I can’t remember saying it aloud, but I’ve thought ‘you people’ to describe groups like tech support giving the run around, or rude salespeople.
If I was using the term aloud, I’d probably say “you people at Dell are blah blah” or " the people in Customer Service always give me a hard time". Just using “you people” doesn’t really make sense or get the point across. If she used the term once, and followed by "this always happens with the help at Unlimited, maybe. But she used “you people” specifically three or four times. She was definitely trying to make a point.
I especially wouldn’t use the term if it was a customer service employee from say India, or any minority. You only need two working brain cells to know how that could be misconstrued or be living under a rock not to understand how that would come across. My grandmother had a habit of calling women working in a department store a “sales girl”. But she was 90 and didn’t really understand why she shouldn’t say it and didn’t after it was explained that it was sorta offensive.
But in your example, didn’t you immediately know that when the Dutch woman used to term “you people” it was clear she was talking about Americans? Or the reference to psychologists you didn’t have to guess whether she meant men with freckles or psychologists. I think it’s the same in this case. When the term “you people” was used to a young A.A. girl she most definitely knew what it meant.
Oh, I’ll very much leave it to her to interpret the intended usage since she was there. Going on about how “you people” shop also suggests some feature other than “cashier” or “salesperson” was the category she was referencing, although I must admit to being ignorant about any stereotypic manner of African American women’s shopping.
I’m just throwing in my two cents about the phrase “you people.” A phrase I hate, by the way, since it really is the essence of stereotyping, regardless of the grouping the user is making.
After lots of reflection on this thread, I have come to realize that I was wrong regarding my take on the usage of the term “you people.” I’ve apologized to Biggirl privately and I apologize to all who I offended in this thread. While I believe that the term “you people” can be used in a general rant, I was wrong to assume that it would be inoffensive to people of color. I was wrong. I suck. I’m sorry.
Imagine my surprise to see this thread on the front page again. That was one very, VERY private apology. Double super secret-- perhaps even telepathic private apology.
But I’ll accept this public one in lieu and will no longer think about, mention or bring up this thread in connection with Kalhoun on this board again.
Kalhoun, I don’t know why your private message didn’t get sent. However, if you sent one, it should still be in your Sent Items folder. I’m not sure what that does for you – maybe you can take a picture of it next to today’s paper or something, but at least you’ll know for sure you sent it and didn’t accidentally hit cancel or something.
