January 07, 2003

Guide

As part of my never-ending community service I bring you the latest installment of my guide to social situations in the middle class:

How to talk about race around your middle-class friends

1. When describing a small story be sure to mention each black character. White characters can be referred to as 'guys' and 'girls', etc. but all black characters must be specifically referenced as 'black guy', 'black girl', etc.

Example: This black guy ahead of me in line at the post office said that he had been waiting twenty minutes already.

2. To save time during descriptions use 'black', 'chinese', and 'mexican'. Please note that 'chinese' and 'mexican' are used to describe every asian and hispanic person on the planet.

Example: You know, Mary, that black girl who sits near the back. No, not her - the big one, Mary.

3. Use the term 'big black guy' to mean scary, violent, large, angry person. This term is so common it could almost be abbreviatted: BBG as in BBW: big bad wolf.

Example 1: As I rounded the corner at full speed I slammed into somebody, sending us both to the ground. I was ok, but when I looked up I saw that I had run into a big black guy (BBG)

Example 2: Yeah, I used to play a little ball. We used to go down the street and play with these big black guys (BBGS).

4. Feel free to use the term 'black neighborhood' in place of 'high crime neighborhood' or 'low-income' neighborhood.

Example: So we were lost, right, and after driving around we ended up in this huge black neighborhood and we were like oh crap now we better just forget the map and try to drive our way out somehow.

4. Pepper your language with the term 'ghetto' to mean cheap and bad.

Yeah, we went to the play, but it was really small; they all had these ghetto costumes on - it was really sad.

5. Never use the N-word. If you feel as if you have crossed over the line be sure to say 'you know what I mean' and 'not like that', but don't feel too bad about it, because you are a liberal and one of the good ones - you just slipped up while joking around.

6. Feel free to say whatever you want because, after all, you can.

January 7, 2003 09:24 PM