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"people of color" is OK while "colored people" is found racist

justabubba

justabubba

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WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:
“There’s two different problems we’re experiencing right now. One is our lack of safety protocols — the other one is the lack of safety of colored students in general.”
Click to expand...

as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
Click to expand...

LOL, All I could come up with was “howlie” (Hawaiian term) and “honkey.”

The Racial Slur Database
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
Click to expand...

Red/Off-Topic:
What?

Blue:
What the hell is "age-challenged?"
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
Click to expand...


Red:
I understood your OP's theme until I got to the "red" sentence, which strikes me as completely non-sequitur to the rest of the post. What has the "red" question to do with the context and theme of the rest of the OP?
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
Click to expand...

IMO anybody bothered by the term colored students and its usage with in the context the video shows and it could ever shadow the real problems are PART of the problem and have issues :shrug:
 
Xelor said:
Red/Off-Topic:
What?
Click to expand...
back in black is an AC/DC song also used as comedian Lewis Black's theme song


Blue:
What the hell is "age-challenged?"
Click to expand...
she is on the younger side of the spectrum, not having the benefit of wisdom realized from experience
it was a term manufactured by me as a wink to the subject and if i were to fabricate one for you it would now be "song-challenged"
 
Xelor said:
Red:
I understood your OP's theme until I got to the "red" sentence, which strikes me as completely non-sequitur to the rest of the post. What has the "red" question to do with the context and theme of the rest of the OP?
Click to expand...

it has to do with derisive terms
until i read rexedgar's list (obviously, following my original post), i had no idea there were so many derisive terms for white people. thus, i had no expectation that people of other races had to also walk on egg shells to avoid an inarticulate description of caucasians as the subject school board member now understands needs to be wary about in her subsequent public speaking occasions referencing minority members
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?

Xelor said:
Red/Off-Topic:
What?

Blue:
What the hell is "age-challenged?"

justabubba said:
back in black is an AC/DC song also used as comedian Lewis Black's theme song



she is on the younger side of the spectrum, not having the benefit of wisdom realized from experience
it was a term manufactured by me as a wink to the subject and if i were to fabricate one for you it would now be "song-challenged"
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

TY for the "age-challenged" clarification.

Pink:
I knew what song you had in mind and I realize the man's surname is "Black." What I don't understand is what relationship you think exists between the mere utterance/appearance of the word "black" has to do with the lexical progression of terms used to identify and distinguish Black people from any other people. Put another way, I don't understand what there is meriting your apology to AC/DC and Lewis Black.


Oh, for the love of Christ! I just now figured out what correlation probably happened in your mind....You wrote "back to 'black,'" and somehow that phrase triggered in your mind AC/DC's tune, "Back in Black" and the fact that Lewis Black uses it as a theme song. Now, I still don't know what about the similarity inspired you to apologize to either, but I do now see what I suspect made you arrive at some reason for apologizing, as it were, to them.

FWIW, "back TO black" wouldn't ever have triggered for me the thought it did for you.
 
justabubba said:
it has to do with derisive terms
until i read rexedgar's list (obviously, following my original post), i had no idea there were so many derisive terms for white people. thus, i had no expectation that people of other races had to also walk on egg shells to avoid an inarticulate description of caucasians as the subject school board member now understands needs to be wary about in her subsequent public speaking occasions referencing minority members
Click to expand...

Fair enough.
 
justabubba said:
WATCH: School board meeting on racist threats erupts after trustee calls students ‘colored’

my age is probably showing, having lived in eras when common usage expressions referring to african-Americans evolved from "nigger", to "colored", to "negro", to "black", to "african-American", and back to "black" [apologies to AC/DC and Lewis Black]

as indicated in the cite, a non-age-challenged, female caucasian used the term "colored students" and upon learning of its antiquated origins immediately apologized. multiple times. here is what she said:


as can be discerned, the school board member was advocating improvements to the benefit of minority students

that seemed not to be heard

what caused this to become newsworthy was her use of "colored" when referring to students

as the title of this thread indicates, it seems a massive leap of semantics to accept 'persons of color' while rejecting 'colored persons'

as a male having a predominantly european heritage, other than the laughable "cracker", what terms are not to be used in my direction without being mistaken for derision?
Click to expand...

White is acceptable, whitey is derisive.

Honky tonk is acceptable, is honky is derisive.

Redneck depending on who is saying it.

Bubba depending on who is saying it.

Peckerwood

 
justabubba said:
it has to do with derisive terms
until i read rexedgar's list (obviously, following my original post), i had no idea there were so many derisive terms for white people. thus, i had no expectation that people of other races had to also walk on egg shells to avoid an inarticulate description of caucasians as the subject school board member now understands needs to be wary about in her subsequent public speaking occasions referencing minority members
Click to expand...

I have to be honest. Even after perusing that list, save maybe "cracker," though to me not really, I don't know of any race-based slur that comes close to the "N-word." I think nothing quite comes close because that term carries all the following "baggage":
  • The N-word is, in the minds of folks who use it epithetically, indiscriminately applicable to any Black person and without regard to nature and extent of the speaker and target's relationship, and without regard to the character, accomplishments, etc. of the target. For such folks, one is Black; therefore the term applies. Period. No other term is so "universally" usable or so "handily" used. The closest slur I can think of is the F-word.
  • The N-word, regardless of the race of the person of whom it's uttered, is thought of as the worst thing one can be called. That said, even in using it to asperse a non-Black person, the term doesn't have the same vulgarity as when used to refer to a Black person.

    Why? Because at the end of the day, a non-Black person who's called an N-word isn't a Black person; thus even being called an N-word, the reality is that they are, at best, in some way LIKE what the speaker presumes Black folks to be like. In other words, when not applied to a Black person, using that term implicitly accords the difference found in "like X but not actually X." Moreover, if one is non-Black yet in some moment called an N-word, there is yet the potential for "recovery" from being so. For a Black, there is no such "recovery" possible or available because a Black person cannot be not-Black; thus the point in #1 above is, to N-word users, everpresent.
  • The N-word goes way beyond mere, so to speak, racially-based derision/disdain. That word encapsulates every single negative stereotype that exists or ever existed regarding Blacks, and the N-word needs no modifier, no qualifier to do so. A listener may not know which stereotype a speaker specifically has in mind, but it doesn't matter; whichever one(s) the listener thinks of will do. Hell, the listener need not even bother delving to the level of which one. Not even "cracker" does that with regard to whites.
  • The N-word amplifies the animus expressed by other epithets. One can see that in the "SWAN" epithet on the list the other member referenced...as if "slut" isn't vile enough an aspersion. It's also seen in the abundance of epithets shown on the list that apply to whites, but only in the context of a white person's interaction with Blacks, expressly reference not merely an association with Blacks, but with Blacks derided further as "N-words."

    To this day, I recall the last thing one of my second cousins said to me: "The only thing worse than a [N-word] is an M-effing [N-word]." That remark marked the instantaneous end of our relationship, and we were but teens at the time. Until this moment, the last time he crossed my mind was nearly a decade ago when I informed him and everyone else in the family that he wasn't to show up at Dad's wake, funeral or interment.
So while there are slurs applicable to white folks, they just don't have the same scope of impact and meaning the N-word does. The fact that other race-b based exist is sad, and users of them deserve all the recriminations they receive in the wake of using them. Are any of them on par with the N-word? No. How do I know that? By dint of being a white dude whatever slur one uses against me, it applies only to me (or perhaps some subset of white folks of which I'm a member); it doesn't speak to, refer to or disparage whites as a whole. Why doesn't it? Because folks don't use anti-white slurs that way and there's no "legacy," such as that with the N-word, associated with such terms.
 
while we are discussing expressions which may cross the borderline of acceptable language, allow me to offer another:
cotton pickin'

is it/could it be found disparaging as blacks were those we usually think of as cotton harvesters
or
is that expression now devoid of any reference to a race, in its current usage
 
justabubba said:
while we are discussing expressions which may cross the borderline of acceptable language, allow me to offer another:
cotton pickin'

is it/could it be found disparaging as blacks were those we usually think of as cotton harvesters
or
is that expression now devoid of any reference to a race, in its current usage
Click to expand...

Id say it varies

in PA ive never heard it used in any other way then to mean offense but im sure thats not the case everywhere

for politicians or people in power in power public or private id recommend avoiding it and i bet the smarts ones do based on common sense
 
First, we shouldn't expect perfect logic and reason when it comes to language. The evolution of language takes a bunch of weird turns. It is ok to call British people "Brits" but it is not ok to call Japanese people "Japs". Person of color is ok but colored person is not. And no, there really are no truly inserting words for white people. Cracker, honkey, gringo...they almost sound like cute nicknames.

Hell, I can just imagine how the new brand of political correctness is going in Spanish speaking countries where nearly EVERYTHING has a "gender". Or how about this: One boy is called a "chico". One girl is called a "chica". A group of 100 girls is referred to as "chicas". But put just one boy in that group of 100 girls and now the group is called "chicos".

If people are trying to force language to be fair and balanced they are setting themselves up for disappointment.
 
What's up with "African American"? If you feel a need to hyphenate your name, should not the country you were born and raised in, be first?
 
Immigrants learning English often want to know why "colored person" is offensive, but "person of color" is fine.

It is next to impossible to give them an explanation except: Just memorize the rule.
 
"people of color" is OK while "colored people" is found racist
Click to expand...

then use the former and don't use the latter.

it's time to eat, grandma.

it's time to eat grandma.

there's only a comma of difference, but a vastly different intent.
 
Helix said:
then use the former and don't use the latter.

it's time to eat, grandma.

it's time to eat grandma.

there's only a comma of difference, but a vastly different intent.
Click to expand...

yea, let's do discuss intent

if you viewed the cited video, you will have seen a school board member who was making recommendations to improve the experience of minority students
THAT was her intent
yet, what became the focus of her comments? that she used "colored" students instead of referring to them in the more peecee manner of "students of color"
her message was lost - despite that she was expressing an advocacy of "children of color"


some can't see the forest for the trees. many of them were in that room when she spoke
 
justabubba said:
yea, let's do discuss intent

if you viewed the cited video, you will have seen a school board member who was making recommendations to improve the experience of minority students
THAT was her intent
yet, what became the focus of her comments? that she used "colored" students instead of referring to them in the more peecee manner of "students of color"
her message was lost - despite that she was expressing an advocacy of "children of color"


some can't see the forest for the trees. many of them were in that room when she spoke
Click to expand...

it's isn't difficult to avoid calling racial minorities "colored people." i manage not to do that daily at work. if i did, they'd fire me on the spot, and i'd have no recourse, as i live in a red state.
 
Helix said:
it's isn't difficult to avoid calling racial minorities "colored people." i manage not to do that daily at work. if i did, they'd fire me on the spot, and i'd have no recourse, as i live in a red state.
Click to expand...

as is made evident from the video, the school board member used the expression not knowing it was non-peecee. immediately after another board member mentioned this faux pas to her, she apologized repeatedly. it was obvious she was not being malicious
and yet her attempt to help minority students was ignored only because of the way she innocently referenced minority students

and if you could be fired for that, your organization is way overdue to vote in a union
 
justabubba said:
as is made evident from the video, the school board member used the expression not knowing it was non-peecee. immediately after another board member mentioned this faux pas to her, she apologized repeatedly. it was obvious she was not being malicious
and yet her attempt to help minority students was ignored only because of the way she innocently referenced minority students

and if you could be fired for that, your organization is way overdue to vote in a union
Click to expand...

i definitely would agree to more union representation. at my own job, i could be fired for any reason or for no reason at all. my entire division could be cut on Monday because some middle management lump saw an odd pattern in his cheerios. however, running around and talking about "colored people" is going to get you fired, union or not.
 
Helix said:
i definitely would agree to more union representation. at my own job, i could be fired for any reason or for no reason at all. my entire division could be cut on Monday because some middle management lump saw an odd pattern in his cheerios. however, running around and talking about "colored people" is going to get you fired, union or not.
Click to expand...

not if you were represented by a decent union, it wouldn't

of course, if that person had a history - a pattern - of racial comments, they would not be salvageable - nor should they be

but an innocent remark, without any indication of malicious intent, no union represented employee should be disciplined for such a comment

if you count the noses of your non-management, non-HR co-workers and determine that 50% plus 1 would be willing to support a union, i would be delighted to draw you a road map to bring in a union
 
justabubba said:
not if you were represented by a decent union, it wouldn't

of course, if that person had a history - a pattern - of racial comments, they would not be salvageable - nor should they be

but an innocent remark, without any indication of malicious intent, no union represented employee should be disciplined for such a comment

if you count the noses of your non-management, non-HR co-workers and determine that 50% plus 1 would be willing to support a union, i would be delighted to draw you a road map to bring in a union
Click to expand...

i don't agree that a union should protect racism at work. however, anyone being fired should have his or her case reviewed by the union with filing a grievance as a possibility.

the reason that we're so touchy about race is that for hundreds of years, the white majority has behaved like complete racist dip****s. the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and that's the way it goes. don't use racist terms at work. i find that to be easy.
 
Helix said:
i don't agree that a union should protect racism at work. however, anyone being fired should have his or her case reviewed by the union with filing a grievance as a possibility.

the reason that we're so touchy about race is that for hundreds of years, the white majority has behaved like complete racist dip****s. the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and that's the way it goes. don't use racist terms at work. i find that to be easy.
Click to expand...

i bet that school board member would have confidently said the same

until she used an expression she did not realize was found offensive by many
 
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