You might think that non-Asians were offended by the name "Roundeye Noodle Bar," as roundeye is a derogatory term Asians use to describe non-Asians. You would be wrong. It was Asians who were offended, apparently because they couldn't see or hear "roundeye" without being reminded of its opposite, "slanteye." The noodle bar was run by two non-Asians who came up with the name to poke fun at themselves.
That's akin to blacks being offended by the restaurant "Cracker Barrel" because the derogatory term "cracker" reminds them of its opposite, "nigger."
We already knew that blacks can use the word "nigger" and white people can't, and we were pretty sure that "slanteye" was out of bounds for whites, (but probably not for Asians), but now we also know that it's probably fairly OK for Asians to call non-Asians roundeyes (I don't know a lot of whites crying into their soup about it), but not OK for roundeyes to call themselves roundeyes. I'm having trouble following the logic. Wouldn't that also mean that it's not OK for niggers to call themselves niggers?
Everyone is so exquisitely sensitive nowadays. You can't even keep a scorecard, because the rules change at the whim of the most easily-offended.
As an Asian who isn't slant-eyed, what I find offensive is the American idea that all Asian people are of Mongoloid racial origin. The vast majority of us aren't.
ReplyDeleteAmericans don't make that assumption. In American English euphemisms for race and original are conversational lubricant. They're not intended to be -- and rarely are -- anthropologically accurate. If you ask nearly any American, he will understand perfectly that Indians, for example, are Asian but not of the same racial origin as Koreans.
DeleteDo not mistake colloquial usage for ignorance. Or for insensitivity -- quite the opposite. Most current American colloquial terms for one race or origin or another have spawned from an attempt to be sensitive to the people in question.
We rely on the common sense of the listener or reader to distinguish that, for example, in the debate over the derogatory terms "roundeyes" and "slanteyes," the term Asian is not referring to Indians.
The term "Mongoloid" is not a well-known or accepted term in American English outside of anthropological circles. In addition, in colloquial English, it has a couple offensive definitions. It's a tricky term to use in a discussion for the general public. As Wikipedia says "Due to associations with both old racial (and racist) theories (just as with Caucasoid, Negroid), and due to associations with Down syndrome, the term is often offensive."
I could use Sinoid, but that is also an obscure term, not immediately recognizable to most readers.
The only other collective term "Oriental" is nearly as non-specific as Asian and has the drawback of being somewhat less "politically correct" for some reason.
When I use Asian, yes, it's over-general, but I believe the average reader takes into account the context and understands, "Well, yeah, of course you weren't including Indians, they don't fall under the 'slanteye' descriptive."