Ryan just did really neato and thought-provoking post entitled “Am I Racist?” Now, I assure you Ryan is far from a racist, and anyone accusing him of such deserves to be tarred, feathered, and kicked in the nut-sack until their ancestors feel it.
I don’t know about you guys, but I like my free speech. But one drawback about living in China is that sometimes you just gotta dilute your criticisms.
Otherwise, you may very well be told — like Ryan was — “If you don’t like it, why don’t you go home?”
Sometimes this feedback comes from local Chinese. China’s not a place where anyone can openly criticize whatever they want about the country. And it’s certainly not a place where non-Chinese guests can criticize. It’s usually met with a “Not-in-my-house-you-don’t!” response. And I think anyone with half a brain in their head can see the silliness behind that knee-jerk reaction.
Sometimes the “If-you-don’t-like-it-go-home” comes from, as Ryan calls them “Sensitive Sally” expats. I prefer to call them dumb-shit fuckwits.
On a bit of a side note, I feel fucking proud to have come from a culture where people can get away with stuff like the following.
Here are a few t-shirts which seem to be popular in the Asian-American community. One says, “Bai ren kanbudong” essentially meaning “White People can’t read this.” The other, a play on the Chinese words “Na ge” or “Nei ge” (pronounced almost as “nigga”), reads “Nigga Please!.”
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Personally I think anyone who takes offense to those needs (yet again) a good swift kick in the sack. Now of course most people who would take offense likely cannot read it, as the shirt says. So they are kinda flying under the P.C. radar.
Sure, I’m white and I’m the butt of the t-shirt’s joke. But the Asian laowai have made a damn good funny, and good on ‘em for doing so.
All the same I can’t help but think about wearing a similar shirt in China. Though I’m not sure how long I’d last wearing this:
13 Responses
YELLOW PPL
August 12th, 2007 at 10:46 am
1If you think Yellow PPL CANT READ THIS is funny then you pls go back home You need kick in ur sack Very bad put on this information You are angry at everything seems You need realise us sick
admin
August 12th, 2007 at 11:45 am
2I think you misunderstood, unfortunately.
“I’m not sure how long I’d last wearing this”
=
“I’m pretty sure I’d be in trouble if I ever wore this”
好好学习, sir.
Do you think the 白人看不懂 t-shirt is also sick?
the yellow man
August 13th, 2007 at 1:03 am
3LOL.
Silly Laowai
August 14th, 2007 at 8:34 am
4Racist? Far from it pengyou! You should look at the mirror and see how racist Chinese are to each other and how they don’t treat their own minorities well too! Chinese are bloody racist, but this guy isn’t!
The Humanaught (aka The Sorta Pinkish White Guy)
August 17th, 2007 at 12:26 pm
5Murphy’s Law eh? Whatever can be misinterpreted will be misinterpreted…
I absolutely LOVE that 那个plz shirt. I don’t know why, but I can’t help but picture Mr. Ryan Wang wearing it.
China Law Blog
August 23rd, 2007 at 6:08 am
6China Racism: That Dog Don’t Hunt…
Not sure why the sudden onslaught of these posts, but three good ones out there all of a sudden on whether the West (and we Western bloggers, in particular) look at China through racist, post-colonialist or paternalistic eyes. The Humannaught started i…
Andy
August 23rd, 2007 at 3:31 pm
7“..Otherwise, you may very well be told — like Ryan was — “If you don’t like it, why don’t you go home?”..”
Now you know what it’s like to be an Asian-American in the United States. Sometimes when we criticize, and often when we’re just standing there, we get told “why don’t you go back to China,” when we speak perfect English and it’s reasonable to assume we were born in the US.
Guy
October 11th, 2007 at 10:42 pm
8“If you think Yellow PPL CANT READ THIS is funny then you pls go back home You need kick in ur sack Very bad put on this information You are angry at everything seems You need realise us sick”
I think that answered your question regarding how long you’d last if you wore that shirt in China. Apparently its funny to pick on the white guys with the “白人看不懂” but….
For those asian americans in the US who experience racism in the US, is it as blatent as being followed down the street by packs of teenagers screaming slanderous remarks (dabizi! dabizi!) and pointing at you? Because that happens to the foreigners on the mainland a tad too much. I would assume its a little more subtle in the US, which probably doesn’t make it any better
admin
October 12th, 2007 at 5:56 am
9Yeah.
Subtlety or not, I would hope that sort of stuff doesn’t exist in any country.
Despite my dabizi, I don’t hear that too much. Laowai, or Bairen sometimes. Mostly laowai.
How I react depends on who says it. If it’s a kid or a countryside farmer, I’ll let it go. If it’s a guy about my age, I’ll usually strike up a conversation with ‘em — and that’s usually a lot of fun. They don’t expect it.
rynsa
November 15th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
10OMG! I’m late to the party, of course, but that shit is funny! My wife, a native of Hubei, couldn’t stop laughing! She wants us to get matching Y”ellow/White… “shirts for our next anniversary celebration!
Does this make us politically incorrect?
Well, whatever, it was good for a laugh. Thanks!
Ernie
January 8th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
11I used to watch Kung Fu and subscribe to the myth that those in the Celestial Kingdom were more refined and polite than us. I’d go out of my way to be deferential to Chinese in the States, and blush when one of my own was rude to them. Here in China, after the hundredth group of school children yelling the F-word at me, and the thousandth comedian asking me “Hollow?” then laughing like a hyena with his mates, I began to redouble my efforts on the time machine. No flux capacitors on Ebay, though.
Meg (who is pasty pale)
March 27th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
12I want that White People shirt, although if I wore it at home, I’d spend the whole time saying “No, it’s not the ancient symbols for oneness with the universe” Haha!
dprk
April 4th, 2008 at 2:22 am
13Quote: On a bit of a side note, I feel fucking proud to have come from a culture where people can get away with stuff like the following:quotE
huh , the same culture where Glen Beck of CNN has asked islamists to leave the country if they dont like americans , the same “If-you-don’t-like-it-go-home” expression … … it always feels nice to puke on others :p
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