Have you ever feel offended by...

[joygasm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kragey He doesn't even tell them he's Punjabi anymore, he just says "Indian." And they STILL DON'T GET IT! And he's not even a Muslim...his father is a Muslim, but his mother is a Hindu, and he was raised in an agnostic household. He has no accent, a wheaten complexion...it's so strange! I don't understand how people can't understand "Indian." Even if they aren't sure whether you mean American Indian or actually Indian (and that catches me, too, because I know some people still say "Indian" for "Native American"), I mean, India is a HUGE FREAKING COUNTRY, and everybody in the US knows at least a little about Native Americans. That's elementary school education!

Haha I know that also gets me. I hate when they ask me if I'm an american indian or a "dot head" indian. First of all my family is very much christian, not hindu.
That also really offends me.
I don't get how people don't see how insensitive their remarks can be. :/
When people tell me they're german I don't assume they're nazis. :/

 

[Kragey]

Quote:

Originally Posted by joygasm Haha I know that also gets me. I hate when they ask me if I'm an american indian or a "dot head" indian. First of all my family is very much christian, not hindu. That also really offends me. I don't get how people don't see how insensitive their remarks can be. :/ When people tell me they're german I don't assume they're nazis. :/

I get that one a lot, actually. XD

 

[joygasm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kragey I get that one a lot, actually. XD

Wow, just shows people won't get over themselves.

 

[LatteQueen]

WHOA..WHERE DO YOU LIVE to have such idiot assholes treat you this way? I am a Baptist and I HAVE NEVER EVER IN ALL MY LIFE been subjected like this like you are....

Pray for them that's all I can say..No matter what you say to them will never change their minds, thoughts, opinions of you and your belief..GOD WILL FIGHT ALL OF YOUR BATTLES GIRL..REMEMBER THAT..AS LONG AS YOU BELIEVE IN HIM NOTHING CAN GO WRONG..

 

[joygasm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LatteQueen WHOA..WHERE DO YOU LIVE to have such idiot assholes treat you this way? I am a Baptist and I HAVE NEVER EVER IN ALL MY LIFE been subjected like this like you are.... Pray for them that's all I can say..No matter what you say to them will never change their minds, thoughts, opinions of you and your belief..GOD WILL FIGHT ALL OF YOUR BATTLES GIRL..REMEMBER THAT..AS LONG AS YOU BELIEVE IN HIM NOTHING CAN GO WRONG..

Who exactly are you talking to? I'm confused.

 

[Lauudd]

I hateeee when movies/people show/say Southamerica like the poorest place in the world, like we're almost wearing a feather in our heads.... please people don't generalise...
Last year I went to Germany and I got some questions asked, some of them:
1.- Where in Europa is Chile? ...............
2.- Do you have cars in Chile?
3.- Do you have tv's in Chile?
4.- Do you have mobile phones in Chile?
I was like OH MY GOD... do you think I live in the middle of the jungle, or what...?

You can find poor people in here (like in every place of the world), there are homeless, but it's not all of us, it's just a small piece of our population. Most of us (if not everybody) have mobile phones, tv's, and maybe cars....... and yes we dress just like you.

 

[malaviKat]

Quote:

Originally Posted by joygasm Haha I know that also gets me. I hate when they ask me if I'm an american indian or a "dot head" indian. First of all my family is very much christian, not hindu. That also really offends me. I don't get how people don't see how insensitive their remarks can be. :/ When people tell me they're german I don't assume they're nazis. :/

I haven't read the entire board so forgive this intrusion if I've misinterpreted something...

I used to get a lot of that online from a different online community. Basically to be Indian (or of Indian descent) meant I had to have a "paki-dot" and that I was automatically Hindu. And if I wasn't that, it was assumed that I was Aboriginal/Native (Canadian). A few people accused me of lying or being confused (as though I somehow didn't know what I was.)

I'm pretty far removed from India and Hinduism so... yeah. And when you consider the fact that Trinidad and Guyana are the only real places to find people of Indian descent in the Caribbean...admitting that I'm Trinidadian often gets a "but you're not black!" in response... I had a friend from 7th grade til halfway through university assume that I was black. When he admitted that to me I was flabbergasted.

An interesting book on Indians and the Indian diaspora... "Being Indian" by Pavan Varma.

 

[joygasm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by malaviKat I haven't read the entire board so forgive this intrusion if I've misinterpreted something... I used to get a lot of that online from a different online community. Basically to be Indian (or of Indian descent) meant I had to have a "paki-dot" and that I was automatically Hindu. And if I wasn't that, it was assumed that I was Aboriginal/Native (Canadian). A few people accused me of lying or being confused (as though I somehow didn't know what I was.) I'm pretty far removed from India and Hinduism so... yeah. And when you consider the fact that Trinidad and Guyana are the only real places to find people of Indian descent in the Caribbean...admitting that I'm Trinidadian often gets a "but you're not black!" in response... I had a friend from 7th grade til halfway through university assume that I was black. When he admitted that to me I was flabbergasted. An interesting book on Indians and the Indian diaspora... "Being Indian" by Pavan Varma.

I always get that also!
If I tell someone I'm trinidadian they assume that you have to be black to be from the caribbean.
My dentist is from trinidad and he's chinese.
My aunt is spaniard and she is also Trinidadian.
So I don't see why they assume you have to be a certain race.

My friends father is indian and he is jamaican, i just think most of them reside in those two countries.


I hate when people assume I'm guyanese just cause there is an overload here and they are all indian....

 

[Shadowy Lady]

Quote:

Originally Posted by malaviKat I'm pretty far removed from India and Hinduism so... yeah. And when you consider the fact that Trinidad and Guyana are the only real places to find people of Indian descent in the Caribbean...admitting that I'm Trinidadian often gets a "but you're not black!" in response... I had a friend from 7th grade til halfway through university assume that I was black. When he admitted that to me I was flabbergasted. An interesting book on Indians and the Indian diaspora... "Being Indian" by Pavan Varma.

I agree with your post. My husband is from Guyana and he's half black and half Amerindian (native American), but most of his friends from back home are Indian (and no they're not hindu).

 

[malaviKat]

^^ Yes from my understanding Indian migrants (and their descendants) are found primarily in Trinidad and Guyana. This is not to say that you can't find them elsewhere in the Caribbean but they tend to be located in mainly those two countries. (Something to do with the historic movement of indentured labour, I guess.) Most people who aren't from the Caribbean tend to assume that everybody coming out of the Caribbean is black or of African descent... which really couldn't be further from the truth!

 

[BEA2LS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by joygasm When people tell me they're german I don't assume they're nazis. :/

sadly, i do get that one, a lot.. i also get a lot of white jokes.. like about white people. it happens at my work and people get away with it, which is not right.

 

[xsnowwhite]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BEA2LS sadly, i do get that one, a lot.. i also get a lot of white jokes.. like about white people. it happens at my work and people get away with it, which is not right.

I get that too, if people hear I'm German they make some type of stupid comment.

 

[blazeno.8]

I guess something that annoys and saddens me more than flat out offends me is when someone assumes that I have to interact with them because of race. And then assumes that if I don't interact, it's not because I'm busy, it's not because they're trying to bum money off of me that I don't want to give, and it's not because they're way too old to be hitting on me... no, it's obviously because I'm racist or I've "forgotten where I come from".

And to the people who have the whole accusation of being white thing... yeah, that's annoying too. I can totally feel you there. I mean, what do they have to prove by saying that their name is "blacker" than mine or that I sound white?

Sometimes I feel that people who do and say these kinds of things are more worried about race and maintaining certain racial division in social interaction than the people they accuse of behaving in a racist way.

 

[joygasm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by blazeno.8 And to the people who have the whole accusation of being white thing... yeah, that's annoying too. I can totally feel you there. I mean, what do they have to prove by saying that their name is "blacker" than mine or that I sound white?

OMG I HATE THAT.
Honestly how can you 'sound' like a race?
I get that a lot...

 

[blazeno.8]

^Well I mean, I've done some work with sociolinguistics and I understand part of where this ideal of a given group sounding a particular way comes from, but at the same time you have the issue that there are so many white people who sound... well different. I'm sure a lot of people who say stuff like that would complain about being glommed into a particular group with misleading stereotypes associated with it, but in essence, they're buying into similar stereotypes.

 

[malaviKat]

^^ I think I understand what you're getting at.

I used to get told that I "sounded white" (interestingly by other people of colour). When I delved further into it, as I had no idea how one could "sound white", I found that what they meant was... "you sound educated". And by extension... "how dare you speak that way?"

I found that doubly offensive as a) it suggested people of colour could/should not be educated and b) that to aspire to that meant you were "selling out". How terrible that it came from people with a similar background! (Not that I'd have received it better from a different source.)

 

[Kragey]

Quote:

Originally Posted by blazeno.8 I guess something that annoys and saddens me more than flat out offends me is when someone assumes that I have to interact with them because of race. And then assumes that if I don't interact, it's not because I'm busy, it's not because they're trying to bum money off of me that I don't want to give, and it's not because they're way too old to be hitting on me... no, it's obviously because I'm racist or I've "forgotten where I come from". And to the people who have the whole accusation of being white thing... yeah, that's annoying too. I can totally feel you there. I mean, what do they have to prove by saying that their name is "blacker" than mine or that I sound white? Sometimes I feel that people who do and say these kinds of things are more worried about race and maintaining certain racial division in social interaction than the people they accuse of behaving in a racist way.

I absolutely cannot STAND that stuff. "They need to stop talking black!" "You're black, why do you talk like a white person?" Uh, you can have an accent from living in a certain area, NOT from being a certain race. If that was the way it worked, then why don't ALL black people talk like they're from Georgia and why don't ALL white people talk like they're from the Midwest? BECAUSE THEY'RE NOT, DAMMIT.

 

[blazeno.8]

Quote:

Originally Posted by malaviKat ^^ I think I understand what you're getting at. I used to get told that I "sounded white" (interestingly by other people of colour). When I delved further into it, as I had no idea how one could "sound white", I found that what they meant was... "you sound educated". And by extension... "how dare you speak that way?" I found that doubly offensive as a) it suggested people of colour could/should not be educated and b) that to aspire to that meant you were "selling out". How terrible that it came from people with a similar background! (Not that I'd have received it better from a different source.)

Well there have been people who ask me about the way I talk who are white, but they're not from the US. I get the feeling that they were asking a sincere question out of curiosity... they weren't trying to pass a judgment on me and telling me that I "forgot where I come from" or "black people shouldn't forget their roots" like some of the nut bags that seem to come out of the woodwork here.

 

[greengoesmoo]

I offended someone by accident yesterday. It wasn't racially offensive but I should know that some words mean stronger things to some people.

I have never received racial abuse at myself, partially because 1/4 chinese in all british otherwise doesn't physically show up as "not white" but I have had a lot of racial comments regarding my boyf, he's half indian, and my god some people can't get over it! I scraped off a few old friends because of thier opinion of him simply because of the colour of his skin.

When I c onfronted a couple of people about this bulls'#t, the issue however was not that he wasn't white, it was that he was HALF white. "if you want a mongrel, buy a dog!"

Until we got together, I was totally unaware of some of the views a couple of my what I regarded as fairly close friends held!

I don't socialise much in my own town these days, we do actually have a fairly serious racism problem in Chatham.