Posted on 02/23/2012 11:02:56 AM PST by presidio9
In the days since an ESPN editor slapped a staggeringly offensive headline atop a story about Knicks sensation Jeremy Lin Chink in the Armor the outrage has mostly simmered down to a question: What the hell was he thinking?
The editor, who was fired, insists that he intended no pun on Lins ethnicity in which case he was guilty only of being bad at his job, because absent the racist reference, the headline is so stale its nearly senseless.
Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.) has slammed that explanation as preposterous, condemning any use of the word chink. Lin himself has said he believes the slur was unintentional and advocates forgiveness.
Meanwhile, plenty of armchair commentators seem dubious of just how offensive the word chink really is, while positing that the headline was merely a gaffe, the kind of thing that might happen to anyone at 2:30 in the morning.
But all of this speculation is beside the point. The editor might well have made an honest mistake.
That is precisely the problem.
Most Americans particularly those who are fastidious about cultural sensitivity and horrified by any charge of racism dont think they have anything to learn when it comes to Asian-Americans. They are accustomed to seeing us as model minorities, accepting us as honorary whites (often with the unthinking condescension that term implies) or dismissing us as foreign, exotic or irrelevant. They are not accustomed to one of us becoming an overnight basketball phenom or to hordes of us shouting our anger at an egregious offense, as is now happening.
Put another way: People dont worry about making fun of Asians. Not even when it comes to a slur that is, indisputably, as ugly as the N-word.
There is no other explanation for how the ESPN editor, whatever his original intention, didnt think twice before posting the headline. Or for how, in recent weeks, sportswriters and anchors have referenced Asian eyes and penis size and received, for the most part, only chuckles and winks.
We all have our biases and blind spots, crude jokes we crack behind closed doors. But most Americans carry a collective sense of responsibility for the wrongs committed against African-Americans (as we should), and it has become second nature, in a public discussion, to conscientiously check for words that might carry a whiff of racism.
We know that, in certain contexts, our intention matters less than what others read and see and hear.
Thats why its virtually unimaginable that any story about, say, an African-American who is shattering stereotypes and records but then stumbles as Lin did would use the word niggardly in the title (even though that word, unlike chink, is linguistically unrelated to any slur).
If, by some weird happenstance, that usage did occur to the headline writer in question, you can be sure that he would censor it before his fingers hit the keyboard, or the second he saw his own words on the screen no matter the time, no matter his deadline.
Asian-Americans dont seem to merit similar treatment.
Any discussion of our achievements whether were talking about SAT scores or Lin himself must be contextualized in our history, which is still obscure to all too many.
While this isnt the place for a lecture, let us at least recall a few milestones in Chinese-American history, from the first coolies purchased to solve a shortage of African slaves; to the railroad workers whose bodies, in the form of 10 tons of bones, were shipped back to China once their hard labor was done; to the Chinese Exclusion Act; to the scientists recruited to strengthen the American military during the Cold War, only to be suspected of spying; to the many American-born victims of bullying still rampant today, with the most heinous recent example being Pvt. Danny Chen, who was driven to suicide partly by taunts that, Im sure, made liberal use of the word in that headline.
My point is not to catalogue the horrors or to compare the sufferings of one race to another. Neither is it to stifle anyones freedom of expression not least, a sports editors prerogative to make a bad pun.
As a writer myself, I dont agree with Rep. Chu that we need blanket censorship of any word. Perhaps there are occasions when one wants to describe, say, a crack of light beneath a door or the sound of one glass against another or, yes, a weak spot in a suit of armor, and if there is absolutely no chance that a racial slur might be construed by a reader, then chink might be just the right word. Probably not, but who can say for sure?
My point is simply that Asian-Americans deserve the same level of respect, particularly when our ethnicity is part of the story, as any other group that has experienced systemic bias. Thats all we need to put that terrible headline behind us and get back to watching the game.
The phrase “a chink in the armor” goes all the way back to medeval times and never had anything to do with Chinese people or Asians in general is taking political correctness to an absurd level. The Democratic PC police are at it again and no conservative worth his/her salt should pander to this BS!
So what does one now call the material used to fill the space between the logs of the walls of a cabin?
Man, where’s the barf alert?
Not advocating the use of ANY hurtful racial epithets, but it sounds to me like Miss Fei skipped "Social Studies" in high school. Too bad we don't require kids to learn about US history any more.
Exactly. Not that the liberal media would even had an editorial slant...
The “victim” of this phrase — Jeremy Lin does not even think about it and is over it, and has in fact PUBLICLY STATED that he has forgiven the man.
Why the heck do these people keep bringing it up for?
It looks like “offended” people will not be happy until the writer gets marked with a scarlet letter and then guillotined.
True, so that makes it a racial pun. In a post-racial world, that's all it would be... a pun. It should be laughed off.
Of course the phrase has been around a long time. So has the word "chink" as what has come to be an unacceptable reference to someone of Asian-American origins. Let's not pretend that a headline that says, "Obama Criticized for Niggardly Approach to Funding" would not cause riots in the streets.
There can be no question that the headline intentionally contained a racial epithet towards Lin. Apparently Asians are like Caucasian Christians - in a an era of political correctness, one of the last accepted targets of overt racism.
As we whites become less and less the evil majority (well at least, no longer the majority) can we pretty please get others to stop calling us hillbillies, clod hoppers, red necks, trailer trash, honkies, yokels, bumpkins, mics, wops, . . . ?
Wot? No? Well, OK.
The liberal media are more slanted than ever. But such a discussion might lead us down a slippery slope...
Somehow, being called a “cracker” or a “honky” just doesn’t have much “sting”...
Probably the same with the Asians.
“Oh, you make fun of me by associating me with some of the hardest working, successful people in the world? Oh, I greatly offended!”
Does my first thought when reading that line mean that I am NOT a racist, or that I am because I didn’t take it that way?
“A chink in one’s armor refers to a weakness, like a crack or gap in a suit of armor, that would make it simpler for an enemy to harm an opponent.”
Notice that none of the 'rightously indignant' hand-wringers ever mention what Jeremy Lin named his own blog - CHINKBALLER
These people need to get over themselves. I will not submit to white guilt. I nor my father, grandfather, great- grandfather, great-great-grandfather had anything to do with slavery, importing coolies or mexicans.
Grow up people.
Anyone so insecure and thin-skinned about their own ethnicity should leave this melting pot of a country and return to the hellhole they came from. We’d all be better off for it. A sure sign of maturity is people that can laugh at themselves.
Oh - the DO "learn" about "History" - its just a much different, PC, revised version of history that has little similarity to actual events. In fact, I'm surprised that History textbooks and class registration materials don't include similar language to what TV programs have to scroll across the screen "not based on actual people or events. Any similarity to facts is purely coincidental".
I suspect it was an attempt to be clever by the editor.
The punishment far outweighed the crime. But, it is ESPN - Extra Sensitive Progressive Network.
It was inappropriate, but come on people, lighten up! Every ethnic group has some names meant to be slanderous, but those things have absolutely no power, unless you give it to them.
- signed:
Part kraut, part cheese eating surrender monkey, and all yankee, brownsfan.
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