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Thanks for your assumption that I didn't learn it. I did. I probably don't have all the emotional background on this subject as you have, growing up in America

Thanks for your assumption that I didn't learn it. I did. I probably don't have all the emotional background on this subject as you have, growing up in America, but that doesn't change my observation.

sumedh 8y ago
Thanks for your assumption that I am an American, I am not. Since you read about it, just imagine all those atrocities if it happened to you, your family, your community for hundreds of years maybe that might help you make that connection emotionally.
- ironjunkie 8y ago
  Do I understand that all those atrocities happened? For sure. It is an horrible thing and it should be recognized as such. What I don't get is the way this is dealt with. Forbidding a set of words don't really makes sense to me. Don't get me wrong, I still think it would be extremmely insensitive to use those words as it would be to use any other insult. What I really don't get is the crazy different treatment those words get. It seems that even if you would be the least racist person in the world, if you mistakenly used one of those words (for example you tried to do a failed joke as Bill Maher did [1]), you will immediately be fired//terminated etc etc, even though everyone knows you are not racist at all. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. One can recognize that the treatment of Black people in this country (in the past and today) is definitely horrible, and also think that this whole forbidden word touchiness doesn't make sense. [1] https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/6/3/15734024/bill-maher-n-word-real-time https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/6/3/15734024/bill-maher-...
  - sumedh 8y ago
    Maybe this will change your mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO15S3WC9pg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO15S3WC9pg
    - cfadvan 8y ago
      Americans really do think they own not only the world, but the language too, don’t they? I’m not arguing for the wisdom of insulting people, it’s just that it’s so arrogant to assume that one group in one country can declare a word belongs to them. A word that same group has spread as a part of popular culture through tv, music and so on through the rest of the world. Just amazing. And this from a country full of people who can’t even pick out most other countries on a map, even the ones they’ve bombed. A country that apparently thinks some Palestinian, East Indian, Russian, Japanese, etc kid rapping along to a popular song is using “forbidden” words. I think Americans should worry less about their empty words, and more about their actions which the rest of the world judges them by. For what it’s worth, I don’t think a lot of Americans are racist or not because of some words. I do think it’s a racist country because of their prison system, shooting and strangling unarmed black men, the systemic racial poverty, the Birther conspiracy, and who they go to war for and against. No amount of careful wording will change that.
      - sumedh 8y ago
        This has nothing to do with Americans its just simple human decency, if you want to be insensitive keep using that word. Incase you are wondering, I am not an American. No need to digress to the current geopolitics which has to do with the topic.
      - TheCoelacanth 8y ago
        Do you see a lot of Americans complaining about the use of the N-word on the opposite side of the world? I don't think I have ever witnessed that subject come up. Why would you presume that an American author talking to an audience in America is discussing worldwide social norms rather than American ones? And I can assure you Ta-Nehisi Coates has spent plenty of time discussing most, if not all, of the alternate subjects you suggested. I'm sure it would dwarf the amount of time he has spent discussing the N-word by a huge margin.
        cfadvan 8y ago
        Were having this discussion on an international forum, online. People are making blanket statements about language without a scrap of distinction as to background or locale, just “white” and “black” and little else. Further back in this thread appears the phrase, Thanks for your assumption that I am an American, I am not. So yes, the context I’m examining was very much on the table.

sumedh 8y ago

Thanks for your assumption that I am an American, I am not. Since you read about it, just imagine all those atrocities if it happened to you, your family, your community for hundreds of years maybe that might help you make that connection emotionally.

ironjunkie 8y ago
Do I understand that all those atrocities happened? For sure. It is an horrible thing and it should be recognized as such. What I don't get is the way this is dealt with. Forbidding a set of words don't really makes sense to me. Don't get me wrong, I still think it would be extremmely insensitive to use those words as it would be to use any other insult. What I really don't get is the crazy different treatment those words get. It seems that even if you would be the least racist person in the world, if you mistakenly used one of those words (for example you tried to do a failed joke as Bill Maher did [1]), you will immediately be fired//terminated etc etc, even though everyone knows you are not racist at all. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. One can recognize that the treatment of Black people in this country (in the past and today) is definitely horrible, and also think that this whole forbidden word touchiness doesn't make sense. [1] https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/6/3/15734024/bill-maher-n-word-real-time https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/6/3/15734024/bill-maher-...
- sumedh 8y ago
  Maybe this will change your mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO15S3WC9pg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO15S3WC9pg
  - cfadvan 8y ago
    Americans really do think they own not only the world, but the language too, don’t they? I’m not arguing for the wisdom of insulting people, it’s just that it’s so arrogant to assume that one group in one country can declare a word belongs to them. A word that same group has spread as a part of popular culture through tv, music and so on through the rest of the world. Just amazing. And this from a country full of people who can’t even pick out most other countries on a map, even the ones they’ve bombed. A country that apparently thinks some Palestinian, East Indian, Russian, Japanese, etc kid rapping along to a popular song is using “forbidden” words. I think Americans should worry less about their empty words, and more about their actions which the rest of the world judges them by. For what it’s worth, I don’t think a lot of Americans are racist or not because of some words. I do think it’s a racist country because of their prison system, shooting and strangling unarmed black men, the systemic racial poverty, the Birther conspiracy, and who they go to war for and against. No amount of careful wording will change that.
    - sumedh 8y ago
      This has nothing to do with Americans its just simple human decency, if you want to be insensitive keep using that word. Incase you are wondering, I am not an American. No need to digress to the current geopolitics which has to do with the topic.
    - TheCoelacanth 8y ago
      Do you see a lot of Americans complaining about the use of the N-word on the opposite side of the world? I don't think I have ever witnessed that subject come up. Why would you presume that an American author talking to an audience in America is discussing worldwide social norms rather than American ones? And I can assure you Ta-Nehisi Coates has spent plenty of time discussing most, if not all, of the alternate subjects you suggested. I'm sure it would dwarf the amount of time he has spent discussing the N-word by a huge margin.
      - cfadvan 8y ago
        Were having this discussion on an international forum, online. People are making blanket statements about language without a scrap of distinction as to background or locale, just “white” and “black” and little else. Further back in this thread appears the phrase, Thanks for your assumption that I am an American, I am not. So yes, the context I’m examining was very much on the table.