?

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I was watching a discussion about a story where an animal group claims that calling animals ''exotic'' is problematic. I don't know why but I do seem think that sometimes some people are looking for problems where there aren't any. I don't have problem with the term really and I love animals and I understand there are some animals can feel pain and maybe express other kinds of emotions but I don't think an animal is going to be offended by that term because they can't come and sit down with us humans to have a debate about it.

If people live too comfortable lives, they'll look for problems or dangers where there aren't any, and start feeling it over things that usually wouldn't be seen as a problem or dangerous. It's why hardship and suffering do have benefits and it makes stronger men and women that have a more realistic perspective and interpretation of life. If you haven't faced them, things that make you feel uncomfortable, no matter how slight, start looking like problems or dangers.

If you've been in a serious car accident for example, you kinda see it silly what people will call animals, or even what they call you.

Theyre upset by animals being called "exotic"?

I get the impression that some folks confuse the words "exotic", and "erotic", because sometimes female strippers are billed as "exotic dancers".

"Erotic" means "having to do with eros (carnal love)".

"Exotic" means "foreign, but foreign in a way that is enticing, or fascinating". Could be cuisine, could be art, music, flora, fauna, or... (for the hetero and cisgender) it could be a person of the opposite sex. With the later the "exotic" can overlap with and go along with the "erotic". But not with the other things.

These folks might be being a little bit illiterate and are confusing the two terms.

Sometimes people like to invent so-called problems for ulterior motives like giving them the appearance/public image of being caring or to distract people from focusing on the real problems. I'm not sure if that's what's going on with that animal group or not thou.

Midget Gums are now offensive because the term Midget may offend people with dwarfism.

Where I live, 'exotic' animals are the ones you're supposed to kill on sight.
Maybe that's the problem they have with the name?

Some domesticated pets like chinchillas are sometimes referred to as exotic pets due to them not being native to this country. However when we hear the term exotic pets, people tend to think of wild non domesticated animals that should not be pets like tigers so the term exotic can be kinda confusing sometimes

Yes.

Yeah there's definitely something to that. Seeing how people problematize the smallest things, I've often enough thought: "How would these people handle it if they encountered a real problem?"

1st World Problems

I thought that was stupid at first, but I heard a Paralympic athlete with Dwarfism talking about it on Radio 2 yesterday and I didn't realise the amount of abuse they still get.

Often "Midget" is shouted at them. It's like a slur. I get it now. The world won't end because Marks and Spencer rename sweets. But it might make people think.

https://www.itv.com/news/anglia/2022-01-13/paralympian-reveals-personal-toll-of-daily-abuse-over-dwarfism

Rabbits are exotic pets too because they require a specialist vet.

According to the dictionary exotic means:


There is no way I would call another human exotic. I can see how that would be taken as racist. I guess old colonialist explorers called things, including people, they brought back from their journeys exotic. It's possibly a bit condescending. I had racist, yet well travelled grandparents. I can see how this word could have racist connotations.

Indeed!

The reason they find the word Midget offensive is because it has become common for some to use that word in a negative context. Every single word or phrase ever can be used in a negative context by others if others decide to use it in a negative way. Some people are mean & if little people find a new word to identify themselves by, others would start using it in a negative way. People are gonna be a-Holes if they wanna be regardless of which words they end up using. The term Little Person can be confusing because kids are technically little people. There was an ep of The Cleaveland Show where the little kid Rollo met someone very short who identified as a little person & Rollo assumed that the guy was a little kid like him & the guy thought Rollo was a very short adult like he was At the end of the ep they realized their misunderstanding & the guy said that it has happened before when he referred to himself as a little person. Rollo said something like, at least if you say Midget everyone would know what you were talking about.

Yeah, what you're describing is called the euphemism treadmill, when an offensive word is replaced with a benign one, which itself becomes offensive through usage, requiring a replacement, and so on. Special education is sort of the poster child for me, as calling someone "special" in that certain way is every bit as offensive as calling them slow or ret*d or whatever the previous term was. You see it with race stuff too, when you see someone online sneeringly referring to a community as "vibrant", you know fell well they don't mean it as a compliment.