They sound the same, which way is it spelled?

Edit, it’s the underwear that is white in this question.

    • Dozzi92@lemmy.world
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      21 hours ago

      “White men’s briefs.” I assume there’s a term for when meaning can be misconstrued for humorous reasons like this. I think you’re responding to a joke.

      • toynbee@lemmy.world
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        18 hours ago

        I actually read it that way and thought it was an odd choice to highlight that.

        It didn’t occur to me that that might not be what they meant until I read your comment.

        • Taldan@lemmy.world
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          10 hours ago

          Technically that is what they wrote since they forgot the comma. “white, men’s briefs” is a list of adjectives describing briefs, the noun. “White men’s briefs” makes “white” the adjective describing the men who own the briefs

          Men’s vs. mens was also an issue that added ambiguity

        • Oisteink@lemmy.world
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          18 hours ago

          Sometimes context gives it off, other times you can apply an cheap version off Occam’s razor and just consider that the race version would be absurd and it’s likely the colour of the brief’s

        • Mac@mander.xyz
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          20 hours ago

          Damn, if only we had some sort of way to symbolize things like this. Maybe small characters we could add to sentences to, i dunno, indicate the way things are related. lol