Taiwan Offends African Allies

Wait a minute, everybody’s forgetting about the damn jellyfish. Perhaps that’s the root of the whole problem.

Africa has thousands of miles of coastline. I’m guessing they have plenty of jellyfish.

Yes, we have jellyfish. Bloody hell.
The “African with spear/shield” image has become offensive in Africa. I guess it is just similar to the Mexican with the big sombrero, or over-simplified drawings depicting Japanese people. Add to that the fact that many Africans are super-sensitive to anything that might imply racism and you’re bound to offend somebody.
The syrup bottle and golliwog images posted here seem more American to me, but I guess they could have the same effect amongst certain groups in the States.
A while ago I actually saw the “African spear” image in a textbook here. The children were supposed to match the people to their place of origin. The picture was highly horrible, though…way too thick lips and huuuuge nostrils, extremely curly hair, and…a bone through the nose.
I don’t think those diplomats over-reacted at all. This is not a vintage Disney movie. It’s probably a good idea to at least try to understand what could be offensive to people in another country.

Hey, listen, in case it has not really dawned on any before…

The locals are for the most part somewhat ignorant.

They can’t see what’s wrong about racial stereotyping in the extreme. Look at the reactions to all this - water off the ducks back.

They sure can when they feel its being directed at them though! They know perfectly well its racist – they just don’t give a fuck.

I wonder if they would have understood what it meant if some backwater Taiwanese person said the word hei guei in their presence. Wonder if the Taiwanese government would be offended if while doing a diplomatic visit to another country, were served food in take-out boxes with a yellow Chinese cartoon boy wearing a coolie hat and pajamas saying “You like flied lice?”.

Hey, it’s just another “cute” innocent stereotype. :unamused:

It was in response to Sandman’s post of the “wog” cartoon. Aunt Jemima has been an American institution for as long as I can remember, and is still around on pancake boxes the last time I checked.

It was in response to Sandman’s post of the “wog” cartoon. Aunt Jemima has been an American institution for as long as I can remember, and is still around on pancake boxes the last time I checked.[/quote]

Maybe it’s me, but where Aunt Jemmima is concerned, I think maple syrup…not slave woman in the kitchen or house servant. I think waffles and pancakes…hotdogs, french toast…

Surely not all these older pop culture things are racist??

I think AJ is as recognizable as a nike swoosh. It’s a great marketing scheme. :slight_smile:

You want real racist garbage served up to the public? Go watch old Tom and Jerry cartoons. :s

AJ was saturday morning breakfast topping and cartoonies :slight_smile:

It was in response to Sandman’s post of the “wog” cartoon. Aunt Jemima has been an American institution for as long as I can remember, and is still around on pancake boxes the last time I checked.[/quote]
There was a heated discussion over Aunt Jemima recently. The image has fallen into disfavor.

It was in response to Sandman’s post of the “wog” cartoon. Aunt Jemima has been an American institution for as long as I can remember, and is still around on pancake boxes the last time I checked.[/quote]
There was a heated discussion over Aunt Jemima recently. The image has fallen into disfavor.[/quote]

I don’t give a rat’s ass what people say about Aunt Jemima. :wanker: Her pancakes are bootie-licious :smiley:

Regarding “wog” cartoons, I remember there was a brand of cracker in Australia in 1987 called a “Pollywog.” Quite racist in my opinion, but there is some debate to what “race” they are directed at

Another problem the golliwog faced was the use of the word ‘wog’ as a British racist term for Indians and Arabs. Though the golliwog obviously represents a negro, ‘wog’ was never used for West Indian immigrants in the UK, for whom American racist words were borrowed.

At some stage a euphemistic acronym was devised deriving ‘wog’ from ‘Wily/Westernised Oriental Gentleman’. A similar offering is: (10)

“An Egyptian friend told me a story his grandfather told him. Those Egyptians “employed” in building the Suez canal wore shirts indicating that they were ‘Working On Government Service’. I have no idea if this has any truth.”
Though for ‘wog’ to have been picked up by the British Army in Egypt during the First World War is not improbable.
Partridge (11) starts his ‘wog’ definition with

A lower-class babu shipping-clerk: nautical: late C.19-20.

For those who aren’t American, Let me explain Aunt Jemima. The image of her is based on a racist practice, of black women who were wet nurses during Slavery and cooks. I think it was in the mid to late 80’s or early 90’s that the image used on the pancake boxes was changed to a professional looking black woman. I do,as i have said before, take offence to it as it is a reminder of dark chapter in African American history as well as insult to me as person. For those who make another connection to it, then cheers to you…

Sandman wrote:

[quote]They sure can when they feel its being directed at them though! They know perfectly well its racist – they just don’t give a fuck.[/quote] :bravo: :bravo: Thank you. As I recall seeing Dodgeball in the theater here, the scene that explained the orgins of Dodgeball-cause the entire place to go dead silent. I know that the translation wasn’t off, cause I can read chinese. So, I know it was due to the fact that it interperted(rightly so) as racist…


Imaniou dead on pointed out:

[quote]I wonder if they would have understood what it meant if some backwater Taiwanese person said the word hei guei in their presence. Wonder if the Taiwanese government would be offended if while doing a diplomatic visit to another country, were served food in take-out boxes with a yellow Chinese cartoon boy wearing a coolie hat and pajamas saying “You like flied lice?”.

Hey, it’s just another “cute” innocent stereotype[/quote]

:bravo: :bravo:

Traveller said:

[quote]Nama, it sure can, spent 6 years on the continent, South Africa and Zimbabwe, as well as Nigeria and Kenya.[/quote] :flowers: :silenced:

[b]Mr.He wrote:[/b]

:tic: :upyours: :upyours: Nope it’s not too thin. It’s just tired of being asked to OVERLOOK and forgive people’s ignorant, racist behavior. Don’t ask me to mitigate my feelings on the subject. IMO, i find that racist in itself, because thru out time blacks have been given this message of -overlook it, don’t make a big deal out of it, and like you said,you have thin skin. You may not be perceive to have a certain level of value,respect for someone of color, but you have to realize that like I said before, people want to be acknowledged and have the feeling of being respected. I find it very curious that in a country that uses plain ordinary undecorated bowls and dishes on a daily basis, that these type of plates were used in the situation. The creator of the plates may have been unaware of the implications of the designs, but someone apart of the organzation for the lunch knew better. Things like this just don’t ‘happen’…

They were probably just trying to be friendly. Taiwanese don’t see anything wrong in acknowledging that people are different and they simplify everything in childish ways. But were they intending to insult anyone? I doubt it. The African American’s here want everyone to look at this thing from their perspective. That is a reasonable thing. But perhaps you need to understand that some people really are ignorant and in their ignorance sometimes mean no harm. If you ask me the Africans showed as little cross cultural understanding as the Taiwanese did.

OK, there are so many levels on which this is screwed up:

1.) serving your very rare diplomatic allies, using bowls that feature a caricature of their race;

2.) taking your very rare diplomatic allies to a restaurant that serves food in paper bowls – spring for a real meal at a nice restaurant (like the sort the Taiwanese take “white” representatives) and they might keep a few allies…

3.) Michel Lu’s pathetic statement: “Taiwanese have been friendly to foreigners, and no one tried to offend our friends deliberately.” Nice. They “have been” friendly to foreigners? Sure – just not African foreigners.

This sort of low-class racist treatment is not the way one treats their friends … the sad thing is that these Africans would fare just as badly or worse if they were to to go China. When I lived in the mainland, I knew several highly educated people from Africa (former foreign ministers and other assorted diplomats) who were absolutely treated like crap every time they tried to buy food at the morning market. Why? At the time, we thought it was because the PRC tried to “even the score” on the whole Tiananmen Square coverage by showing, ad nauseum, footage of U.S. national guard troops trying to keep the order in South Central during the Rodney King riots.

Of course, this sort of pathetic “diplomacy” is precisely the sort of treatment that I would expect from a country whose Minister of Foreign Affairs refers to Singapore as “holding China’s balls” and as a tiny “piece of snot”. Great. That’s another country with whom Taiwan used to cooperate on some aspects of military training, etc., who is going to scratch Taiwan off it’s Christmas card list.

Perhaps to round out this week, Vice President Lu could kindly offer to move all the aboriginal people to Central America again… :unamused:

[quote=“Mr He”][quote=“Namahottie”]
Traveller, I hope that your comment can be backed up with actually experience on the continent…[/quote]
[/quote]

:upyours:

Your comment there was too thin-skinned. What you misread into my reply is your problem - and bu starting to claim that my comment was about the choice of cutlery, you are proving my point.

Your skin remains too thin. All non-asian looking foreigners face racism here.

actually, I would say that all non-asian looking foreigners and all Asian foreigners that are not from Taiwan face racism here.

However, the levels of racism are not the same. If any of you are white or asian teachers here and have tried to teach african american or african or caribbean literature here, you know what Nama and Imani are saying. I had to spend 3 days of class discussing racism after a book from Jamaica was taught. I’m not sure how it works for people of African descent, as maybe some form of politeness takes over. All I know is that I was horrified.

I was not surprised to see that Taiwan had offended its African allies.

[quote=“Mr He”][quote=“Mr He”][quote=“Namahottie”]
Traveller, I hope that your comment can be backed up with actually experience on the continent…[/quote]
[/quote]

:upyours:

Your comment there was too thin-skinned. What you misread into my reply is your problem - and bu starting to claim that my comment was about the choice of cutlery, you are proving my point.

Your skin remains too thin. All non-Asian looking foreigners face racism here.[/quote]
In the US, UK, and Australia, white people in predominantly white areas don’t understand racism the way people of color will, simply because we don’t experience it. I do believe that people who are at times discriminated against will start to get sensitive and feel there is discrimination and racism when there really isn’t. But that’s largely because the racism and discrimination that is there gets to them.

In Taiwan, all non-Chinese will feel the discrimination. And we probably feel a person is discriminating against us at times when they aren’t and the other side is acting logically and in an unbiased way considering their circumstances. So we think we understand, and to some extent we do.

But non-Chinese people of color and white people here face different reactions. White folk are treated as outsiders, but we get some sort of prestige factor. Sometimes our being an outsider works in our favor. Unless I’m mistaken (and I very well may be since I’m not a person of color), that doesn’t hold for other non-Chinese here.

So, perhaps people of color in Taiwan see offence and discrimination where none is intended, but that’s because there is discrimination and offence in enough places that it’s really not surprising that they will. I wouldn’t call that thin-skinned.

White folk should try not to pass judgement without understanding, and people of color should try not to be like a Martin Lawrence character.

[quote=“mofangongren”]Of course, this sort of pathetic “diplomacy” is precisely the sort of treatment that I would expect from a country whose Minister of Foreign Affairs refers to Singapore as “holding China’s balls” and as a tiny “piece of snot”. Great. That’s another country with whom Taiwan used to cooperate on some aspects of military training, etc., who is going to scratch Taiwan off it’s Christmas card list.

Perhaps to round out this week, Vice President Lu could kindly offer to move all the aboriginal people to Central America again… :unamused:[/quote]

Mark Chen deserves a “medal” for putting the Singaporeans in their place. Too often, Singapore has illusions of grandeur, thinking it is actually more important than just a little “dot on the map.” When I worked for Felix Soh and the Straits Times, they would brag about their close ties to China and the PLA. I hope both China and Singapore face internal revolt in the coming years. In fact, one day I hope to piss on Lee Kuan Yew’s grave and not get fined for it :upyours:

I’m no big fan of Singapore, but given Taiwan’s position it was a bit much for the country’s top “diplomat” to say. There are the things that “feel good” to say and there are the things that diplomats, in their role as such, need to say in order to be productive. Considering how much Singapore has brownnosed the PRC over the years, it’s actually pretty cool that their military cooperates as much as it does with Taiwan.

Mark Chen should have recovered from the situation a bit better. Instead of saying he was using an old Taiwanese expression, he should have said he was trying to allude to the old American expression, i.e., that Singapore had China “by the balls.”

i think bob has a good point here…taiwanese are racist mainly in a little kiddie pointing at the funny man type way…they are very much a race of people who simply won’t grow up and treat people simply as people…it’s not malicious, simply ignorant and caused by the lack of internationalisation brought about by taiwans orphan annie nature and provincial background…i’ve been here 15 years and attitudes to foreigners are still antediluvial (hope thats the right word). but at least they’re friendly to us; it makes it all forgivable…

and now a story to amplify my point…

a friend of a friend works in a company that is an agent for a german manufacturer. one day the german rep. came to taiwan for a visit. the boss thinking to make the german feel at home got his staff to greet him with a sieg heil type salute thinking this was the norm in germany (obviously had watched a good few war movies)…of course you can imagine how bizarre the german must have felt! still it’s the thought that counts…

[quote=“Mr He”][quote=“Mr He”][quote=“Namahottie”]
Traveller, I hope that your comment can be backed up with actually experience on the continent…[/quote]
[/quote]

:upyours:

Your comment there was too thin-skinned. What you misread into my reply is your problem - and bu starting to claim that my comment was about the choice of cutlery, you are proving my point.

Your skin remains too thin. All non-Asian looking foreigners face racism here.[/quote]

No my comment isn’t thin-skinned, as before I could have said something thin-skinned about his comment, I wanted to know if he had exprience on the continent. Rather than give me a regurgatation of what the asinine media potrays… So, I was questioning the validity of her/his opinion… get over yourself he…