If the apology is intended to express remorse, then you express remorse. Express what you have learned that makes you remorseful. Explain how you’ll behave differently in the future, and offer to right the wrong (if possible).
If the apology is intended to help you keep your job, then a certain amount of groveling is required. Lie about how terribly you feel, how you’d never knowingly hurt anyone’s precious feelings, etc. Live, learn, collect your pension in peace.
If you believe that what you did was necessary and appropriate, don’t apologize. Offer noncommittal sympathies for anyone offended, offer a statement of solidarity with the people you’re sympathizing with, and a brief rationalization of why you had to do it (and would do it again). Prepare your CV and get ready to look for a new job. Consider hiring a labor attorney to investigate remedies, most importantly that your employer pays what they owe, and doesn’t poormouth you to prospective employers.
There’s no situation where it’s appropriate to write a 9-page manifesto about how you’re the victim and your accusers are the real oppressors. Absolutely none. If you do that, then you deserve to get fired on principle.
I agree with much of the rest of what you said; but that’s probably just going to tick people off.
‘I’m sorry that I accidentally offended you, I didn’t mean to’ is reasonable. ‘I know that this is offensive but I feel it’s necessary and appropriate anyway for these reasons’ may be OK, depending on how good the reasons are. ‘I’m sorry that/if somebody was offended’ is just a noise, and is not going to mollify anybody.
To answer the OP, there are two suitable responses, all depending on the situation:
If you said or did something that’s indeed racist, then apologize. Simple as that.
If you were misunderstood (for instance, you said the word for “that” while speaking Chinese, which is pronounced na geh or ni geh, sounds very similar to the N word,) or quoted out of context, then strongly defend yourself. You’re not wrong, your attackers are the ones who are wrong.
Hah! A couple of weeks ago, I was working the afternoon car rider line, and a kid, maybe eight, came up to me and started talking about a prize they’d won from the classroom treasure chest. I wasn’t paying close attention because I was trying to keep track of various logistics, but the kid seemed happy chattering, so I was making the right noises. But their conversation seemed to demand more of a response, so I glanced over and said, “Remind me, what’s your name?”
The kid glared at me and said, “Daddy, be serious.”
Oops.
When someone believes they’ve experienced a microaggression like a White person thinking they’re a different Black person because all Black people look alike, I’m genuinely unsure whether it’s better to say, “Sorry, I’m a dummy with everyone’s faces, White or Black,” or just to apologize and promise to do better. The former, if successful, might make them feel better because they realize they’re not experiencing a microaggression. But if it’s unsuccessful, it might feel like a White person doubling down and refusing a chance to be better. Lord knows that happens often enough.
Why? What’s the point of this? Why not apologize and move on? That professor you’re referring to doesn’t have to use that example, he’s not ethnically Chinese (is he even a fluent speaker?). I don’t see why you would bother defending yourself – you accidentally offended some people. You’re not racist, and you don’t want to be seen as racist, so just apologize and work to do better.
Haven’t we previously established that almost all the incidents of people claiming that innocent words were misinterpreted as racist weren’t actually innocent after all? They were mostly versions of the “But Mom, I’m not touching him” game.
I do the thing where I constantly mix my kids names up. My father does it as well with me and my brother. With me, I usually realize it right away, and you’ll often hear me say something like “Kelly, I mean, Zukie, I mean Susie” (with the middle name being my dog’s name – kids’ names changed), so for me I guess it’s like “all small living things in the house look alike.” I used to make fun of my dad for doing it when I was a kid and, well, now here I am.
If you read my post, that was situation-specific advice for when I’m certain I said nothing wrong, I’m not backing down, and I’m not afraid of the consequences. If that’s the case, why should I mollify anyone?
In that situation, it would be adequate and appropriate to say “I said what I said, grow up.” But instead I personally I’d go with a perfunctory “I’m sorry if anyone was offended, that is never my intention” because it’s the literal truth.
If you believe this is never appropriate, then what we’re really saying is that every accusation is always valid and the only legitimate response is to grovel and beg forgiveness. That is IMO a false premise and a topic for a different thread.
No, I didn’t mean to say that every accusation is always valid. What I do mean to say is that if you’re entirely sure you said nothing offensive, even after asking the other person why they think it was offensive and listening to the answer: then just say that, including your reasons. (For example: ‘I used the word Indian because that’s part of the official name which that group of people uses for themselves, and I was referring to that specific group in that context’.) Don’t add “grow up”; but also don’t add “I’m sorry if anyone was offended.” That’s not an apology, it’s not mollifying, and it carries an implicit accusation of its own, that they shouldn’t have been offended and/or (especially if you use “if”) aren’t actually offended but just want to make a fuss.
I don’t dispute that. I’ll repeat what I said before: if I did nothing wrong, then my only responsibility is to offer whatever clarity seems to be missing. It’s not my responsibility to mollify or soothe anybody, and I’m disturbed by the implication that it is my responsibility to do so (if I’ve done nothing wrong).
I can be the same way, and so it gets under my skin a bit when people assume that any mixing up of names/faces is somehow nefarious. I do it to people I have worked with for years. Indeed, they give me a hard time about it.
Here’s the thing though; not all microaggressions are actually aggressions of any sort. Sometimes they’re just misunderstandings that have been incorrectly interpreted as something they’re not.
I mean, definitely apologize for getting people confused, but whatever microaggression or racist interpretation someone else had with you confusing people isn’t really your problem.
You can’t control how they interpret it or feel about it, no matter how concerned you may be with that sort of thing. And I’m not even sure if you should apologize for someone else’s misinterpretation- it isn’t something you intentionally did- it’s how something you did was interpreted by someone else, and you can’t control that.
No. It’s not for anyone else’s benefit, it’s for me to express how I feel. I get to do that, because I’m not in the wrong.
What’s with the implication that I need to do or say anything different whatsoever if I did nothing wrong? Is it just fighting the hypothetical in which I’m blameless, or are you inherently bothered by the suggestion that there are situations of offense where the accused doesn’t actually owe anyone anything?
Yes. George Pullman liked his name so much, he insisted that the porters in his Pullman cars be called “George” regardless of what their actual name was. Coincidentally (not), all those porters were Black.
What I’m trying to point out is that the phrasing ‘I’m sorry if anyone is offended’ is annoying to many people. It’s pretty much a cliché for being useless and annoying: go search on “sorry if” or on “ifpology”.
If what you want to do is specifically to annoy others, that’s up to you.
I want to congratulate some of you for being so hip to the current usage and vernacular of all things that you’re so sure you haven’t made any sort of misstep!
I am, however, trying to square this with other threads where people complain that they can’t keep up with changing usage. It’s really a mystery.