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Are you saying it would be racist in that context? Because that's the key here: If it's a person of the same colour leveling the insult, you'll have a hard time convincing anyone - gammon, eggplant, or whatever - that it's racially motivated.
Sure. I mean you're assuming you can only say something racist if you have racist motivation. That isn't true. I've complained in the past that the bar for racism is far too low, but here we are now setting the bar too high.
Yes ffs. He was a black character in a book. Are you going to suggest there's no racial connotation to the term Uncle Tom?
I feel like you're deliberately missing the point to troll me. Uncle Tom was specifically someone who was servient to white people. It's not a colour, or a reference to a colour, it's a reference to a fictional individual.
I know you don't think the Uncle Tom reference is racist. So you're simply trying to say that this reference is comparable to "gammon". It's not.
Then so is Uncle Tom. And, since people like Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali used it, ergo, you must believe those black men were racist against black people.
No.
If I call you Tommy Robinson because you're a racist twat, I'm not being racist, even though Tommy Robinson is white. This is basically what you're arguing with the Uncle Tom thing. I wouldn't call a racist black person Tommy Robinson, it makes no sense. Well, I might call someone a black Tommy Robinson, but then again I could call someone a white Uncle Tom, if indeed they were servient to black oppressors. That wouldn't be racist either.
The reference is to a person, not a colour. Stop pretending that you can't see that.
You're still extremely conveniently ignoring that the person doing the name-calling is the same colour as the person they are insulting.
I haven't ignored that. I addressed it. Here...
 Originally Posted by ong
If we have an example of a black person using the word against another black person to cause shock or distress, then yes that's racism.
How in the fucking universe can that be racist?
Let's look at this from a different angle. If I am an employer, as a male, and choose to employ only women, am I discriminating against men? Of course I am. Men can be sexist to other men. And yes it's possible for black people to be racist to other black people. An example would be a black person calling another black person by the n-word purely to upset that person. That is racism. Or a black employer deciding that he doesn't want to employ other black people because, idk, he thinks Africans have a lower IQ than white people (and that perhaps he's an exception).
Are white people calling angry ignoramuses gammons racist against all white people?
Sure. I'm pretty sure if I get angry enough, I'll turn gammon coloured. So even if the insult isn't directed at me, even if the insult was used by a white person, it's still a reference to skin colour that applies to all white people. This is why I think white people using this term are stupid.
No, they just don't like angry ignoramuses.
Great. So if I don't like angry black people, I can call them eggplant, and that's not offensive to non-angry black people. Right? You seem to be ignoring this counterpoint.
It's not a racial insult, it's an insult based on their behaviour.
I agree, which is why I don't consider this to be serious racism. But it's still racism, it's still a reference to the colour of someone's skin.
If you want to do the analogy properly, turn him into a black man, have him refer to a group of angry ignorant black men, and have him using the word "eggplant". How upset are you now, snowflake?
If black people did turn purple when angry, then the term "eggplant" would be precisely as racist as "gammon" ie a little bit racist.
Don't be fooled into thinking this upsets me. I don't give a fuck if people want to throw the term about. I'm just calling it racism because that's what I believe it is.
fwiw, I'm not arguing "snowflake" is racist, even though snowflakes are white. The reason is because the term isn't intended to be a reference to the colour of white peoples' skin. You can also call a black person a snowflake.
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