Quote:
Originally Posted by Angel
I don't think I'm racist but I'm sure others will call me such during the course of my life - particularly when they don't get their own way. My views on how this country should deal with immigration, for example, are often construed as racist when really they are common sense. But unfortunately the PC brigade think everyone who calls a blackboard a blackboard are neo-nazis hellbent on another holocaust 
What really grinds my gears is when you get certain black people going on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about (historical) slavery. Seriously, stop it. I am sick to the back teeth of all this "white man trying to bring me down" BS - you weren't born then, your parents and grandparents weren't born then - and neither were mine. So it's not my fault that years and years ago some white people enslaved some black people - it was wrong, yes, but not my fault. So stop making out like it is.
And I think you'll find a number of white people were instrumental in STOPPING the slave trade - funny how that gets overlooked by the militants... Plus here in the UK we all but invented serfdom - that's lots of white people being slaves to other white people - it wasn't and still isn't necessarily a colour thing. It's a money thing - the poor and uneducated are easier to enslave than the rich and learned. Slavery is still alive and kicking all over the world and it's every colour, not just black. So please stop harping on about your ancestors and do something productive towards helping those still alive if it's that damn important to you.
Also get annoyed that it's only white people who get called racist. Like somehow it's perfectly justifiable to be horrendously racist towards a white person but if they so much as hint at a stereotype they get all but tarred and feathered for racism.
/rant |
I've met racist black people... I've met racist white people... I've probably met racist Asian people, but not that I can remember actually saying any ****. There are assholes everywhere. There is also much muddying of the waters by racism-- as in, wondering whether some interaction between people of different races is racist even when it's not.
I've called them both racist. I've been called racist. But that was by an asshole who liked picking on the scrawny white kid.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tsuyu
I find it funny how the n-word is a big deal, yet the word "cracker" used as slang for white people is no such deal, considering how truly offensive it is.
It comes from the term of cracking a whip, to imply that the "cracker" is a slave owner or somesuch.
|
Depends on where you are. I'm from PG county, Maryland, which is like 75% black-- most of the schools are more like 90% black. From kindergarten to eighth grade I attended PG county public schools. It varied, as does anything else, with age and personality; but in general the people who used the word "cracker" used it exactly the same as they used the word "nigga." In a couple memorable instances, the word "nigga" completely lost any and all racist connotation, when I was called "nigga," and I'm about as pale and pasty as it gets.
On the other hand, to some people and from some people "******" and "cracker" have the same cruel and offensive meanings as ever. If a stranger uses either of them, it's just about always offensive.
The words themselves can be used among friends, especially among younger people, but strangers? No. And even among friends they can come off as vile.
And yes, most the people in these schools who liked the word "nigga" were dumbasses who listened to too much rap and thought they were bad, but who were well-to-do suburban dumbasses-- what you Brits would call chavs, what my brother and I call gangsterd.
And I'm reasonably sure that your etymology there is wrong. According to Wikipedia, it's just one of those everybody-knows-it-but-there's-no-evidence etymologies. And I read it elsewhere, too, though I can't remember where.
Oh, and on another note-- yeah, I'm a bit racist. I don't like rednecks. Which usually means people with a love for the Confederate battle flag (but who usually fly the Confederate naval ensign, the dummies); and a tendency to ascribe a bit too much importance to skin color or where you were born or what language your parents spoke or how you worship god (or not). And, in case you're wondering, those traits can and have belonged to black people I've known, too. Usually the black ones don't worship that traitorous, racist, much-defiled flag-- though some do, I've only ever met one.
And yes, I go long-winded there. Sorry.
