I’ve been living in the Philippines for almost two years and people who have never seen white people before call white men Joe. I’ve heard this is because that it comes from G.I. Joe in World War II. But Vietnam vets tell me that Joe was what prostitutes called all their customers in Saigon and Manila.
Incidentally, black men are never called Joe. White people are considered Americans and vice versa. They have the idea that Barack Obama is the first non American president, not because of the rumor that he was born in Kenya, but rather that he is not white.
Someone needs to come to the Philippines (someone with more clout than me) to say that Americans come in all colors. Even Filipino.
The story I was told was that “Jo” was the reply soldiers would give when prostitutes asked for their names. Since this was a pretty common form of expressing Filipino-American friendship, pretty soon every guy became a “Jo.”
The whole “Americans are white” thing is pretty universal. I knew an African-American volunteer in Cameroon who caused a near riot when she was placed with a host family who refused to believe she was not African. Eventually the family calmed down and decided she was just a very dark skinned white person, a notion they maintained during her entire stay despite her numerous explanations.
I imagine that during WWII, in both Europe and the Pacific virtually all the American forces seen by the residents were white. I can see where “Joe” would be associated both with being an American soldier, sailor, or Marine and with being white.
People can be quite ignorant about foreign countries. I mean, how many people from Rwanada would be shocked to learn how little Americans know about the Hutu and Tutsi tension?
I was definitely surprised, having lived in China and returned, how little people here in the USA know about foreign countries. I mean, people in China obviously don’t know a lot about the US, but it is amazing to hear the things I’ve heard since I’ve returned.
Stuff I’ve heard from educated folk in the US. None of these statements were jokes or said out of cruelty:
Was it difficult to tell your kids apart from one another? I mean, they look so similar to one another.
Were you afraid you would be arrested if you said the wrong thing?
Are their vaginas really sideways?*
Why do they have slanty eyes?
Konnichiwa! I lived in China, remember.
Ching, ching, chong, chong, guk!**
Really. From a guy you would normally call intelligent. He was not joking.
** This was from a person who was high, high up in the educational setting.
Pfft, I call BS, more or less an elitist meme imagined from the mythical ugly american. No “educated” person in the world thinks asian vaginas are slanted.
What I find interesting with regards the OP is that the first Filipino family I really became acquainted with, all of their kids are named Joe. The son is Joe (Joseph), the oldest daughter is Josephine, the younger daughter is Jocelyn. I think that there might be a couple more, but those are the ones that I know. Can’t recall if it’s a George Foreman kind of thing or if they just went with a naming theme.
As for Mahaloth’s assertion, sounds totally plausible to me, it’s not hard to find some real morons out there - and I think anyone over the age of about six that would say most of those things is a moron or was very poorly raised.
I live in China, and when I return home I hear questions similar to the ones that Mahaloth has received.
“ching chong” I have heard that one before
When I was growing up the joke was that an Asian vagina is sideways, and that the farther apart they spread their legs the tighter the vagina becomes.
Sadly, as an adult I have been asked about this also.
People have also asked me if Chinese people all look the same and how can I tell them apart.
As ShibbOleth wrote, there many morons out there.
I have also visited the Philippines many times, and I have heard “Hey Joe”
many times.
It is my understanding that it is just a leftover from the military days and “G.I.Joe”.
Blacks can receive the “Hey Joe” also.
Many time I was asked questions such as "Where in America is Germany ? "
Many Filipinos seem to think that every foreigner is an American, or “kano”.
I just came back from Thailand, and was surprised that:
a Thai person herself said “ching, chong,” to me as if to indicate that she knew it was our stereotype that Asian languages sound that way.
in Thailand, you can be arrested for saying the wrong thing, namely insulting the King (or being perceived as doing so). I don’t know how much it happens, but I didn’t want to take the chance, so I just never spoke about the monarchy.
When I lived in Thailand, I worked in Chachoengsao province. Thais either find that name amusing or find it terribly amusing when we say the name of that place. I think it sounds “sing-songy” to them. IME, many Thais are easily amused, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
Thailand does have a lese majeste law that you’ll hear some idiot, usually a drunken Brit, arrested for about 1-2 a year. The King normally (always?) pardons them. The stuff I can recall people getting arrested for was putting up defamatory placards or jumping up and down on an image of the King (which would also be on the money). I’ve never heard of anyone inadvertently insulting the King and getting arrested - you would typically have to make an all out effort. Some off the cuff remark that you didn’t like his hairstyle or something wouldn’t do it. Luckily there is not much to actually criticize him on, as far as I’ve been able to tell he’s a very decent man. That’s not to say you couldn’t get your ass kicked for making a smart ass remark. Thais really love their current King (Bhumipol) and also Rama V (Chulalongkorn). These two seem to be the favorites and the ones you’ll see photos or shrines in homes and businesses.
I got called Joe in Vietnam in the early 90s, soon after it had opened up to tourism. Mainly south of the DMZ (north of it people called me “Ruski” and threw stones at me).
One guy near Da Nang in particular spoke in a wonderful American dialect that I presume had been picked up two decades before. I asked him if there was anything to eat and he said “Lunch? Oh, you want chow? Haul your ass to China Beach, some of the dudes down there they got chow, Joe.”
As China is not a democracy, that’s not such a stupid question. I suppose it’s more liberal today than it was 40 or so years ago, though.
I understand that “slanted” or “slanty” eyes is considered a racial insult in English, but the question of why Asians have eyes of a different form than Europeans is an interesting one. Not that you’d be able to answer it just by virtue of living there, though.
Obviously, I should have said “sideways” vagina instead of slanted. I was probably thinking of “slanted” eyes.
I know it’s hard to believe, but I was asked this once by an average man over the age of 55 and by a young woman who was bout 28 at the time. While I consider their inquiry stupid, they would be considered “educated” in the sense I mean it. More than one university degree(both with at least Masters).
As a teacher, I accept it if kids ask about “slanty” or “slanted” eyes. I usually just politely tell them that “slanty” is kind of a weird way to say it and some people might be offended. Then, I tell them that it is OK to wonder about differences between races and ask them why our eyes aren’t shaped like that.
More than any of the other comments I’ve heard, I can’t believe any educated people would think you can’t tell Asian people from one another, like they all really do look exactly the same.
Well, obviously that’s culturally insensitive. But how is it ignorant?
I understand that there are some scientific studies that show that people of one race often do find it difficult to distinguish unknown people from another race. This was in the context of white witnesses of crimes being very bad at telling apart black people.
Something I learned when I was studying abroad in Japan: 外人 *gaijin *(a slangy and potentially offensive term for a foreigner, short for 外人 gaikokujin) is almost exclusively applied to *white *foreigners.
Different ethnic groups have different distinguishing features. So, to completely make some crap up, say that people whose ancestors come from Region A all have similar noses but varying ears, but people from Region B all have similar ears but varying noses. So to an A who’s only used to seeing other A’s, all B’s look similar, because their “distinguishing feature” is pretty consistent across individuals. But the reverse is true for a B.
Several years ago I followed a blog by an English teacher in Japan who was a big black man, and he called himself Gaijin all the time. Can’t remember if he ever noted being called that by someone else, although I imagine there’s few Japanese who’d be that impolite.
Conversely … I used to teach an article written by a Chinese man who had moved to the United States. He had been here for some time – how long, I’m not sure, but probably months – before he realized that people used hair color to distinguish others. It just wasn’t in his repertoire of distinguishing features.
(My apologies, but I can’t remember the source or author, so you’ll just have to take my word for it unless someone else out there knows it.)
“Joe” is still a common term for an American soldier. The term is still used by American soldiers. “Joe bar” is still used to refer to bars where the majority of patronage is American Servicemen. Many (Majority) Americans visiting the Phillipines are American soldiers, probably visiting in-laws or just looking for easy ass. I once heard a statistic on a documentary that something like 90+ percent of Phillipines who immigrate to the United States do so as spouses of US Servicemen. It is no surprise at all that they would call white people “Joe” over there.
And to continue the Hijack about ignorance in other countries:
Today I was told by a very polite Bahamian that she does not like America and will not be going there anymore! She will stick to Panama and New York.
It’s pretty disappointing that it’s assumed to be racist when white people claim that other races look alike.
A few months ago on NPR I heard of a study that discovered that facial recognition is a learned ability.
Basically, you learn to differentiate faces by viewing the faces that are around you. So a white person that was only exposed to white faces would have a hard time distguishing between asian faces. It’s a learned ability so once you are exposed to other faces you learn to distinguish between them.