Ed Do you like your cheese?

[cullennz]

I tell you what. As you seem to need a paint by numbers led there thing.

Just google "Paki bashing"

 

[PursuedByABear]

I tell you what. As you seem to need a paint by numbers led there thing.

Just google "Paki bashing"

I don't need to google stuff I remember, thanks. "Paki" was an insulting term before "Paki bashing" was coined, it was not the origin of the term. It was used in that phrase because it already existed as an insulting term.

However, that is irrelevant. Everything I said applies, even if it were the origin of the term. What if the racists had called it "Pakistani bashing"? Try starting thinking there, and see where you get.

 

[cullennz]

I don't need to google stuff I remember, thanks. "Paki" was an insulting term before "Paki bashing" was coined, it was not the origin of the term. It was used in that phrase because it already existed as an insulting term.



However, that is irrelevant. Everything I said applies, even if it were the origin of the term. What if the racists had called it "Pakistani bashing"? Try starting thinking there, and see where you get.

Fine

Then keep using the Paki term. I won't. But each to their own.

 

[PursuedByABear]

Fine

Then keep using the Paki term. I won't. But each to their own.

What? What on earth do you think I am arguing for, here?

You started by taking issue with my assertion that "Pakistani" can also be offensive when used in the wrong context, and have now somehow convinced yourself that I am arguing for the use of "Paki".

Just so you can be sure, I am not.

 

[lionking]

No it isn't. You can't "reclaim" a word that isn't negative.

Short of ironic use, which reclaiming is, is there any way "wog" can ever have not been derogatory?

I’ve already explained this. In Australia “wog” is not a derogatory word now. Deal with it.

 

[angrysoba]

I have explained in what whay you are doing exactly that, but I'm willing to accept that it was done unintentionally.

Fair enough. (I probably just misinterpreted what you were saying) Let's just lay this to rest now.

 

[PursuedByABear]

I’ve already explained this. In Australia “wog” is not a derogatory word now. Deal with it.

I'll need a lot more than your assertion of an unsupported anecdote to accept that. It's a word that has been used all over the world for well over a hundred years, with many different meanings but always in a derogatory way. I don't accept that you speak for all Australians in changing it.

 

[angrysoba]

I don't think it's possible to make any sort of case for the word "wog" ever being intended as anything other than negative and dismissive. Perhaps you could try.

It has a very different resonance among people in the UK and people in Australia. For Australians it denotes a different demographic (people from the Mediterranean rather than people from South Asia), and is probably more like saying "Pom" - something that nobody except very hypersensitive people get upset about.

I've heard liberal Aussies say, "Look at my mate's curly hair. Totally go the wog gene!" and it meant nothing more than banter, if that.

 

[cullennz]

I am not at all surprised you want all your posts hidden. but it's not "the same argument again with the Aussies", you have been arguing with a British person about whether "Pakistani" can ever be offensive. I say it is, you say it can't be. I've never for one second suggested "paki" is anything other than offensive.

I mean it's not the other ideas. They are fine. It's the straight out bollocks that are weird. But all good

 

[cullennz]

"Not innately offensive" does not mean "not offensive". That's why the word "innately" is in there. if you don't know what "innately" means, say so and I will explain.

Lol

Ok

Use your dictionary

 

[PursuedByABear]

It has a very different resonance among people in the UK and people in Australia. For Australians it denotes a different demographic (people from the Mediterranean rather than people from South Asia), and is probably more like saying "Pom" - something that nobody except very hypersensitive people get upset about.

I've heard liberal Aussies say, "Look at my mate's curly hair. Totally go the wog gene!" and it meant nothing more than banter, if that.

Ok, that is of course an important distinction. It is essentially a different word, then, and could of course be inoffensive in a culture where the group it is applied to is not subject to genuine racism.

 

[PursuedByABear]

Lol

Ok

Use your dictionary

An innately offensive word is one that is offensive from coinage, designed to be dismissive and dehumanising.

Paki has become offensive due to usage.

This is my whole point. I honestly can't understand how you can't understand it.

 

[cullennz]

"Not innately offensive" does not mean "not offensive". That's why the word "innately" is in there. if you don't know what "innately" means, say so and I will explain.

OK

Let us say that you view it as not offensive at times as you say.

When are they?

 

[angrysoba]

Ok, that is of course an important distinction. It is essentially a different word, then, and could of course be inoffensive in a culture where the group it is apleid to is not subject to genuine racism.

According to the Guardian:

...the word "wog" went out with Alf Garnett's generation in Britain and is an almost inconceivably offensive term of abuse for blacks or Asians.

Curiously, however, the term has metamorphosed in the Antipodes. Greek, Italian and Lebanese communities happily refer to themselves as wogs and the term is general parlance for anybody from an approximately Mediterranean background.

A popular stage show, Wogs Out of Work, parodied Greek life and was followed up by a TV series, Acropolis Now. A film, Wog Boy, stars Melbourne comedian Nick Giannopoulos as a dole bludger battling the Australian authorities. Soccer is sometimes known as "wogball" in Sydney, as it is overwhelmingly played by southern and eastern Europeans. A "wog mansion" is a big, extravagant house with Corinthian columns.

Sam Pappas of Sydney's Greek Orthodox Association insists there is nothing particularly offensive about the term: "If it's used in a 'Come on, you wog' - as in 'Come on, mate' - way, then it's perfectly OK."

 

[PursuedByABear]

OK

Let us say that you view it as not offensive at times as you say.

When are they?

In the UK? I am not sure, I was not alive. Quite probably 1954 would have been fine, before there was much significant immigration from Pakistan and nobody had ever used it as a racist slur. I may be wrong on that.

In Australia? Again, I can't really say, but I would go out on a limb and say anyone who spoke of "the Pakis playing the Aussies" on the 1964 tour was probably not being offensive. Quite possibly later, I am not familiar enough with Australia to say.

In the USA? Up until quite recently.

There came a point, a different point in different cultures, where "Paki" ceased to correlate with "Aussie" as a simple shortening of "Pakistani" and become an offensive word used for people, many of whom were not Pakistani. This was solely down to the fact that it began to be used as a racist slur, and/or people began to be aware of it as such.

"******" and "coon" and "wog" (in the UK at least) did not have the same path. They were offensive from the outset. Innately, you might say.

 

[lionking]

According to the Guardian:

Thank you. The link encapsulates the evolution of the word perfectly. When I was a child it was terribly offensive. Now it’s a word of endearment.

 

[Meadmaker]

Yes, I did say that. In fact "Pakistani" can in itself be offensive in the UK if used indiscriminately in this way.

That doesn't explain why Pakistanis in Pakistan would see "Paki" as offensive though.

This reminds me of "I can't think of anything more derogatory than 'Belgians'."

 

[EHocking]

And if you want to get all technical about it. If you a British stop calling Indians Asians

British Pakistanis, Indians, Bangladeshis and Sri Lankans prefer that the British use refer to them as South Asians. This is because they find referring to this group of people as coming from the “subcontinent” a demeaning outdated colonial reference.

 

[arthwollipot]

Is that last part true? I get the feeling that it has a very large market saturation in Australia. Is that not correct?

It's in literally every supermarket and corner store in the country.

Yes, it has market saturation.

 

[arthwollipot]

And yet I have pointed out that “wog” is not an offensive word in Australia. Perhaps UK sources are not the final word on English language around the world.....

There's a difference between a group of people "reclaiming" a word and using it to apply to themselves, and that being acceptable for other people to use to apply to them.

Just be a white guy, head into Detroit, and start calling people the n-word. After all, African-Americans use the word to refer to themselves, right? Should be fine for you to do so too.

Let me know how it goes.