Drunks and Douchebags

[andyfox]

Now that I have your attention . . .

There was the following exchange on the News, Views, Gossip Forum:

Original Poster:
"Had a drunk Philipino guy sit next to me and tell me 'I don't care if I win or lose, I only want to make that guy(pointing at an angry Armenian douchebag) lose all his money.' Philipino guy caps every pot the Armenian is in to the river. Both lose over $600 in about 45 minutes.
Armenian douchebag threatens to set my hair on fire."

I responded:
"It's common knowledge that all Philippinos are drunks and that all Armenians are angry douchebags. So we'll know their nationality next time without you having to tell us.

"I'm trying to think why nobody's ever threatened to set my hair on fire."

O.P.:
"That is stereotyping. I did not stereotype so I fail to see how your comments are relative to my post."

Me:
"When you talk about a 'drunk Philipino' or an 'Armenian douchebag' it implies that you think their nationality is relevant to the fact that they were drunk or douchebaggy. What reason, otherwise, would there be to mention their nationality?"

O.P.:
"Descriptive term only that simply adds to the color of Commerce characters, IMO."


Is it me that's all wet, or the O.P.?

[New001]

I'm going to have to agree with the other guy here. I'm not sure what his original intent was with adding the nationality, but it does help to make the story more interesting and descriptive. I don't see it as any different than mentioning the person's gender or anything else notable.

It might be different if he said something like "... he's Armenian, so of course he's a douchebag..."

[madnak]

I agree. It seems descriptive, not offensive. It's like if I say "a black guy in a blue t-shirt walks in."

[Borodog]

I have never met an Armenian who was not a douchebag.

Of course, I have only ever met one Armenian. But man, what a douchebag.

[timotheeeee]

George Bush doesn't care about black people. Oh all right, I could've left out the 'black.'

[cardcounter0]

I think you are the one out of line. The nationality is used to identify the subjects.

The poster could have written "drunk in blue polo shirt" and "angry douchebag in red polo shirt" and then refered to "blue shirt did this.." and "red shirt said that ..."

But then the story loses some of its flavor, blue shirt/red shirt could have just as easily occured at a IVY League WASP poker party instead of getting the feeling and accents of a mexican and armeanian getting into it.

[FlFishOn]

I draw a pretty good mental picture from the phrase 'drunk Philipino' after 7 years play at Artichoke Joe's.

[BluffTHIS!]

andy,

You need to be careful. If you refuse to bow down to the PC line, you might be radicalized into becoming a repub.

[andyfox]

There's nothing negative about wearing a blue tee shirt. What about if I had said, "a cheap Jewish guy"?

[Myrtle]

[ QUOTE ]
There's nothing negative about wearing a blue tee shirt. What about if I had said, "a cheap Jewish guy"?

[/ QUOTE ]

It would have been different than saying "a cheap Italian guy".

One reinforces an acknowledged stereotype.....the other does not.

.....A drunk Irishman.

......A dumb Pole.

......A lazy black man.

......A mafiosi Italian.

......Sneaky Frenchmen.

......Nazi Germans.

.......