# What should be done in response to the White Power gesture being flashed on camera? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 15, 2019, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895 "2019-12-15T16:10:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/261 "2019-12-18T20:49:06Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Look, lets be clear: if someone has a lot of Taylor Swift picture, it \*always \*means something bad. It just doesn’t necessarily mean white supremacy. It could mean someone has bad taste in music, I suppose. > [@Slash1972](#): > > There are people in this very thread who think that making the OK sign indicates you are a racist. The more charitable reading is that they think it’s strong evidence that someone is racist, especially when combined with other evidence. For example: Wearing the uniform of a _Waffen-SS Obersturmbannführer_ is usually pretty strong evidence that you’re racist. However, that is completely negated if you’re acting in a movie. It becomes good evidence again if you’re playing Gandhi and you’re wearing the uniform on your day off. More context provides more evidence, one way or the other. So: How much evidence does the OK sign provide? How eager should someone be to do something which provides any evidence whatsoever of being a racist? People say that correlation is not causation. They never say that correlation is still meaningful. They definitely never say that correlation is usually all the evidence we’ll ever get for most things. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/262 "2019-12-18T20:50:25Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![Mallard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Mallard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mallard)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/263 "2019-12-18T20:52:20Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > If the right to offend is part of the right to free speech (which I support), then the right to be offended is also a right. Right? > > So, if you find yourself commenting on people who are offended by something you find trivial (“slightest BS”), then why is their objection not as trivial (to you) as the trivial offense itself? I guess the “right to free speech” includes the “right to be convoluted” and not make a lot of sense. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/264 "2019-12-18T20:52:26Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > I wonder why people here keep talking about the ‘OK symbol’ because that has nothing to do with the cadets at the football game. What that guy flashed was NOT an ‘OK’ because it was upside-down. Different signs. Not the same. Stop talking about ‘OK’-- it’s nothing to do with this. Are you saying you’d like some honesty? Because if you wanted honesty that’s all you had to say. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/265 "2019-12-18T20:59:49Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > (scraps plan to replace avatar with Jay Z picture) > > Strange day when Marilyn Manson is the least controversial avatar picture to have. Pfft. Avatars are for millennials. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/266 "2019-12-18T21:04:27Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > How much evidence does the OK sign provide? Very little. > [@](#): > > How eager should someone be to do something which provides any evidence whatsoever of being a racist? Depends. Perhaps they want to troll people? I think it would be pretty funny to change my avatar to a milk/Taylor Swift picture just for laughs. But the moderators frown on that so I won’t. Besides, I’m sure that having white skin provides more evidence that a person is racist than the OK sign will EVER convey. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/267 "2019-12-18T21:06:31Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Pfft. Avatars are for millennials. Careful, lots of racists use “Pfft” (joke) ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/268 "2019-12-18T21:17:53Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > Very little. > > Depends. Perhaps they want to troll people? I think it would be pretty funny to change my avatar to a milk/Taylor Swift picture just for laughs. But the moderators frown on that so I won’t. “Just for laughs”. See, if I saw somebody doing something because they think it’s funny to playact as a racist, I start making inferences about which sorts of people think it’s funny to playact as a racist. > [@Slash1972](#): > > Besides, I’m sure that having white skin provides more evidence that a person is racist than the OK sign will EVER convey. Nope, that’s just snowflakey whining. MRA-ish stuff about how the white man is _soooooo_ oppressed. ---
**Author:** ![Mundane\_Super\_Hero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mundane_super_hero/32/6304_2.png) [@Mundane\_Super\_Hero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mundane_Super_Hero)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/269 "2019-12-18T21:26:18Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > (scraps plan to replace avatar with Taylor Swift picture) You just saved yourself a to 40 song played on repeat all summer. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/270 "2019-12-18T21:30:52Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > “Just for laughs”. > > See, if I saw somebody doing something because they think it’s funny to playact as a racist, I start making inferences about which sorts of people think it’s funny to playact as a racist. Sure. I recommend you never see the movie Borat. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/271 "2019-12-18T21:33:33Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > Nope, that’s just snowflakey whining. MRA-ish stuff about how the white man is _soooooo_ oppressed. Well, I’m white. And outside of my circle of friends, almost every single white person I’ve met (outside of the military) is racist. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/272 "2019-12-18T21:44:28Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > Sure. I recommend you never see the movie Borat. I’m actually not planning to. I have better things to do with my time. And let’s be clear, I know what parody and satire are. But just saying, “I was just joking!” does not make something parody or satire. > [@Slash1972](#): > > Well, I’m white. And outside of my circle of friends, almost every single white person I’ve met (outside of the military) is racist. I’m white too, but that doesn’t make me oppressed. Or racist, for that matter. I came by my racism through good hard work, not thanks to my skin color, thank you very much. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/273 "2019-12-18T21:46:50Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > I’m actually not planning to. I have better things to do with my time. > > And let’s be clear, I know what parody and satire are. But just saying, “I was just joking!” does not make something parody or satire. I agree. If a person has to say “I was just joking”, then it was not parody or satire. > [@](#): > > I’m white too, but that doesn’t make me oppressed. Or racist, for that matter. I came by my racism through good hard work, not thanks to my skin color, thank you very much. Where is this “oppressed” coming from? ---
**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:** [December 18, 2019, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/274 "2019-12-18T21:51:04Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > I agree. If a person has to say “I was just joking”, then it was not parody or satire. [What does that make this, then?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22034762&postcount=267) ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/275 "2019-12-18T21:53:39Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > [What does that make this, then?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22034762&postcount=267) Joke. That’s why I said “joke” in there. It’s not parody or satire. It’s a real, if poor, joke. You can tell, because I put “joke” at the end. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/276 "2019-12-18T22:16:38Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > [What does that make this, then?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22034762&postcount=267) That one was a joke. However (and contrary to his own statement), it wasn’t him capping it with “(joke)” that made it one. It was an explicitly absurdist comment, and easily recognizable as such. Seriously folks, I get that comedy is hard, but it’s not _structureless_. It’s not _imaginary_. Were I to say, “Shakespeare sucks.”, that’s not a joke. If I were to say “Shakespeare sucks. Just kidding!”, that’s _still_ not a joke. This is something Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer don’t understand about (non-scatological) comedy - you can’t just make a statement or put something in your film and have it be funny just because it’s there. There are a bunch of different ways of doing comedy but that’s not one of them. But the quoted post was one of them. Even without the identifying tag. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/277 "2019-12-18T22:44:04Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > I wonder why people here keep talking about the ‘OK symbol’ because that has nothing to do with the cadets at the football game. What that guy flashed was NOT an ‘OK’ because it was upside-down. Different signs. Not the same. Stop talking about ‘OK’-- it’s nothing to do with this. The people in the link in post 254 are using the right-side-up version that I think of as the OK sign. So presuming the caption’s accurate, apparently that version is also in use by racists. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/278 "2019-12-18T22:50:58Z")
The original 4chan hoax post was talking about the normal OK sign, and in fact the notion that it stands for (W)hite (P)ower is based on the right-side up sign. ([cite](https://www.adl.org/blog/how-the-ok-symbol-became-a-popular-trolling-gesture)) ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2019, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/279 "2019-12-19T00:36:58Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Are these guys playing the circle game? > [Locked Down in OMSI During the Aug. 17 Protests, A Professor Puts the Proud Boys in Context](https://www.wweek.com/news/2019/08/25/locked-down-in-omsi-during-the-aug-17-protests-a-professor-puts-the-proud-boys-in-context/) These guys are. [https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D6LAn7yUEAAQpdx.jpg](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D6LAn7yUEAAQpdx.jpg) [![](https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/milo-handsign.jpg) ](https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/milo-handsign.jpg) [![](https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/uploader/image/2017/02/13/wintrich-podium.jpg) ](https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/uploader/image/2017/02/13/wintrich-podium.jpg) Made you look! Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk! As an aside, I’ve been considering getting a 1488 tattoo on my arm to commemorate Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias’s rounding the Cape of Good Hope. I’m a history buff! ---
**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:** [December 19, 2019, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895/280 "2019-12-19T01:04:51Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > Joke. That’s why I said “joke” in there. It’s not parody or satire. It’s a real, if poor, joke. You can tell, because I put “joke” at the end. Are you sure you understand what parody is? Because what you wrote is pretty clearly a parody of the attitude you’re arguing against in this thread. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-in-response-to-the-white-power-gesture-being-flashed-on-camera/844895.md?page=15)