7 ms·

This is the first time I've heard of that. I can just imagine being somewhere loud and giving the ok / perfect symbol to a friend across the room and then bein

This is the first time I've heard of that. I can just imagine being somewhere loud and giving the ok / perfect symbol to a friend across the room and then being called a racist. Damn, that's scary.

edoceo 6y ago
A thumbs up is still acceptable and has not yet been hijacked by assholes.
- skinkestek 6y ago
  I remember from back when I picked up Norwegian litterature, a short story or essay or something that ended with something along the lines of: "cucumbers is the only thing that hasn't been deemed unhealthy yet. Hurry up and eat cucumbers while they are still healthy!"
  - iRobbery 6y ago
    https://www.businessinsider.com/spain-cucumber-crisis-ecoli-2011-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/spain-cucumber-crisis-ecoli-... i hope you stopped eating them 2011 ;-)
- s- 6y ago
  Thumbs up is definitely offensive in some cultures
  - edoceo 6y ago
    Right, it's offensive in Iran (according to a quick DDG) - but offensive != hijacked and repurposed.
snowwrestler 6y ago
That won't happen; context matters. If you're posing with the confederate flag and a bunch of guns during a BLM protest, and flashing the OK hand symbol, it's going to be taken very differently from just using that same gesture to a friend in a random grocery store or something.
- mistermann 6y ago
  Context or innocence does not protect you: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/613615/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article...
- serf 6y ago
  >That won't happen; context matters. how many times does that have to be proven wrong? Mob-justice is all the rage right now. All that matters is that someone is pointing the pitch-forks at you or your cause.
FireBeyond 6y ago
If that's what you got out of this, I'm not sure what to say. I even used the SCUBA shop, which is next door, for reference. No-one that I've seen has advocated that the OK sign be abandoned for divers. I've been mid mouthful at a restaurant when a server has asked how my food is and I've made this sign and not been called a racist. However, should I and half a dozen of my buddies, armed an in full tactical gear, standing 10 ft from a BLM protest, waving my Confederate flags, all choose to make this sign for a photo, then a _reasonable person_ may choose to interpret this as "we know exactly what we're implying here, and we're not all just telling the cameraman that "everything is perfect"."
- skinkestek 6y ago
  A bloke (and a less privileged bloke at that, 75% non white according to himself) was recently fired because someone had shot a photo of him resting his hand out the window of a company truck in what lpoked line an OK hand. It was discussed here a few days ago. Stop firing the innocent or something, from the Atlantic.
  - Smoosh 6y ago
    oh, come on. "resting his hand ... what looked like" ??? Wasn't the story that people in another car taunted him and urged him to make the symbol, and they recorded it when he did? He may have not known what the meaning was (I believe that is what he claimed) but that is an entirely different defense to make than "I wasn't doing it, it just looked a bit like it".
    - geronimoe 6y ago
      What are you talking about? You need to defend yourself for hand gestures now? You need to preface your arguments with "I'm not white" now? The point is he didn't make a racist gesture, so why are we even talking about it.
    - skinkestek 6y ago
      Point is it seems he did it after they kept following him and trying to get him to do it, it seems the guys in the other car even did it first to try to get him to mimic it. And that is before we talk about the problem with firing someone over this in the first place. Context is important. I have had to tell my kids more than once that when an elderly person use their middle finger to point at something it isn't offensive because they grew up in a time when it didn't matter. That elderly person sure doesn't mean "F* you" as they are pointing their middle finger horizontally towards something while saying "look there". In fact I think we all do something every single day that would be considered offensive by someone at some point.
breakbread 6y ago
My wife is a high school teacher and, until we had our first child, was also the swim team coach. Early last year she made a kid run laps after he low key photo-bombed the team picture by making the "Ok" symbol on one of his thighs. Then she gets an angry text message from the kid's mother who believed her son was being punished specifically for making the "ok" symbol. This woman had found a picture of my wife on Facebook where she can be seen pulling her shirt down by pinching the bottom of it between her thumb and pointer finger, inadvertently making the "ok" symbol. She basically said she was going to put my wife on blast and out her as a racist. Ridiculous (Hilarious, even, in retrospect). My wife didn't respond, of course. She immediately looped in her admin and explained what was going on. Fortunately that was the end of it, but it's not hard to imagine someone getting caught up in a similar situation and it becoming a full on witch hunt.
- Yetanfou 6y ago
  > My wife didn't respond, of course. She immediately looped in her admin and explained what was going on. Fortunately that was the end of it, but it's not hard to imagine someone getting caught up in a similar situation and it becoming a full on witch hunt. Well, the hunt began when your wife made a kid run laps because he made an OK sign on his leg because he thought that was a 'cool' thing to do comparable to giving the person in front of you 'rabbit ears' by making a V-sign behind their head, not when that kid's mother started social media dumpster diving for 'evidence' to use against your wife. The way to avoid these witch hunts is to avoid starting them, not to make the first step and then complain when others follow suit. She could have taken the kid aside and asked him why he made that sign, he probably would have replied he got it off the 'net or from his friends who made him think it was 'cool'. She then could have told him why it is not cool, i.e. that him making that sign would be interpreted by some as him being a supporter of a nefarious ideology. By singling him out to run laps after he low key photo-bombed the team picture by making the "Ok" symbol on one of his thighs she more or less handed that kid's mother all the ammunition she needed to follow in pursuit. In Dutch there is a saying which applies to this; "Wat gij niet wilt dat u geschiedt, doet dat ook een ander niet", it translates to "Do not do unto others what you do not want to have done upon yourself".

This is the first time I've heard of that. I can just imagine being somewhere loud and giving the ok / perfect symbol to a friend across the room and then being called a racist. Damn, that's scary.

edoceo 6y ago

A thumbs up is still acceptable and has not yet been hijacked by assholes.

skinkestek 6y ago
I remember from back when I picked up Norwegian litterature, a short story or essay or something that ended with something along the lines of: "cucumbers is the only thing that hasn't been deemed unhealthy yet. Hurry up and eat cucumbers while they are still healthy!"
- iRobbery 6y ago
  https://www.businessinsider.com/spain-cucumber-crisis-ecoli-2011-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/spain-cucumber-crisis-ecoli-... i hope you stopped eating them 2011 ;-)
s- 6y ago
Thumbs up is definitely offensive in some cultures
- edoceo 6y ago
  Right, it's offensive in Iran (according to a quick DDG) - but offensive != hijacked and repurposed.

snowwrestler 6y ago

That won't happen; context matters. If you're posing with the confederate flag and a bunch of guns during a BLM protest, and flashing the OK hand symbol, it's going to be taken very differently from just using that same gesture to a friend in a random grocery store or something.

mistermann 6y ago
Context or innocence does not protect you: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/613615/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article...
serf 6y ago
>That won't happen; context matters. how many times does that have to be proven wrong? Mob-justice is all the rage right now. All that matters is that someone is pointing the pitch-forks at you or your cause.

FireBeyond 6y ago

If that's what you got out of this, I'm not sure what to say. I even used the SCUBA shop, which is next door, for reference. No-one that I've seen has advocated that the OK sign be abandoned for divers. I've been mid mouthful at a restaurant when a server has asked how my food is and I've made this sign and not been called a racist. However, should I and half a dozen of my buddies, armed an in full tactical gear, standing 10 ft from a BLM protest, waving my Confederate flags, all choose to make this sign for a photo, then a _reasonable person_ may choose to interpret this as "we know exactly what we're implying here, and we're not all just telling the cameraman that "everything is perfect"."

skinkestek 6y ago
A bloke (and a less privileged bloke at that, 75% non white according to himself) was recently fired because someone had shot a photo of him resting his hand out the window of a company truck in what lpoked line an OK hand. It was discussed here a few days ago. Stop firing the innocent or something, from the Atlantic.
- Smoosh 6y ago
  oh, come on. "resting his hand ... what looked like" ??? Wasn't the story that people in another car taunted him and urged him to make the symbol, and they recorded it when he did? He may have not known what the meaning was (I believe that is what he claimed) but that is an entirely different defense to make than "I wasn't doing it, it just looked a bit like it".
  - geronimoe 6y ago
    What are you talking about? You need to defend yourself for hand gestures now? You need to preface your arguments with "I'm not white" now? The point is he didn't make a racist gesture, so why are we even talking about it.
  - skinkestek 6y ago
    Point is it seems he did it after they kept following him and trying to get him to do it, it seems the guys in the other car even did it first to try to get him to mimic it. And that is before we talk about the problem with firing someone over this in the first place. Context is important. I have had to tell my kids more than once that when an elderly person use their middle finger to point at something it isn't offensive because they grew up in a time when it didn't matter. That elderly person sure doesn't mean "F* you" as they are pointing their middle finger horizontally towards something while saying "look there". In fact I think we all do something every single day that would be considered offensive by someone at some point.

breakbread 6y ago

My wife is a high school teacher and, until we had our first child, was also the swim team coach. Early last year she made a kid run laps after he low key photo-bombed the team picture by making the "Ok" symbol on one of his thighs. Then she gets an angry text message from the kid's mother who believed her son was being punished specifically for making the "ok" symbol. This woman had found a picture of my wife on Facebook where she can be seen pulling her shirt down by pinching the bottom of it between her thumb and pointer finger, inadvertently making the "ok" symbol. She basically said she was going to put my wife on blast and out her as a racist. Ridiculous (Hilarious, even, in retrospect). My wife didn't respond, of course. She immediately looped in her admin and explained what was going on. Fortunately that was the end of it, but it's not hard to imagine someone getting caught up in a similar situation and it becoming a full on witch hunt.

Yetanfou 6y ago
> My wife didn't respond, of course. She immediately looped in her admin and explained what was going on. Fortunately that was the end of it, but it's not hard to imagine someone getting caught up in a similar situation and it becoming a full on witch hunt. Well, the hunt began when your wife made a kid run laps because he made an OK sign on his leg because he thought that was a 'cool' thing to do comparable to giving the person in front of you 'rabbit ears' by making a V-sign behind their head, not when that kid's mother started social media dumpster diving for 'evidence' to use against your wife. The way to avoid these witch hunts is to avoid starting them, not to make the first step and then complain when others follow suit. She could have taken the kid aside and asked him why he made that sign, he probably would have replied he got it off the 'net or from his friends who made him think it was 'cool'. She then could have told him why it is not cool, i.e. that him making that sign would be interpreted by some as him being a supporter of a nefarious ideology. By singling him out to run laps after he low key photo-bombed the team picture by making the "Ok" symbol on one of his thighs she more or less handed that kid's mother all the ammunition she needed to follow in pursuit. In Dutch there is a saying which applies to this; "Wat gij niet wilt dat u geschiedt, doet dat ook een ander niet", it translates to "Do not do unto others what you do not want to have done upon yourself".