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Arizona Republican refers to Black Americans as 'colored people' in House floor debate
(www.nbcnews.com)
this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2023
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TIL "colored people" is offensive. Seems pretty benign to me...?
Context and intent is important. Faking ignorance about knowing if it was offensive is an equally important consideration.
Honestly, this has more nuance than you’d immediately think. Dude’s lived through at least a few iterations of euphemisms that turned into pejoratives, and keeping it straight can be difficult. Depending on the time period, negro, colored, African American, and black could all be considered kind or harsh. That said, definitely racist as hell given he continues with…
“The military was never intended to be, you know, inclusive. Its strength is not its diversity. Its strength is its standards”
Ah, yeah he's a racist piece of shit. And also, unsurprisingly, 100% wrong. Speaking as a veteran (US), the diversity of our military is a HUGE source of its strength. This dumbass is literally advocating for weakening our military for the sake of being racist.
That's not just stupid, that's dangerous stupid.
Is he saying people should be denied access to the military even if they meet the miliary's standards?
Forgive my brevity. Yes. Generally, and subconsciously, people prefer to see themselves in those they put in leadership positions. This policy will exclusively make military officers paler as a result, not better. The military has been promoting people of color to higher positions in line with racial enlistment proportions for like 50 years without issue. Reduced potential for bias is always welcome.
Last part you quoted seems reasonable, though.
To paraphrase, he doesn’t want all of those diverse sorts, just the good ones. It’s a dog whistle at an octave that even octogenarians can hear.
How is the last bit racist? Sounds like he's saying it's purely based on measurable standards, that race/ethnicity is not a factor
To paraphrase, he doesn’t want all of those diverse sorts, just the good ones. It’s a dog whistle at an octave that even octogenarians can hear.
It was a term du jour back in the Jim Crow (read: hyper racist) era. That particular phrasing has baggage.
I do hate how history can muddy language like that. Terms like "colored people" should mean literally people who are colored... and nothing else. I've never been one to actually use that term because it's so non-specific; but I never knew it had a derogatory connotation either.
It's been racist for several decades, and it's not benign at all.
Noted. As other posters have mentioned, it carries a lot of historical connotation... I've either never run into it or never noticed it before (again, seems benign, barring the historical context). Thankfully I've also never used it, cuz it's kind of a shitty descriptor - not specific at all.
As a non-American I'm perplexed by this. I remember growing up and hearing the accepted euphemism 'coloured person' instead of black person. I'd worry about myself if I ever visited that I'd accidentally cause insult. PC seems to be gone nuts
Do you call white people non-colored people? No? Then why would you call a black person colored? Lol
You never let me answer before your smarmy remark. But beleive it or not back then, yes you could. Are white people actually 'white'? Are black people actually 'black'? It was a means to denote race the same as black and white is these days. My point was I didn't realise this term was an actual insult now but it's good to know. Have off with your lol