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Original poster

A teenage shop assistant today...

217 replies

Tinytillytot · 19/09/2014 17:51

Shouted after me as i walked into a changing room cubicle that "Those clothes had BETTER come out on the clothes hanger" and then kissed her teeth.

Was I unreasonable to leave my clothes on the floor then swan out like a badass and simply saying "ciao".

I know it's sad and petty but I really enjoyed my coffee shortly after.

OP posts:
JeanneDeMontbaston · 19/09/2014 18:53

Hope you're ok, line.

ThirdPoliceman · 19/09/2014 18:53

No black people in my parish either. Although I used to live next door to a lovely family from Zim ( that's what we call Zimbabwe). No teeth action from them although my son had a LTR with a very nice girl from South Africa ( we call it Safrica now) and she spoke the clicking language. I could listen to her for hours.

treaclesoda · 19/09/2014 18:54

well it probably doesn't matter where teeth kissing comes from, but a previous poster raised the issue of where it originates from because I asked if someone could explain it, because I'd never heard of it.

ethelb · 19/09/2014 18:54

I really don't want to go down the racism route treacle.

But that argument is used by my PILs to justify their use of various racist language.

I mean if they had never heard that you shouldn't use x word, then how could they possibly know not to use it etc etc Confused

I feel they have chosen to fail to expose themselves to anything outside their very narrow experience. I feel someone who doesn't know what teeth sucking is in 2014 may have done similarly, consciously or not.

Aliceinvodkaland · 19/09/2014 18:55

what does kissing your teeth mean? Wine

Debs75 · 19/09/2014 18:55

I love that teeth kissing/sucking in noise that mainly Carribeans do, especially when its really long and drawn out.

OP if I had heard that I would have put them all back on the hangers but inside out and on the wrong sizes. See I'm a silent rebel who wouldn't want some spotty teenager shouting at me but would like the smug feeling knowing she had several items to resort Grin

hmc · 19/09/2014 18:55

Bless you linerunner - I was thinking you were being a bit of a sod to the OP, but nice apology and sorry you have had a tough day

Aliceinvodkaland · 19/09/2014 18:56

what have you done liney!!! Grin naughty!!

VanitasVanitatum · 19/09/2014 18:56

Not really sure why leaving the clothes on the floor was 'scumbaggy' when the shop assistant was so imexcusably rude! I would definitely have reported her OP, that was so horrible of her.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 19/09/2014 18:57

ethel, I've never heard that 'kissing your teeth' is a racist phrase, and a google search suggests that is a very odd interpretation of it.

When people claim 'oh, I didn't know such-and-such was a racist term, so I kept using it,' the point is, it was in their vocabulary. On this thread, people simply didn't know what the words meant ... they weren't using them in ignorance because they weren't using them at all!

Aliceinvodkaland · 19/09/2014 18:57

why is everyone having a go at liney? Confused

Aliceinvodkaland · 19/09/2014 18:58

stop having a go at liney! and i am saying that in an all encompassing fuckin way!!

treaclesoda · 19/09/2014 18:58

ethel that's very hurtful.

I haven't willfully excluded people of different backgrounds from my life or chosen not to expose myself to them. I have never in my life met someone from a Caribbean background. How can I expose myself to something that isn't around me?

And I don't use racist language, or hold racist views.

LineRunner · 19/09/2014 18:59

Because I got uptight, Alice, and I shouldn't have. That's all.

ethelb · 19/09/2014 19:01

I never said that using the phrase kissing your teeth was racist. It isn't. Stop making things up.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 19/09/2014 19:03

I know that, ethel, I'm explaining why the comparison doesn't make sense.

You compared people asking what a phrase meant, which they do not use, to people continuing to use a racist phrase and claiming ignorance as a defence.

They're not the same thing at all. The only ways your logic could hold would be if

  1. this were a racist phrase (it's not)

  2. people who claim to be ignorant of its meaning were in the habit of using it (they're not).

bialystockandbloom · 19/09/2014 19:04

I don't really understand why treaclesoda is getting a hard time, actually Confused She only asked what 'teeth kissing' meant.

VivaLeBeaver · 19/09/2014 19:05

Some people truly do live in places where there are no black people.

15 years ago I had a Kenyan lodger and I swear he was the only black person in the city. And it is a city, not a town. The looks we got when we went out together shopping , etc were noticeable.

Even now I've been a midwife in this city for 9 years and have never looked after a black woman. Never seen a black woman in the maternity block. Dd goes to secondary school and says there's no black kids in her school.

Oh and my lodger never kissed his teeth. I've never heard of it, never heard anyone doing it.

MrsCakesPrecognition · 19/09/2014 19:06
.
5madthings · 19/09/2014 19:08

Clearly she was rude, not sure what her age has to do with it though.

MrsWinnibago · 19/09/2014 19:11

If you live in an area where the young people kiss their teeth then it's a "thing" just like tutting or eye rolling. It's not racist to mention that someone did it ffs!

Hulababy · 19/09/2014 19:12

I've never heard of teeth sucking.

I live in a city with a diverse multi cultural mix. I work in a school with a diverse multi cultural mix. I've worked in secondary schools with a mix, and i a prison with the diverse mix of people too.

I've possibly seen people do it I guess. But never heard of the phrase at all.

ethelb · 19/09/2014 19:13

People end up ignorant of things because they have chosen to put themselves in a position where their experiences are not broadened.

Treacle did only ask what it meant, which is fine, if a little shocking in 2014 (I'm not the only one on this thread to feel this way) but then went onto defend this by asking how she could know about it if she had never experienced it. This is a cop out IMO. And is an excuse frequently used by casual racists (for example) when challenged and should be avoided by right minded people.

(I am assuming treacle is a woman!)

LadyWithLapdog · 19/09/2014 19:15

I'd never heard of it. Just got DH to demonstrate it and he's surprised I didn't know it. We've been married 20 years so his knowledge must have been from much longer ago.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 19/09/2014 19:15

My brother went through a phase of being very keen on using this and other phrases, in a sort of rather sweet 'white boy from small rural village goes to Big City and demonstrates New Cultural Awareness'. He has mostly grown out of it now.

I'm sorry, when I first commented on this thread, I just thought it was funny, and that was a the back of my mind. I don't imagine the OP intended anything particularly deep by the phrase and I really struggle to believe that people asking what it means, in genuine ignorance, are in any way racist.

I feel slightly guilty for that stupid comment now, because it seems to have turned from a weak joke into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

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