# And so the "code words" begin.
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [September 4, 2008, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066 "2008-09-04T22:11:57Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/21 "2008-09-05T00:25:09Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#):
>
> Well, you’re well named, bless your heart.
Beat me to it.
I know a fun experiment. Naturally Oblivious, why don’t you run out to a black neighborhood and call the first adult black man you see “Boy”, for bonus points after he gets done kicking the shit out of your oblivious ass, tell him he is being “uppity”.
Askeptic-born in Bessemer, Alabama.
---
### Author:  [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/22 "2008-09-05T00:29:08Z")
> [@askeptic](#):
>
> Beat me to it.
>
> I know a fun experiment. Naturally Oblivious, why don’t you run out to a black neighborhood and call the first adult black man you see “Boy”, for bonus points after he gets done kicking the shit out of your oblivious ass, tell him he is being “uppity”.
>
> Askeptic-born in Bessemer, Alabama.
Co-sign.
5-4-Fighting,
Black, born and raised in MS and knows how to avoid ass-kickin’s _every day_ in Crown Heights, NY.
---
### Author:  [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/23 "2008-09-05T00:31:25Z")
This is the Dope, where people once argued that spraying a black person with toxic bugkiller while screaming “nigger” was _not necessarily_ a racist act. Of course someone showed up to defend this within the first few posts.
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### Author:  [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/24 "2008-09-05T00:34:11Z")
“Watch that ‘boy’ shit, redneck. You’re talkin’ to the Senator of Illinois.”
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### Author:  [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/25 "2008-09-05T00:44:39Z")
I realize “uppity, boy, darlin” and “honey” can all be something-ist, and I also realize 99.9% of adjectives can’t be used with regard to certain “uppity” people who should, in order to be politically correct, remain completely adjective-free, with the remaining allowable adjectives being “strong,” and “intelligent.” Even then you have to be careful you’re not being patronizing. Goodness forbid you say Obama is “well-spoken,” or “articulate.” We all know what you meant by that.
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### Author:  [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/26 "2008-09-05T00:45:46Z")
> [@OtakuLoki](#):
>
> And I’m disappointed to find that I’m more shocked to hear of a representative misusing ‘simulation’ for ‘situation,’ than I am to hear that the same representative is using such blatantly racist terms as “uppity” or “boy” to refer to a black man.
I won’t defend another thing the representative said and might not ever, but his use of simulation was correct. Obama was taking part in some sort of war game simulation at the time.
---
### Author:  [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/27 "2008-09-05T00:51:55Z")
Yeah, that damn political correctness. Why, I bet 99% of the complaints the FCC receives and uses to regulate our freedom of speech probably come…from…the left…wait…damn.
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### Author:  [@eldowan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eldowan)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/28 "2008-09-05T01:32:02Z")
Maybe I’m just stupid, but someone please tell me how uppity and boy are “blatantly racist”
I don’t care about if its talking down to someone, condescending, or anything of that sore.
Racist. How?
---
### Author:  [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/29 "2008-09-05T01:43:36Z")
> [@eldowan](#):
>
> Maybe I’m just stupid, but someone please tell me how uppity and boy are “blatantly racist”
>
> I don’t care about if its talking down to someone, condescending, or anything of that sore.
>
> Racist. How?
Well, because for a very long time whites used the term “uppity nigger” to refer to black people who didn’t know their place, i.e., who weren’t Uncle Toms. They also used the term “boy” to refer to adult black males, because no black male could be a man.
I’ll tell you something else. Any Georgia elected official (I’m from Georgia, and I’ve worked for elected officials here) who says he doesn’t know that the terms “uppity” and “boy” when used to refer to a black man are racist, is lying his fucking ass off. (His apologists may merely be mistaken, but, um, probably not.)
---
### Author:  [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/30 "2008-09-05T01:44:45Z")
> [@eldowan](#):
>
> Maybe I’m just stupid, but someone please tell me how uppity and boy are “blatantly racist”
>
> I don’t care about if its talking down to someone, condescending, or anything of that sore.
>
> Racist. How?
Words have history an context. BOTH of those words have historically been used by racists to belittle black people. So exclusively, in fact, that their use can have no other possible interpretation.
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### Author:  [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/31 "2008-09-05T01:52:04Z")
> [@Ensign\_Edison](#):
>
> This is the Dope, where people once argued that spraying a black person with toxic bugkiller while screaming “nigger” was _not necessarily_ a racist act. Of course someone showed up to defend this within the first few posts.
Couldn’t it just be performance art?
---
### Author:  [@ArizonaTeach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ArizonaTeach)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/32 "2008-09-05T02:11:10Z")
> [@askeptic](#):
>
> Has anyone in the Obama camp or Elected Democrat said that? No? Fuck off.
Fuck yourself sideways with a cactus, asshole.
Was that code enough for you?
I didn’t realize that the OP only applied to Elected Officials, just not actually saying it or anything. On the other hand, your incredibly sourced rebuttal of my basic point that the sexism is flying fast and furious (much moreso than the racism) has caused me to curl up into a fetal position and cry, cry, cry my life away. Oh, how I wish my mother had stayed at home and raised me instead of helping to support my family! Oh, how it burns, knowing her selfishness has caused me to hurt **askeptic’s** feelings. What a bad, bad mother she is for having a career.
Oh wait, you’re just full of shit and have absolutely nothing to say.
Your mother must have been **awful**.
---
### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/33 "2008-09-05T02:13:08Z")
> [@Ensign\_Edison](#):
>
> Yeah, that damn political correctness. Why, I bet 99% of the complaints the FCC receives and uses to regulate our freedom of speech probably come…from…the left…wait…damn.
Well, to be fair, 99% of FCC complaints come from the Parents’ Television Council. Although it’s a conservative organization, it’s not exactly representative of conservatives in general, most of whom can’t be bothered to complain to the FCC any more than the rest of us.
---
### Author:  [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/34 "2008-09-05T02:31:03Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#):
>
> Well, to be fair, 99% of FCC complaints come from the Parents’ Television Council. Although it’s a conservative organization, it’s not exactly representative of conservatives in general, most of whom can’t be bothered to complain to the FCC any more than the rest of us.
The point is that it’s completely absurd to whine about “PC” being “out of hand” when even a fringe righty group like that can have such an iron grip on what we are allowed to say where.
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### Author:  [@eldowan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eldowan)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/35 "2008-09-05T02:57:39Z")
> [@Evil\_Captor](#):
>
> Well, because for a very long time whites used the term “uppity nigger” to refer to black people who didn’t know their place, i.e., who weren’t Uncle Toms. They also used the term “boy” to refer to adult black males, because no black male could be a man.
>
> I’ll tell you something else. Any Georgia elected official (I’m from Georgia, and I’ve worked for elected officials here) who says he doesn’t know that the terms “uppity” and “boy” when used to refer to a black man are racist, is lying his fucking ass off. (His apologists may merely be mistaken, but, um, probably not.)
> [@lissener](#):
>
> Words have history an context. BOTH of those words have historically been used by racists to belittle black people. So exclusively, in fact, that their use can have no other possible interpretation.
OK, I didn’t realize the history behind those words.
However, because I didn’t know the context and meaning _behind_ those words, completely refutes your statement that they “_can have no other possible interpretation_”. They absoluetly can, and do have other possible intrepretations, and to say otherwise is to tell me what my interpretation has to be.
However they may be out of line to use, the terms aren’t inherently racist. People I know call each other ‘boy’ and don’t mean ‘nigger’. How do I know? because it was being said from one white ‘boy’ to another.
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### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/36 "2008-09-05T03:00:32Z")
> [@nancarrow](#):
>
> couldn’t it just be performance art?
you freakin’ win!
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### Author:  [@Jodi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jodi)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/37 "2008-09-05T03:07:50Z")
> [@askeptic](#):
>
> Referring to a black guy as uppity is not exactly code, it is blatantly racist.
I’m not saying this is wrong, but if true, I genuinely didn’t know it. So ISTM that accusations of _blatant_ racism may be overstated, if ignorance can be blamed instead.
What struck me from the article was the second step – not asserting that “uppity” is code, but asserting that “elitist” is also code: code for “uppity.” Does that mean all black people are immune from accusations of elitism, because those accusations cannot be divorced from racism? Elitist = uppity, uppity = racist. Mind you, I don’t think Obama is particularly elitist, but I certainly think he _could_ be, and I don’t see what his race has to do with it.
Not everything is code, and not everything is code to everybody.
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### Author:  [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/38 "2008-09-05T03:09:25Z")
> [@eldowan](#):
>
> However, because I didn’t know the context and meaning _behind_ those words, completely refutes your statement that they “_can have no other possible interpretation_”. They absoluetly can, and do have other possible intrepretations, and to say otherwise is to tell me what my interpretation has to be.
That would be a valid point if you were an elected official in Geogia.
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### Author:  [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/39 "2008-09-05T03:17:27Z")
> [@eldowan](#):
>
> However, because I didn’t know the context and meaning _behind_ those words, completely refutes your statement that they “_can have no other possible interpretation_”. They absoluetly can, and do have other possible intrepretations, and to say otherwise is to tell me what my interpretation has to be.
Dude, that’s like arguing that since you, yourself, don’t speak French, then calling someone a nigger crack whore, or whatever, in \*French \*. . . . whatever, done pissing into the ignorant wind.
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### Author:  [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2008, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-so-the-code-words-begin/462066/40 "2008-09-05T03:21:18Z")
> [@FriarTed](#):
>
> you freakin’ win!
Thankyou. And you know, [I rather agree](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=481348). 😉
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