How would you feel if your boss implied that you are a special Jew since you were brought up to value generosity and fairness, unlike those other Jews?
Sometimes people can expose offensive ideas without realizing it. And it’s not endearing when this happens. It may not be “OMG offensive!”. But that doesn’t mean it’s not eye-rolly.
I must be the only person on the planet to use hyperbole. 
Admittedly, that would be annoying. That particular example has never happened to me, but if it did, it would be annoying because it demonstrates an underlying prejudice.
More common is the notion that Jews of today are literally like the Jews found in the Old Testiment, or follow those beliefs literally.
Similarly, that all Jews are like the Ultra-Orthodox.
Both of these I’ve actually encountered reasonably frequently. I don’t consider those in any way malicious, or indicating malice.
Sure. But by the same token, not all ignorance is malice, or demonstrates an underlying maliciousness.
Nope, I’m the same way. Well except I’m black not Jewish. But then monstro is essentially saying that as well. I’ve heard similar so often that I’ve come to well not expect it but take it in the spirit it’s offered. Albeit with a bit of eyestrain :rolleyes:
You know, I rethought my response and it bought to mind my biggest pet peeve. Do you want to know where I encounter this behavior the most? In books. Nearly every author who has a great black character does this sort of thing with the characters background. They are always one of six kids raised by a single mom with a Bible in one hand and a switch in another, who didn’t raise no dummies. It’s insulting and a backhanded slap to the rest of the group. A no where near complete list includes authors like Tom Clancy, John Ringo and James Patterson.
Says the poster who’s one of six kids raised by a single mom and is succesful.
Okay, let me throw this out to the black people here.
I was talking with a black coworker one time and during the course of the conversation he mentioned that he had been born in another state and had lived in several different states when he was a kid. And I asked him if his family had been a military family. He seemed a little taken aback by my question and said no but didn’t elaborate further.
I hadn’t intended any racial implication to that question. I’m not from a military family myself but I grew up in a military town and I know military families move around the country. You tell me you moved around a lot when you were a kid and that would be my first thought.
But looking back on it afterwards, I wonder if he saw my question as being racial. Something like “I think the army is full of black people” or “I don’t consider the possibility that a black parent might be a corporate executive”.
I agree. It seems like whenever you see a black character in a movie, he or she came from a poor inner city family. Or occasionally, you’ll it defied by a black character coming from a wealthy background.
Most of the black people in this country come from the same background as most of the white people: the middle class. But you never seem to see any black characters who come from a middle class background.
No racial implications to my ear. Maybe they were unfamiliar with the association between the military and frequent moving, and thought you making a non sequitur?
Yeah I don’t hear it either.
It’s funnier when you realize that the subtext is an assumption that you have slept with every gay person from every city in the world.
Oh, yeah? For dinner I’m eating poached eggs on Brussels sprouts.
It thought it was mildly funny, with a couple really good moments (like the orphans in Europe…rings very true.)
I know a lot of non-black DC (though not necessarily white) locals who are both fascinated and repulsed by the other, blacker half of the city, and the stuff they say makes my jaw drop regularly.
Dude, there’s probably an entire Internet forum devoted to people who have a fetish about this. It’s a big world and none of us are alone.
This is really true. There is this underlying feeling I get from a lot of people that if you didn’t MEAN it to be offensive then it de facto cannot be offensive, because intent is everything. And I’m like, no, in reality it is the exact opposite. You can have the best intentions in the world and still manage to offend someone through ignorance or awkwardness or whatever. It doesn’t mean that the offender is a horrible person who we must all direct five minutes of hate toward. But it also doesn’t mean that what they did/said wasn’t offensive.
That sounds really good.
The same mental process that makes the drive home with ones own company bearable after running over a toddler and fleeing the scene.
Cuz you’re a MeanOldLady, that’s why !
Me, I found the Asian video to be hilarious and painfully on-point. I’ve got two South Korean kids and they have both referred to themselves as Twinkies. ( Yellow on the outside, white in the inside ). First time I heard that I about died.
Anyone who says these videos don’t “work” is completely full of crap. These videos point out so many of the preconceptions and comments that white folk make but don’t like to have thrown in their face.
Please.:rolleyes:
The serious answer is because it helps. There are people who just don’t care if they’re being offensive. But most of us do. If you explain to us that what we said is offensive, we’ll make an effort to improve.
So while it aggravates you to hear this stuff now, coming here means you’ll hear less of it in the future.
I saw some satire site like the Onion that had an article about Will Smith and Jada Pinkett adopting a Romanian orphan and it took me a minute to get the joke.
I’m white and I’ve never heard white people say these kinds of things to black people, but I live in DC where race is ever present in every interaction. People are hyper aware of it in a way that’s not really healthy. FWIW, I think you have to be somewhat comfortable with a person’s “blackness” to enter into a conversation like this, if that makes sense.
How about an option for:
I’m white and it makes me sad that people still talk like this so I think it’s true but not at all funny.
I moved to the US in 1979, from Europe. One of the several things that struck me, way back then, was the uneasieness between races in the US - at the time, this was not something I was familiar with. I suddenly became hyper-aware of racial differences and awareness because that seemed the norm here (back then anyhow.) In short, I suddenly became nervous about saying “the wrong sort of thing” even though in the UK I had friends of varying ethnicities and didn’t give it much thought because there, then, race was less of a big deal, I guess?