So if I called you “Paddy”, that would be fighting words? Equivalent to calling a black man “nigger”? If you call an englishman “Limey”, that’s equivalent to “nigger”? “Kraut” is equivalent to “nigger”? “Frog” is equivalent to “nigger”? “Belgian” is equivalent to “nigger”? What drugs are you on?
I know, I know, it makes logical sense that there should exist a racial slur against whites that has equal power to “nigger”. But there ain’t, and the reason there ain’t such a word might be clear with a little introspection on the racial history of our country.
I live in Virginia and it’s especially “funny” when I tell someone that I’m 100% Irish… I brace for the lame and inevitable jokes about the Irish drinking too much. I guess if I were a teetotaler, I’d have license to be offended by it, right?
Or what’s even better, when people find out I’m from Massachusetts (AND Irish), I get an even better slew of jokes mainly about being a drunk, a bad driver, or talking too fast, etc.
Like I said at the beginning, it’s all bullshit. We have to deal with ignorance every day – regardless of one’s emotional attachment to a given word, I don’t see a huge reason to get all bent out of shape about it.
So in other words, the perceived severity (and therefore the degree of punishment for those who use it) can be increased simply by having the affected minority collectively blow their gaskets whenever it’s used. Sounds to me like a good way to get something of real political value out of cheap, cheap outrage.
FYI: I graduated college as a history major and I have a graduate degree in education with a concetration in history. I’m well versed in the history, especially in regards to the social dynamics over time, of the US.
To be fair a Canadian guy I worked with once told another employee that “I will fucking kill you if you ever call me that again” after the guy called him a frog. Lol I don’t even think he was French-Canadian.
In regards to the whole Cracker versus Nigger thing. I don’t think most white people will get offended by it, I think most will just laugh it off. But if the person is calling someone else a cracker in an effort to hurt them, they are no less an asshole than the guy saying nigger is trying to hurt someone’s feelings, they just don’t have the same powerful weapons in their verbal arsenal.
I, too, come from 100% Irish heritage. I, too, lived in Virginia. I, too, come from Massachusetts originally. All I can say is that you are really fucking sensitive. If anyone called me a drunk, or a mick, or a cracker, I’d not be the slightest bit offended. In fact I’d laugh at them.
Where did I say that I was offended? I CLEARLY STATED that my emotional reaction and perception is irrelevant – mainly because, to me, I don’t care about the aforementioned slurs aimed at me, and other people would be offended. THAT’s why it’s not relevant to this discussion.
Fact is, I drink a good amount of beer, I drive fast and I talk fast.
This makes your position even more difficult to fathom. There’s the personal level of affront, which I think we can all agree varies from individual to individual. It’s fine to say that being called “cracker” is hugely offensive to you individually. Perhaps it is as offensive to you on a personal level as “nigger” is for some people. No way to argue that.
There is the social and political context which you seem to be ignoring. When an old White man uses the word “nigger,” that connotes an ugly historical moment from which this nation is (arguably) emerging. (It just adds fuel to the fire that he’s old. A young White man saying this would also court a lot of trouble.) Furthermore, there’s this aspect of privilege that seems to have escaped your analysis. Whites are the most advantaged “race” in the U.S. - they hold positions of power and economic superiority. Dominant groups have the advantage of greatly shaping culture, media, and political opinion.
I’m a man. I can be reasonably assured that I am viewed as an individual rather than “a man” or occupying “the man role.” Not so for a woman entering a field that is dominated by men - she’s the “woman executive” versus an executive who happens to be a woman. Calling a man a “bastard” and calling a woman “bitch” in such a context is quite different. I daresay most men wouldn’t be bothered one way or the other about this, and if they did, it would be because it impugns that individual man. There is no subtext about men generally from that insult. Calling a woman is not only an insult to the woman on an individual level, it is also something that carries a stigmatizing effect to all women. This is part of privilege, and just as men have it, in this particular moment in this particular time. Same is true of White Americans. So let’s not kid ourselves and pretend that the fact that these words were used in polite conversation a generation ago, and now they are not, that all slurs are created equal.
Of all the stupid things I’ve ever read on the SDMB, your assertion that “nigger” and “cracker” are equally offensive is one of the stupidest. It’s just bafflying insanely wrong. Utterly and completely and totally wrong.
No one can use logic to prove anything about how offensive something is. Something is offensive if it offends people. Thus the only real way to measure how offensive something is is to ask people how offensive it is. And given that basically everyone in this thread not only disagrees with you, but is baffled as to how you came to your position, you might want to consider the possibility that you are wrong.
(Note: I’m not necessarily saying that “nigger” should be more offensive than “cracker”, or that there’s something objectively different about it (although I suspect there is). Rather, I’m saying that it is more offensive, as evidence by people being offended by it.)
I guess it could go either way. You could argue a young guy was going for the word that would hurt a Black person in the worst way, which is stupid, but I know from previous threads that this rationale exists. Coming from an old guy, who lived through the civil rights movement, you would think he’d have a realization of what damage can be inflicted with that word.
Furthermore it reinforces in my mind that this guy probably is a racist. Given his position as an educational leader of sorts with considerable power, it’s really sad for the university that they’ll be known for some time as the school that had the trustee who said “nigger.” But then again, something tells me that he probably gave some signals that he’d use these kinds of words in the past.
Well, I think the argument would be that, since we have made such strides in civil rights through the years, an 80 year old would have grown up in a much more racist society than a 20 year old. So, growing up, he was exposed to a lot more casual racism, and heard that word a lot more in contexts that weren’t virulently racist. So, because of that, he’s bound to pick up some of that casual racism. While, for the 20 year old, who hasn’t been exposed to that, the use of the term doesn’t come as natural to him.
An example of this would be my grandmother. A few years back, she had to make a choice between two options, so, she started a rhyme…“Eenie, meenie, miney moe, catch a n****r by the toe…” When she realized what she said, she stopped and was really embarrassed, obviously.
Now, my grandmother isn’t ready to go out and join the Klan. She supports civil rights and always did. It’s just she reverted back to a rhyme of her childhood, which was common and not particularly controversial at the time.