When a non-white person uses the word "cracker" they aren't referring to a word that is synonymous with 400 years of oppression, ignorance, hatred, and flat out bigotry solely based on the color of one's skin. I used to think the same way, I thought "why should words be off limits to white people", but that was when I was young and did not understand the power those words held at other points in our history. For the most part, words are just words, racial slurs have been used by comedians lately as part of jokes, and we laugh at them because of the shock value. The N-word however is something that is just different than anything else in America, as B-Bob so eloquently stated, that word is a word that comes with special connotations and for a white person to use it really just isn't cool.
I've got a question. If there is another group that can identify with being enslaved, mistreated, and basically all the background the N word has accumulated, would it it be offensive if they used it?
Remember, there is a difference between N---ER and N---A. N---ER - Derogatory. N---A - What rappers and black youth use. Basically 'bro'. Other races can say this without getting their asses kicked, but it's frowned upon. (I've used it with black friends numerous times as a joke). I've never heard a black person say N---ER.
My question is why do the blacks bring up being "slavery" and "held back" so much for so long ... when the rest of the world ... lived in and have slavery. Asia/Africa/Europe ect. pre- 1930's but it seems everybody have moved on but them. I believe that if the Hispanics or Chinese were brought over as slave instead of the Blacks ...... we wont hear the same complaint as we do now. Nobody I know is really racist, but have the same view on this. How long can the slavery of 2+ generations hold down a person born in this generations. I know families from Mexico and China that came here with basically nothing, and maded a decent living here. I'm not trying to be a racist here, but I just dont understand. I heard stories about Mexican's family members dieing trying to come over to work and find a better place. Then you hear stories about the ones that are already here living of the governments and still complaining. Maybe is not being racist but is the race that portray how people view them. I have friends from Taiwan, HK, and Mexico that come and visit for a short period .... and have the same view by the time they leave. Is 2010 .... time to move on.
(1) Everyone hasn't moved on. Go visit post-colonial Africa. Or India. Or the Middle East. Talk to a Jew. The legacy of oppression, in whichever form it may take shape, isn't something that works itself out in a generation. (2) Legally blacks were freed during the Civil War. But it took almost another 100 years for them to gain the same basic civil rights as whites in this country. During the interim, they were degraded, dehumanized, and practically re-enslaved through legislature and sometimes terror. This is not something that works itself out in a generation. (3) Asians, hispanics and other minorities were not brought into the country en masse and dehumanized, rounded and sold like cattle for the purpose of forced labor. We did not fight a war over (among other things) the right for an entire section of our country to enslave hispanics, asians and other minority groups. We did not institute an entire code of law for the express purpose of dehumanizing and reenslaving these peoples after they were freed. There many sociological issues among African Americans -- the state of our education, our music, our struggle to become just 'Americans' while not denying our culture or history, the disproportionate number of our males who are currently incarcerated -- that can trace their roots back to slavery.
It goes like this. Four hundreds of years only whites were able to be in government, own land, form most businesses, get into the best colleges and universities, run education, etc. Slavery ended, but oppression continued. Meanwhile Blacks still weren't even allowed an equal education. So more whites control more businesses, hold more government jobs, control more seats of higher education. Now anyone who knows about where we learn knows that much of education comes from parents and families. You have families that were denied equal education, have nobody representing their interests in government for hundreds of years. Once they attempted to give equal access to education and voting the schools didn't even know how to address the needs of learners who mostly came from generations of people who weren't allowed to have top quality education, so the education system failed in large part. So even at this point the people who give out jobs who have connections are almost entirely white. They are the power base, and their connections are white. To think that 400 years of this kind of thing can be completely undone in 50 years is a little silly. Now to talk about other groups doing better is interesting because their are actual studies done. And groups that were colonized, enslaved, and/or conquered do worse than other immigrant groups who came voluntarily. This is true even though they may have come from similar economic backgrounds etc. So Hawaiians, Mexicans, African Americans, and Native Americans all perform at a level that is different from recent West African immigrants, Asians, South Americans, and others that came here voluntarily. You should really try and read more, because my own understanding is limited, but I hope this little bits helps answer your questions.
To add something You think everything is equal now? Go visit the schools in urban communities today. Go look at a city like Kansas City and tell me how a black person expects to get a halfway decent education with a school district ripe with corruption that doesnt give a **** about its students. Go tell me a school district with a 1:1 ratio of teachers and administrators really cares about the welfare of its students.You have a schools there with over 75% of its kids below the poverty line and 95% are African American, an administration that's only interested in fattening its wallet, and teachers who either leave from being disillusioned or just stop caring either. And its not funding either. They have classrooms with brand new chemistry equipment but no teachers who know what to do with it because no sane and competent teacher wants to deal with a corrupt administration like that. You have kids that have been outright shot at school, when I was in debate in high school I spoke to a kid who had his brother shot at lunch. There's no sanity in those conditions. And this isnt limited to Kansas City. Urban schools are a joke in tons of places in America and 50 years after the civil rights act we've failed African American children in schools across the country. So there's no moving on when the people running our most important institutions, our schools, still fail communities that could benefit the most from it. Yes people come here and can do well but dont somehow pretend that its equal and simple hard work makes things work. You can work as hard as you want in a school that I described at and still fail.
Treated all the same. You think people got in trouble for killing a Chinese or Irish railroad worker back then? Nope.
it's become so common that middle white class kids are calling each other this without knowing what they are saying. racism, it's everywhere. in japan, where i live and work, people who are NOT japanese are called "gaijin" which written literally means "outsider". foreigners here are treated as second hand citizens. it's ignorance, but a part of how people perceive others.
Yeah but they don't think of you as inferior necessarily, just different and not local. In fact, many Japanese view Whites as superior. And most importantly, you aren't going to be beat up and lynched for being a gaijin.
indeed. japanese people in general are "shy". they don't have a lot of faith in their english, and therefore might give you the feeling that whites are superior. if you are japanese, i'm sure they will tell you something of a different than what you believe.
Ever seen those "Japanese Only" stores and spots? This is something American tourists really need to learn. Just because you hear stories of people going to bars and clubs where a lot of foreigners hang out and how friendly the locals there are, doesn't that's how all of them behave. Ever stop and think what kind of locals go to those bars in the first place to meet foreigners?
Annnnd what is your point in the thread? Seriously. That an entire ethnic group is biologically set to be self-pitying and whiny? Good thesis, bro. By the way, most of the people advocating some consideration and decency in this thread are not of african decent, for what it's worth. Did they have their whiny gene activated by standing to close to a dark person? If you want to make an analogy, such as: Chinese people were once treated by Japanese people with a harshness and inhumanity of a scale that is not unlike what a large group of Africans once experienced at the hands of Americans, then you might have some interesting historical angle, at least worthy of discussion. But to say (for instance) that Chinese people coming to north america had it every bit as bad, and on the same numerical scale, that Africans did... That's some radical history, unless the real transcontinental railroad was about 300 miles wide and has been hidden from us.
