[tapping the sign]
"degenerate" is fascist dehumanizing language can we stop using that word already please.
the other half of this is that when you "reclaim" it, you muddy the waters instead of it being something that people can be thrown out of the bar for.
because people are using it, actively, to help dehumanize the rest of us
there's a comment to the OP saying the commenter was using it because "other queers used it against them" and i gotta wonder how little reflection is going on there when those people also probably felt they were reclaiming the use before it worked into their lexicon.
we've seen the cycle before with people adopting the active, general dog whistles used to test the waters and see who gets them, over and over since 2016 and it's pretty much never been for the best. why start now.