"The pen is mightier than the sword"

There is an expression called "the pen is mightier than the sword". And for obvious reasons — words are powerful. The implication of the words we choose can cut deep and sink in swiftly, or it can reveal itself at a measured pace. But language is also a complex and ever-changing system, and sometimes we don't even realize the things we're saying are harmful and oppressive to other people, but that's where microaggression stems from. Often, they are never meant to hurt - acts done with little conscious awareness of their meanings and effects. Instead, their slow accumulation during a childhood and over a lifetime is in part what defines a marginalized experience, making explanation and communication with someone who does not share this identity particularly difficult. Social others are microaggressed hourly, daily, weekly, monthly.

This project is NOT about showing how ignorant people can be in order to simply dismiss their ignorance. Instead, it is about showing how these comments create and enforce uncomfortable, violent and unsafe realities onto peoples' workplace, home, school, childhood/adolescence/adulthood, and public transportation/space environments.

Words Detected

Words the current system can detect are the following:

• bitch
• ghetto
• illegal
• retarded
• whore
• hoe
• slut
• no homo
• that's so gay

Analyze This!