Its a racist day in my neighborhood.

[Phisi]

Well done, you sir, have extraordinary self control. As to asking if someone were adopted, I don't think that is much to do with racism but assumptions that break the norm or the perceived norm. For example in say, of a couple with blonde hair and their children also have blonde hair except for one, it breaks the expectation of what you you think is normal. It could just be normal genetics or the husband or wife could be their step-parent or they could be adopted or the mother could have had a fling with the postman Not racist, just confused. It happens with other stuff as well, if you shave your hair when the Worlds Greatest Shave is running but then say you didn't do it for that, people get confused and make assumptions like maybe you have cancer or your workplace requires it or you were just getting hot.

 

[trollnystan]

@trollnystan

your avatar.... is that... GARRUS!?
he is NOT doing some calibrations

Alas it is not, although I pretend it is. (Damn those calibrations... I have some "calibrations" for him to do, if you know what I mean, wink wink nudge nudge...)

Spoiler: It is the Techno Turian from Thane's loyalty mission

 

[michiehoward]

Well done, you sir, have extraordinary self control. As to asking if someone were adopted, I don't think that is much to do with racism but assumptions that break the norm or the perceived norm. For example in say, of a couple with blonde hair and their children also have blonde hair except for one, it breaks the expectation of what you you think is normal. It could just be normal genetics or the husband or wife could be their step-parent or they could be adopted or the mother could have had a fling with the postman Not racist, just confused. It happens with other stuff as well, if you shave your hair when the Worlds Greatest Shave is running but then say you didn't do it for that, people get confused and make assumptions like maybe you have cancer or your workplace requires it or you were just getting hot.

I can't explain, really, I know it sound so doucheie but it really has to happen too you. Ok if you want a clear cut example. Circa 1986

My mother, and my grandmother (my dad's mom) and I are walking down Lake Shore Blvd. My grandmother spots a lady she has known since highschool and who has been outta Canada for over a decade. Anyway the "oh my God's how have you been's and so good to see you's" ensue. Afew minutes elaspe time for introductions. Before my grandmother gets out "This is my daughter-in law and my granddaughter" This woman pipes in with.

"Oh my God! Evelyn when did you have another child?!?!!?"

My mother was holding my hand. My grandma was in her 60's at the time, pretty much biologically impossible or rather VERY improbable that you had me, this woman assumed my mom was the help.

 

[Al-Bundy-da-G]

Don't take this the wrong way, but the idea of saying that a word such as gook, red-skins, or even ****** is racis is in itself racist. I understand how the word can and does offend, but in the end it's just a vibration in the air nothing more.

OT: As the others said striking the man would have ended badly for you and only you. In America it is a felony to assault someone, which leads to losing rights if convicted. I admit I know nothing about the Canadian justice system, but I would imagine it has a similar result. Besides that even if the charges are dropped you still would have tarnished your reputation, and in all likely hood, lost your job as well.

The best solution it would seem, would be to simply ignore this and continue conversation as normal, unless your temper is far gone enough to simply have it out in a verbal sparring session.

On an off note, I just realised how pretentious I sound when I trying to be polite.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Eh, I probably would've said something. We had a contractor working on our house for a few days. We talked while he was taking breaks, mostly chit chat, etc. Then one day I hear him talking to my brother in earnest about how God created HIV to kill gay people. And my brother was just going along with it, nodding. I confronted him, told him how he was demonstrably wrong, and left.

My brother probably doesn't even remember this incident anymore, but I won't ever forget how weak he was.

I know what you mean. Taking the easy way out, overtly or tacitly agreeing rather than confronting is so tempting...and nobody seems to want to admit they might take that route themselves.

That guy who was a racist also was really cool to you, bringing you coffee and talking about something as personal as a situation of living with a foster family. (basically opening his heart to you more than most people do)

I want to ask you this; how much of your anger was at the fact that you realized racists can be nice people too? I think that was what hurt you more, rather than the slurs themselves.

That pain you felt due to this realization, my friend, is the product of our society that demonizes racists and is completely black and white about this issue. (pun not intended)

I'd agree with that. Well, I wouldn't have said that racist people can be nice, rather that they can be otherwise nice. Racism is a rather large (if not uncommon) flaw.

But yeah, it doesn't have to be the moustache twirling villains that fuck people over, it can be normal, everyday folk, who are convinced (not without reason) that they are good people.

And then again, few people will sit down and say "I will be racist today", what they do or say would seem personally reasonable to them, they just can't or won't see the problems they are causing.

 

[Batou667]

P.S. I think "Quadroons" is an awesome word. I have no context to use it in, but wow...

Possibly even cooler-sounding is "Octaroon", which is somebody who is half-quadroon (at this point I'd personally just be inclined to start calling the person "white", but apparently the distinction was important in the past - slave owners in the South used to legally have slaves, some of which were only one part in 32 African...). Here in the UK even the phrase "mulatto" would seem antiquated and pejorative, but if it's been disassociated from its racist connotations in other parts of the world, that can only be a positive thing.

As for the OP's dilemma: I think that just saying "Well, not all black people are like that. I'm actually part-black myself" would have shut the guy up good and proper. It's amazing how quickly some people's fervently-held beliefs evaporate when challenged. I suspect the guy wasn't a real racist at all, he was just latching onto "fashionable" anti-black sentiment to appear to have an opinion on the matter.

 

[Aurgelmir]

As much as it sucks you probably did the best thing. For one, you don't want to make an major issue where you and this tenant can't get along. He can easily make your life hell. For another, it shows you're the bigger person.

Honestly, I can't believe people still think like this. I know older men who will tell you they had been racist before. I asked one what changed and he said that he realized society looked down on that kind of thing nowadays and would only make his life hard, so he basically just stopped. I'm sure it wasn't THAT simple, but considering some of the stories I heard, its something else that either of them are not racist these days. If they can see that, why can't others?

Sometimes all you need is to learn about other races to understand that they are not any different from your own race.

Judge the person, not the race a lot of people say... and I agree fully.

 

[CrazyGirl17]

Good for you for not submitting to violence, if that had been me, I woulda kicked him in the crotch or something. But he shouldn't be allowed ti get away with it, I think.

 

[Denariax]

Absolutely nothing.

Take the moral high ground and smile. It'll only infuriate them more.

 

[Marmooset]

Well, here's a solution:

 

[EeveeElectro]

You did the right thing. Even if you ranted and raved at him for hours on end, his stupid, small ignorant mind wouldn't have been able to understand and he wouldn't have changed anyway.
You maybe should have mentioned about your movie, if he had ant decency he would have apologised and stopped talking.
Also it depends if he was giving it the whole, "One person annoyed me, so I'm going to judge all black people on that individual..." or if he was just using her skin colour against her.
He sounds a bit ignorant anyway, it's best to just ignore those people.

 

[jessegeek]

Thank you all for you kind comments, but as I must face this tenant tomorrow, and this jerk will try to bring me a coffee, I must say something before he runs his mouth again, I rent to the majority of my family, he will eventually see that my mother is a black woman.

So I either show him, tell him, or throw the god damn coffee in his face.

And yes it was that I had nothing but anger to spew at him, and being at work, that I remained silent.

And you know, oddly enough it the major thing was I had not been faced with such obvious in your face racism in so long, that I was shocked that anyone from any generation still openly talked this way with relative strangers. Really I was shocked.

snip

snip

You both said better, yeah I was just flabbergasted at the openness of it as well.

I feel so bad for you, but you definitely did the right thing. I think that perhaps verbally countering him in a calm way the next time you see him may be the best way forward.

Also in response to how shocked you were that those attitudes still exist, sadly I think racism is persistent in all generations. I'm from the UK and have lived there all my life, and my dad is white British and my mother is Brazilian, so I have dark tan colouring. Thing is, both my mother and myself look like we could be Arabic. Post 9/11, when I was 10 years old, a group of men in their twenties yelled at me to go back where I came from. A girl at my school commented that "like most Arabs, your mum thinks she's superior to everyone else" and over the last decade I have been spat at in the street 3 times. At my high school, I have called out multiple people for making homophobic. anti Semitic and racist jokes and comments which they cracked because no openly gay or Jewish or black people were in the room, so therefore no-one will find it offensive.

All of the people who perpetrated these racist actions were aged 10-30. I do not live in a white-bred, backwater community, but in one of the most diverse cities in the UK, which has one of the lowest crime rates. I've come to the conclusion that there is a loud and ignorant minority in most places, but they are a tiny minority.

 

[Signa]

Sounds like you need to ask yourself what bothered you most about his use of the word.

Firstly he was lying. Secondly what bothered me was he used the word because he thought he was safe saying ****** in a private conversation with two other white people.

Well, you were there and I wasn't so I won't disagree, but you said it yourself:

and he piped up with his former social worker was a black woman and was a ******.

If that's the way he said it, then everything I've said in this thread sounds true. To him, there is a difference between some one who is black, and someone who is a ******. Maybe he thought he was speaking in the clear, but us whities have gotten pretty good at policing our own when it comes to rampant racism (just look at all the people in this thread calling him a piece of shit). He'd have to be completely stupid if he thought that it was OK to just approach you as start talking about his Klan meetings.

And please understand, I'm not trying to defend the guy for being an idiot. You were definitely the better man in this case. I'm just trying to point out that as careless as he was, it might not have been driven by actual hatred for those with darker skin than him.

 

[Dastardly]

But now 10 hours later what is bothering me is that I just walked away and let him carry on. I was choking on rage and stomach bile was curdling up in to my mouth. I couldn't even think of a sensible non-violent or non-insulting thing to say.

What should I have done?

1. It is good that you are that bothered by this.
2. It is good that you did nothing about this.
3. The combination of those two things is one of the most awful truths in the entire world.

What can you do? Arguing with someone in that state of mind (theirs, I mean, not yours) is fruitless, because they are not reasoning. They're speaking from the emotional, reactive part of the brain, not the part that governs reasoning and higher-order thinking. It would truly be like trying to "talk" a frenzied lion into not eating you.

So, you won't convince them of anything. What's the other alternative? Make them stop? Then you're in trouble, because it's not illegal to be a racist... but it is illegal to assault someone (including "for being racist").

All we can hope to do is marginalize these people, so that their ideas are not given any greater voice. With luck, that will mean they'll be forgotten in time.

 

[repeating integers]

Just quickly, yeah you probably did the best thing, it's not worth losing your job.

When customers/clients say things that I disagree with or am offended by at work I tend to just not say anything.

I think it may be worth saying something next time you see him, just rehearse it before hand and once you're done walk away to avoid getting your blood pressure too high.

If you'd not been at work I'd have said you should have had a go at him, but as I said, it's not worth losing your job.

Also, where do "Mulatto" and "Quadroons" come from? Is this a local thing or does everyone else just know this. I understand what they're supposed to mean (because they were explained) but where do they come from and what's the story with them.

For a little reference as to why I might not have encountered them, I'm an Aussie, so it could just be they're not used here, and I'm only 21 so it could be a generational thing.

A Mulatto is someone who is half-black, a Quadroon is someone who is 1/4 black. They are old terms that aren't used much nowadays for fear of sounding racist. I know I tend to associate them with the selling of slaves.

OT: I think you did the right thing. If you do bring it up to the man next time he tries to bring you coffee, try to keep a calm head, hard though it may be.

EDIT: Lol, ninja'd by the OP =P

This is COMPLETELY offtopic, but I'm currently listening to Money, by Pink Floyd. I swear to god, your avatar is dancing to it perfectly. I could watch it all day - well, for all 6 minutes of the song anyway.

OT: Next time you see him, why don't you politely explain your heritage and how you find the terms he used offensive? From your description of him, he sounds like he's otherwise a nice guy, I'm sure you could convince him of the error of his ways.

 

[FarleShadow]

Am I the only person bothered with our current fad of 'rising bile' when talking to people who hold racist beliefs?

Its just when, like the op, you're going to 'explode' because they're being intolerant smacks of precisely the same intolerance that racism does..

Or, as one image I saw that had me in fits:
"STOP LIKING WHAT I DON'T LIKE"

 

[Ipsen]

Sounds like you need to ask yourself what bothered you most about his use of the word.

Firstly he was lying. Secondly what bothered me was he used the word because he thought he was safe saying ****** in a private conversation with two other white people.

Well, you were there and I wasn't so I won't disagree, but you said it yourself:

and he piped up with his former social worker was a black woman and was a ******.

If that's the way he said it, then everything I've said in this thread sounds true. To him, there is a difference between some one who is black, and someone who is a ******. Maybe he thought he was speaking in the clear, but us whities have gotten pretty good at policing our own when it comes to rampant racism (just look at all the people in this thread calling him a piece of shit). He'd have to be completely stupid if he thought that it was OK to just approach you as start talking about his Klan meetings.

And please understand, I'm not trying to defend the guy for being an idiot. You were definitely the better man in this case. I'm just trying to point out that as careless as he was, it might not have been driven by actual hatred for those with darker skin than him.

Been reading your posts on this topic for a bit now, Signa, but I gotta chip in now.

First, let's put out a thought about the word '******'. If you're going by the 'Chris Rock definition', you're still wrong, or at least missing the obvious part of the insult. Unless you're just too caught up in the cultural stigma surrounding the word, ****** stems from the latin adjective for 'black'. So no, it does not JUST a word for theives, murderers, and fools, otherwise society would have picked something more fitting. You can't separate what '******' means on the surface (and what that color STILL implies today in topics of race), and its deeper meaning.

Now, our offensive co-worker at the office might not have thought so much about the word, but he still used it. He essentially called this black woman 'black', but he knows he meant something more mean spirited than that. But if he's going to use an insult that refers to an entire race of the human population, than he insults everyone of that race by his own mean-spiritedness.

So yea, OP has the right to feel angry, and OP did the right thing for walking away; unless you're personally invested with this person, they're showing that they've no need to be enlightened by your life struggles. Let them pass with their small-minded bigotry.

All this just being my view, but I take a hard stance against the word, mainly for its weird both its weird cultural stigma and persistence (the term 'black' refering to my race helps with that persistence).