# Gypsy / Romani discussion (spun off from GQ thread) **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 26, 2021, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074 "2021-06-26T16:34:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/1 "2021-06-26T16:34:55Z")
> [@The legality of deterring mailbox baseball](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-legality-of-deterring-mailbox-baseball/593646/156): > > In my day Gypsy was a figure of mystery and romance, there were songs written and movies made about the romantic life on the Gypsy road. > > What happened to change that? Rhetorical question but I’ll venture an answer. My father’s parents were from Hungary, and he also lived there for awhile. The Romani were often nomads (because they were driven out of places they tried to settle,) they spoke their own language, and were associated with petty crimes. They were, to use an American insult, thought of as “trailer trash.” Even the term “gypsy” (as in “Egyptian”) was a slur against their darker complexions and alienness. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/2 "2021-06-26T17:00:33Z")
**Moderator Note** The OP of this thread was split off from the GQ thread as it was off-topic for that thread. This thread is for discussion of the term “gypsy”, which has often been used as a racial slur, and is now therefore considered offensive. The original thread that this was spun off from is here: > [@The legality of deterring mailbox baseball](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-legality-of-deterring-mailbox-baseball/593646): > > On a recent (rerun) episode of CSI, part of the plot involved a homeowner who, tired of having his mailbox destroyed by teens playing [mailbox baseball,](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mailbox_baseball) installs a mailbox filled solid with concrete. The result is that the next vandal to strike the mailbox with a bat (from a moving car) suffers severe injuries to his arm and shoulder, and the driver of the car ends up crashing and killing both himself and the injured mailbox hitter. On the show, the homeowner was charged with (IIRC) negligent h… Some discussion of the issue may be found on the wikipedia page here: > **[Names of the Romani people](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Romani_people)** > > The Romani people are also known by a variety of other names; in English as gypsies or gipsies, and Roma; in Greek as γύφτοι (gíftoi) or τσιγγάνοι (tsiggánoi), in Central and Eastern Europe as Tsingani (and variants); in France as gitans besides the dated terms bohémiens and manouches; in Italy as rom and sinti besides the dated terms zingari, zigani, and gitani; in Spain as gitanos; and in Portugal and Brazil as ciganos. > Self-designation also varies: In Central and Eastern Europe, Roma is commo... ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/3 "2021-06-26T17:09:52Z")
> [@The legality of deterring mailbox baseball](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-legality-of-deterring-mailbox-baseball/593646/156): > > In my day Gypsy was a figure of mystery and romance, there were songs written and movies made about the romantic life on the Gypsy road. > > What happened to change that? I have to admit, I wasn’t aware of it being any kind of culture until it was brought to my attention. IIRC, it was brought to my attention here. There was (is?) a poster that was of Romani descent and would regularly explain the problems with the word when it came up. In fact, as I recall, the first time I walked into a thread where this was going on, it was over another poster’s use of the word ‘gyp’. I don’t think, at the time, I was even aware that gyp (as a pejorative used about someone ripping you off) was short for gypsy and as I said before, I wasn’t aware that gypsy was a culture. That was quite a while back, but after a few posts like that, I don’t think I’ve used the word since, at least not in that sense. This was also right around the time that gyp or gypsy was falling out of favor as more people were learning this. So I certainly wasn’t alone and this poster wasn’t just getting offending over nothing. I’ll have to look back and see who that was. Quick ETA, the first thread I found, while looking for that poster, was from 2012 when it was being discussed. Someone in that thread mentioned they’d started hearing about it at least 10 years earlier. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/4 "2021-06-26T17:09:57Z")
This is not an uncommon dog name. I do wonder whether their owners know that it is actually a racial slur. > [@Joey\_P](#): > > I’ll have to look back and see who that was. I would guess that would be ZPG\_Zealot, no longer a poster on this board. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/5 "2021-06-26T17:13:33Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I would guess that would be ZPG\_Zealot, no longer a poster on this board. I was wondering if it was her, I just didn’t want to put that name out there if I was wrong. In the first thread I found she did mention that it was derogatory, but no family connection. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/6 "2021-06-26T17:16:09Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > This is not an uncommon dog name. Human as well. > **[Gypsy Rose Lee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gypsy_Rose_Lee)** > > Gypsy Rose Lee (born Rose Louise Hovick, January 8, 1911 – April 26, 1970) was an American burlesque entertainer, stripper, and vedette famous for her striptease act. Also an actress, author, and playwright, her 1957 memoir was adapted into the 1959 stage musical Gypsy. > Rose Louise Hovick was born in Seattle, Washington, on January 8, 1911;\[note 1\] however, she always gave January 9 as her date of birth. She was known as Louise to her family. Her sister, actress June Havoc, was born in 1912. T... ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/7 "2021-06-26T17:23:40Z")
I’m Romani - about a quarter - quite possibly half. But completely assimilated - my great grandparents decided to pass when they came to the U.S. It was hard enough to arrive here as Eastern Europeans. And I have faced discrimination when people discover it - notably an Irish friend of mine just dropped me - she told other friends that I wasn’t to be trusted. Romani are associated with Irish Travelers (though they are two distinct groups of people) and both are associated with crime in much of Europe. There is still a lot of anti-Romani sentiment in Eastern Europe, although my understanding is that it is getting better with more education and integration. Interestingly, although the Romani were treated nearly as bad as the Jews during the Holocaust, it took until the 1970s for Germany to recognize that it was a formal systemic genocide against the Romani. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/8 "2021-06-26T17:25:40Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > This is not an uncommon dog name. Just saying, but he n-word also used to be a “not uncommon” dog name. At least, common enough to make it into two pieces of popular media that I’m personally familiar with. > [@k9bfriender](#): > > I would guess that would be ZPG\_Zealot, no longer a poster on this board. No, I think **Joey P** ’s talking about Kal, who had a lot of interesting and informative posts about Romani culture and anti-Romani prejudice. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/9 "2021-06-26T17:28:45Z")
Kal was a much better source of information. Much truer to my understanding of the culture. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/10 "2021-06-26T17:30:01Z")
As Fate would have it, this topic was addressed in a Staff Report more than a few years back. > **[Who are the Gypsies?](https://www.straightdope.com/21344132/who-are-the-gypsies)** > > A STAFF REPORT FROM THE STRAIGHT DOPE SCIENCE ADVISORY BOARD ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2021, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/11 "2021-06-26T17:30:13Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > No, I think **Joey P** ’s talking about Kal, who had a lot of interesting and informative posts about Romani culture and anti-Romani prejudice. That’s possible. I looked through some of the posts and that name did pop up a few times (and these threads were going on way back in the early 2000’s. In one thread GFactor even said he was doing a column about it (for here) and listed off his bibliography for people to pick through about the subject. > [@silenus](#): > > As Fate would have it, this topic was addressed in a Staff Report more than a few year back. Ninja’d (kinda) ([here’s the post](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-term-gypsy-offensive/394092/7) I was referring to). ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/12 "2021-06-27T01:04:35Z")
Is this one of those situations where the term was offensive to the Romani people the whole time, but it just took a while before outsiders learned about it and/or started to care? ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/13 "2021-06-27T02:19:59Z")
Germany enacted a “Law for the Fight Against Gypsies, Vagrants and the Workshy” in 1926 (pre-Hitler.) That gives you an idea of where they stood. Granted, the term doesn’t have the same emotional impact in the U.S. as it does in Europe, if only because the actual Roma population is so small here. Popular culture here treats the term as more of a collection of stereotypical traits than an actual group of people. My own feeling is that it belongs in the same category as “Oriental” or “Colored” - antiquated and imposed on the group by outsiders. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/14 "2021-06-27T04:30:37Z")
In early Ceausescu Romania (1970) Romani were pretty much given a pass from laws that strictly prohibited private enterprise. On Sundays, Romani would take the train into town, laden with produce from their farms, and set up a black market. Tho police would wait until late in the day before moving in with a show of force, and chase the laughing Romanis back to the depot. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/15 "2021-06-27T05:22:07Z")
> [@Kent\_Clark](#): > > Germany enacted a “Law for the Fight Against Gypsies, Vagrants and the Workshy” in 1926 (pre-Hitler.) That gives you an idea of where they stood. And yet German culture of the same time period had a very romantic view of Native Americans (e.g. Karl May’s books). I guess it’s easier to romanticize an ethnic group that you don’t see on a daily basis. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/16 "2021-06-27T13:47:47Z")
Though the flip side of that overlooking of Romani during a horrifying regime is that Romania also enslaved the Romani population until 1856. (Although by 1856 it was a minority of the Romani population. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/17 "2021-06-27T18:03:56Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I have to admit, I wasn’t aware of it being any kind of culture until it was brought to my attention. IIRC, it was brought to my attention here. There was (is?) a poster that was of Romani descent and would regularly explain the problems with the word when it came up. In fact, as I recall, the first time I walked into a thread where this was going on, it was over another poster’s use of the word ‘gyp’. I don’t think, at the time, I was even aware that gyp (as a pejorative used about someone ripping you off) was short for gypsy and as I said before, I wasn’t aware that gypsy was a culture. > That was quite a while back, but after a few posts like that, I don’t think I’ve used the word since, at least not in that sense. This was also right around the time that gyp or gypsy was falling out of favor as more people were learning this. So I certainly wasn’t alone and this poster wasn’t just getting offending over nothing. > > I’ll have to look back and see who that was. > > Quick ETA, the first thread I found, while looking for that poster, was from 2012 when it was being discussed. Someone in that thread mentioned they’d started hearing about it at least 10 years earlier. When I read this post, I thought you might have been referring to **Kal** , who gave his insights as a Romani in [this 2002 thread](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/irish-travelerss-con-artist-image-fair-or-foul/129611) I started (I was curious about the Irish Travelers, which led to a discussion of the Romani). He has not posted in a while, but was seen on the board in August of last year. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2021, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/18 "2021-06-28T10:11:18Z")
I’ve always encountered Romani as figures of at least suspicion if not outright criminal, from the _Famous Five_ books onwards. At least, adult Romani, they often got assistance from good Romani children. This often sat _alongside_ romanticizing their lifestyle - the Five were always going off in caravans. Look also at _The Wind in The Willows_, where travelling in a Romani-style caravan is painted as an awesome adventure, yet a Romani horse-dealer is characterized in less positive terms. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2021, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/19 "2021-06-28T10:41:47Z")
“Workshy” would make a good name for dogs too ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2021, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/20 "2021-06-28T13:38:37Z")
My mid-century origin American perspective is that the casual view of the Romani / (always called gypsies until like the 1990s) was that they were an exotic / mysterious people of Europe who lived in colorful wagons and were associated with things like fortune tellers, casting of curses, and other things supernatural. Trying to think back to my knowledge of decades ago, I think at one point I frankly just understood gypsies and their caravans to be an old “cultural practice” that mostly had died out in modern times, I don’t think I even really understood there were actually large gypsy populations, that they were a distinct ethnic group etc until years later. I never knew of a serious negative connotation of them until I spent time stationed in Europe in the 1980s when I found out that many locals loathed / hated them. I definitely have zero awareness of Americans disliking or hating gypsies, and like the post referenced by the OP I mostly remember them being portrayed as “mysterious” and “exotic” people in media of my youth. By the 90s I definitely remember that at least some level of awareness was building that “hey this is actually a historically persecuted ethnic group of nomadic peoples who have lived mostly in Europe for hundreds of years.” Something that has only grown over time. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074.md?page=2)