My friend keeps using this racist term

[Mrsbird311]

A really good friend has on the last couple of occasions used this term to describe someone from Pakistan each time I've said to her that people don't use that term and that it's very offensive but she won't have it, she says its just short for Pakistan, like we would call a Scottish person a scot, I don't see it like this and told her that it is really offensive she then got cross with me and said I'd gone all PC on her, I told her she sounded like an Alf garnet type bigot, I know she isn't a racist person in the slightest but she can't see this is offensive who is BU?

Thumbwitch why do you think it's ok to call someone else thick? I can't believe your using a derogatory term when speaking to someone about being offended about them using a derogatory term, Oh the irony...

A propos absolutely nothing- did anyone see that programme called "Meet the Ukippers"?

Asking a question, Peggy, just asking a question.

Yes I did Hak. The woman from E. Mids!!!

Peggy, do you wish to 'reclaim' what are generally regarded as racial slurs?

Enormous I am relaying what one of my in-laws who worked in India for a spell recently told me. If it's wrong, I apologise.

I have heard Pakistani cricket fans using this term to cheer for their team, some years ago. That's up to them. No excuse for your friend using it though, it is a racist term.

Thumwitch, they don't say Paki on the news in Australia.

Not every country/description has to have the same ending the world over
Polish
German
Australian
pakistani
Chinese

See all the different endings. All perfectly fine and correct. Saying scotlander, polander is just as ridiculous as saying ausrti, germi, Chini, poli, if you truly believe paki is the right term.

Ridiculous.

Toby no problem . It just sounded a bit odd to me as I had never heard it.

perfectly thank you for putting it much more eloquently than me. That's what I meant. I was just a bit too pissed off to explain it properly

My pleasure enormouse. I am astounded at the ignorance.

I was once reported for racism at work. I had received a document about a crime from another force where they wanted us to speak to the offender. I put all the information from the document of the offence verbatim including the derogatory term - goodness gracious me you ... (You get the picture but I typed it in full as I had to so the officer knew what the offender had said and done). The person who got allocated the incident reported me as he thought the goodness gracious me ... Comment was me just putting a random racist remark in an official document. Why he thought that I have no idea, especially as that was the only thing the incident was about and should know that when speaking to an offender you have to tell them exactly the allegation. Luckily as soon as my boss saw it he realised it wasn't my comment but I was very annoyed about it.

I am a NZer and I didn't know it was racist. I said something about the "Paki cricket team" at work once (in the same way I'd say "Aussie" cricket team) and a friend/work colleague mildly pointed out that that term was quite racist you know. (I think there might have even been a legal case about this very point?)

I was mortified and have never used it since, and I hate to think that I might have blithely used it before and no one pulled me up on it.

perfectly so you were pulled up on a quote? At least your boss was behind you.

I do think a tenuous grasp complete ignorance of suffixes should preclude an individual from suggesting which words ought to be reclaimed.

Evelyn, attacking minority groups for 'reclaiming' the word is not helpful. Work on eradicating racism and then we can tackle the reclaim bit too. There are many many many pakistanis, blacks, gays etc who do not 'reclaim'. There are also many many many 'i am not racist but...' types who would love to 'reclaim' too.

"What am I missing?"

White privilege.

Yep, pulled up on a quote as the person reporting didn't think and see it was a quote! Funny, it was nearly 20 years ago and I still remember it vividly.

the word P is ok
mn hq won't edit the thread title so it must be

This thread has been on my mind all day, and has definitely triggered recollections of a time I'd much rather forget.

Don't know how to do it, but can someone ask mnhq to add trigger to the title please.

Like chillyegg, enormous and other pp, I had years of this kind of shit - neighbours complaining about us ps in the street (but knocking for help from mum who was a nurse, when their son's self inked tattoo went septic) , or the group of NF skinheads who crossing the road towards me and mum, snarled in our faces and told us to F off back to your own country, you f'ing ps.

A boy in my tutor group at school, was canny enough to know that calling me the other word may get him into trouble. So, for FIVE years, he called me 'Stan. Everyone would laugh- teachers included.

Fuck me ijust . I can't believe that. Fucking hell, 5 years of abuse and the teachers not doing a thing.

The abuse I faced were isolated incidents. I can't imagine how it must have been to have been confronted with that shit over an extended period.

Yes as a district nurse in inner city brum our team was known as the black one the paki, the pretty one, the young one, the old one and the wheel chair one ( her ds was disabled)

That's how the patients identified us.

And yes all our neighbours called the lovely bloke in the local Pakki shop Stan.

Sorry not glossing over terms as that's as silly as reinventing history.

It's racist and nasty op I agree.

Teachers in the 70s were routinely racist and sexist.

At my junior school there was a 'dim table' with I suppose those children with SN. If you were naughty you were sent to sit there as a punishment.

Anyone under the age of 45 has no idea how bloody awful the 70s was.

Of course it's racist and I wouldn't say it. It's completely true that my packistani educated mates do use it. All the time. "Do you want to come to the packi tomorrow they've got a sale on' "there's a new packi restaurant better than Lahore" etc etc. I even hate writing it. And when the crickets on it's even worse.

My gay mates used the word Queen a lot. I'd never call them that. I think it's a similar thing.

I hate the word and find it extremely offensive. I know some pakistanis who use it and I don't like that either but it is not the same as a white person using it as a term of abuse. I grew up with the word and like others have said it sends a chill through me when I hear it. I can still remember every time I was called it and the fear I felt.

I don't think the word can be reclaimed. In fact just yesterday I had to witness a very nasty incident at work where a delivery driver (white) had a disagreement with a worker (asian) and called him a fucking p* cunt. It had been a few years since hearing the word used in this way and it really shocked me and made me angry.

The way I see it, if you're not the one being racially abused you don't get to decide what is or isn't racist. I didn't realise "paki" was racist, someone told me, I stopped using it. You don't start arguing over whether it is or not. If some people think it is, then that's sufficient surely.

Scot is not short for Scottish. What a stupid analogy

It's not a true analogy but "Scot" as a noun is perfectly acceptable usage instead of "Scottish" Google "a true Scot" you'll find plenty uses of it. Here's it being used by a Scottish kilt maker

m.scotsman.com/news/true-scotsmen-are-told-to-cover-up-1-829419

Yeah, enormouse, and it was horrid, absolutely fucking horrid day in day out.

Off on tangent slightly: I went to a school reunion thingie a couple of years back. I'd seen on Facebook who had accepted the invite and said racist twat non person had declined.

Get there and organiser happens to mention RTNP is coming after all. I felt like I was 11/12 all over again and just didn't feel comfortable staying, but just as I was about to leave he turned up.

I knew I had to say something, but had no way of knowing what the reaction would be.

With a large drink to give me courage, I went over and said to him, ' hi, RTNP, do you know that you made my five years at school absolutely fucking miserable'. He actually had the grace to look embarrassed and a bit sheepish and he apologised. He admitted he had been a prize prat then, but couldn't seem to get out of the big jack the lad persona he'd created in class.

Although I'd like to think it was a genuine apology, I still can't 'forgive and forget' though and never will.