The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[Ryujin]

If that's a store owner's sales pitch, I would not be surprised to learn they are have trouble staying in business.

They closed down, a little over 10 years ago, after 20 years in business.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

They renamed it.

View attachment 362943

One of my snarkier friends suggested that the reason for the re-branding might have something to do with "alphabet soup" acquiring culture war connotations that soup-makers might prefer to avoid. I was going to dismiss the notion but some poking around shows it may have been at least partially co-opted as a dog whistle for LGBTQA+ so...maybe? If that's the reason I'm not happy about it.

The same research informed me that you should not feed alphabet soup to your dog, although the shape of the noodles has nothing to do with it and they might even be more easily digested than longer traditional noodles. It's the garlic, onion, salt, colorings and preservatives that are bad for them. You'll have to either have to come up with a dog-safe home recipe or use another method to teach your dog to read.

I also discovered that (if wiki can be trusted) Heinz brought back their "alphabetti spaghetti" in 2005 after it being gone for 15 years. I can dimly remember the parents feeding us that as kids. It wasn't very good even for what it was - SpaghettiOs with literary pretensions.

 

[MarkB]

The same research informed me that you should not feed alphabet soup to your dog, although the shape of the noodles has nothing to do with it and they might even be more easily digested than longer traditional noodles. It's the garlic, onion, salt, colorings and preservatives that are bad for them. You'll have to either have to come up with a dog-safe home recipe or use another method to teach your dog to read.

I tried it with my dog once, and it definitely upset his stomach. He kept leaving little messages around the house.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

I tried it with my dog once, and it definitely upset his stomach. He kept leaving little messages around the house.

Yeah, just in general dogs and human foods don't mix well. Even when they like the taste it's often bad for their inner workings. Easy to forget that just because live with us their digestive systems are very different, especially when they're begging.

 

[Maxperson]

One of my snarkier friends suggested that the reason for the re-branding might have something to do with "alphabet soup" acquiring culture war connotations that soup-makers might prefer to avoid. I was going to dismiss the notion but some poking around shows it may have been at least partially co-opted as a dog whistle for LGBTQA+ so...maybe? If that's the reason I'm not happy about it.

I was stunned when I read this, so I did a bit of poking around myself. Alphabet Soup is a metaphor for the abundance of abbreviations or acronyms that dates back to at least a far as FDR's alphabet soup of agencies of the New Deal. It also doesn't seem to necessarily be negatively used when applied to the LGBTQA+ community.

Dr. Michael Bach who is a leader in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion just put out a book in 2022 called Alphabet Soup: The Essential Guide to LGBTQ2+ Inclusion at Work.

Interestingly, I also found a book called Alphabet Soup: The ABCs and 123s of NFTs & Other Blockchain Acronyms: Your Quick Reference Guide to Unpacking Digital Currency Jargon, which came out in February of this year, so the term is still being used in its original context at least some of the time.

It SEEMS to be neutral in that it's a term used to indicate a bunch of letters in acronyms and not really a dog whistle, but having not done a lot of research, not being in the LGBTQA(2?) community and not having heard it before this morning, I'd like to know from someone in that community how the term is viewed, so I'll summon @Gradine who I hope will have some insight for us.

 

[Gradine]

So, I have definitely seen "alphabet people" or "alphabet soup people" used pejoratively.

I will say that "alphabet soup", when used to complain about LGBTQ+ people, or even the proliferation of different identities within that community, definitely reads as a homophobic dog whistle.

That's not to say that there's not plenty of other use cases for the term, most of which can be said to be value neutral (though I'd argue that the term itself is inclined negatively), but I've very rarely, if ever,seen the term used positively (or even neutrally) to refer to queer people

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

So, I have definitely seen "alphabet people" or "alphabet soup people" used pejoratively.

I will say that "alphabet soup", when used to complain about LGBTQ+ people, or even the proliferation of different identities within that community, definitely reads as a homophobic dog whistle.

That's not to say that there's not plenty of other use cases for the term, most of which can be said to be value neutral (though I'd argue that the term itself is inclined negatively), but I've very rarely, if ever,seen the term used positively (or even neutrally) to refer to queer people

Yeah, I've seen it used to refer to government agencies as well, but typically in a pejorative sense.

Not hard to imagine Campbell's saying "you know, let's just step backwards out of this whole conversation."

 

[prabe]

Unrelated to the above: Y'all go on and be excited, seems kinda mediocre to me.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

That's not to say that there's not plenty of other use cases for the term, most of which can be said to be value neutral (though I'd argue that the term itself is inclined negatively), but I've very rarely, if ever,seen the term used positively (or even neutrally) to refer to queer people

That book by Bach that @Maxperson mentioned seems to indicate it isn't wholly seen as negative but yeah, I can see grounds for being cautious about usage to avoid misunderstandings.

Yeah, I've seen it used to refer to government agencies as well, but typically in a pejorative sense.

I've mostly encountered that in reference to intelligence agencies (US and otherwise) and it was definitely derogatory in those cases, but espionage in general tends to invite criticism on ethical grounds, so no surprise there. The US ones also get called three-letter shops/people sometimes, for obvious reasons.

I can imagine it being applied to unrelated agencies or businesses as well.

 

[RealAlHazred]

After reading everyone's posts about pizza here, I'm left with a few thoughts:

• These are bad pizzas.
• People in the thread aren't eating pizzas correctly.
• You all don't understand why you like eating pizza.