Be very wary of using the same term for "any X" and "stereotypically bad X". Everyone recognises it's bad if X is a race or other similar class. You may say "but most of the X I meet are stereotypical. That's why it's a stereotype". Right. This makes it very understandable to blur the two concepts and use the same word for them. It's a natural English usage, to have a word that means one thing, and, by extension, use it to mean "like that, but not stereotypically bad" or "like that, but is stereotypically bad". But it WILL tend to lead you into prejudicial habits of thought, so it's better avoid in advance.
What do you say if you mean "someone kind of like a redneck, but I don't mean that in a bad way!"? Many people have reclaimed redneck to identify themselves in a non-pejorative way. But like notably more vicious slurs, it's a problem for someone else to do that, even if it's hard to think what you should say instead.
The term I saw used today was "Mary-Sue". People are split whether author-darling characters done well count as Mary-Sue or not, which is a clear indication that there's a problem with the term, however innocent it may superficially feel. It either needs to include any apparently Mary-Sue character (in which case criticisms need to specify what that a particular story does badly) or only bad ones (in which case you also need to justify what's wrong with it, not just say "oh, it's clearly an author character"). It's a case where a generally-inclusive community needs to be aware that all communities create out-groups, and be aware of this community is prone to do, not just be proud it doesn't make the same mistakes as western society in general. Even if (or especially if) it DOES have legitimate grievances.
The point is, you have to be really stubborn to be prejudices against people for absolutely no reason (although many people are). You have to watch for cases where you feel you have a legitimate generalisation and then say "hold on, this generalisation, while natural, is going to disenfranchise many real people in my emotions, is that right"?
What do you say if you mean "someone kind of like a redneck, but I don't mean that in a bad way!"? Many people have reclaimed redneck to identify themselves in a non-pejorative way. But like notably more vicious slurs, it's a problem for someone else to do that, even if it's hard to think what you should say instead.
The term I saw used today was "Mary-Sue". People are split whether author-darling characters done well count as Mary-Sue or not, which is a clear indication that there's a problem with the term, however innocent it may superficially feel. It either needs to include any apparently Mary-Sue character (in which case criticisms need to specify what that a particular story does badly) or only bad ones (in which case you also need to justify what's wrong with it, not just say "oh, it's clearly an author character"). It's a case where a generally-inclusive community needs to be aware that all communities create out-groups, and be aware of this community is prone to do, not just be proud it doesn't make the same mistakes as western society in general. Even if (or especially if) it DOES have legitimate grievances.
The point is, you have to be really stubborn to be prejudices against people for absolutely no reason (although many people are). You have to watch for cases where you feel you have a legitimate generalisation and then say "hold on, this generalisation, while natural, is going to disenfranchise many real people in my emotions, is that right"?