What is wrong with describing someone as Asian?

[ProudAS]

It's what the person is and not being used in a derogatory manner. My colleague felt he had to whisper though when describing another colleague to me.

I fail to see how describing someone by their ethnicity is any different to describing them by their gender.

I think the problem is that some people are defining "a mild preference" as " being offended " Now this i can agree with. Only problem is there is an awfu lot of people who claim to be offended when other people dont conform to their preferences.

There are some people on here who would be offended if you said........"It was pitch black and I couldn't see my hand in front of my face" !!!

Dance party- no there aren't.

"Only problem is there is an awfu lot of people who claim to be offended when other people dont conform to their preferences."

Not on this thread there aren't- so why mention thm?

You speak for everyone on MN do you curlew ?

I never said on this thread in particular, and i mentioned it because i do think that is part of the wider problem. And because we are discussing this issue. Danceparty, there most certainly are. And they always tend to be the most vocal!

Couldnt see my hand in the dark?

Wtf are you on about?

A black colleague was showing me a photo of a group of friends who I mostly knew. They were all white except for one. I asked her who the black woman in the photo was and she got very annoyed that I would use her colour to single her out . I pointed out, not unreasonably, that if they were all black except one white woman I would ask who the white woman was. At least she saw sense in what I said

I understand what you mean Danceparty

Silly woman.

nowt, according to my asian husband.

Are you saying people would be offended because you called the dark black?

Am I just being incredibly blonde stupid? I honestly have no idea what you are on about!

Danceparty, I haven't encountered anybody like that on here but accept there must be some. Silly people.

Beyondthe limits - Danceparty means that she believes some people would take offence because they would see it as implying that you can't see black people in the dark - bit convoluted i know, but there we are.

Tittytittyhanghang and Lyra - I do see what you're saying but there aren't the sensitivities around height and hair colour that there are around ethnicity.

It does irritate me when there are the alleged controversies around words such as blackboard.

applepieinthesky DS1's father was half Iranian, but they wanted to be referred to as Persian. He was also half Pakistani, so Asian I guess. I tend to put DS1 down on forms as mixed British/Asian, but it's not actually a good enough fit. When people describe him they tend to say he looks very Mediterranean, we go on holiday to somewhere like Spain or Turkey and the locals think he's one of them.

It's all getting far too complicated as we all mix our heritages up

CC, that's less common nowadays isn't it? I remember a time when Baa Baa Black Sheep was banned in some schools, nativity plays at Christmas were frowned upon and other ridiculous things like that. I think people are getting a grip on themselves a bit more now.

I thought the banning of Ba Ba Black Sheep was an urban myth. Did some schools actually ban it!?

"You speak for everyone on MN do you curlew ?"

No. But I feel pretty safe to say that there is no one who would object to the use of the work pitch black to describe a very dark place.

" I remember a time when Baa Baa Black Sheep was banned in some schools, nativity plays at Christmas were frowned upon and other ridiculous things like that."

You do know these things never happened, don't you?

Curlew, of course they did.

God knows, that's why I put 'alleged'. Could've all just been a figment of the imagination of Richard Littlejohn types, spouting off about Loony Left councils and the like.