Because, for example, if a rapist fitting your general description has been preying on the women in your neighborhood, and some of your busybody neighbors are standing around when you're leaving for work and one of them yells "That's him! That's the rapist!" nothing will ever come of it. It's just words.
Another strained attempt to claim apples are oranges. Chanting "USA" is in absolutely no useful way comparable to shouting "Rapist!"
Did I say "context never matters"? No. So enough with the bullshit about "context" as a trump card that makes "USA!" a racial epithet. Some other context about some other expression meaning something different in another situation is not going to change anything.
About a year ago, my son was playing club baseball. Most of his team were Mexican- Americans, with one or two that were born in Mexico, but raised here (and are now U.S citizens). Also, one was born here in AZ, but raised in Mexico, parents moved back so he could attend an American high school. Out of the 14 kids on the team, all were U.S. citizens, and all were of Mexican descent. When the played other teams that were of mixed ethnic backrounds, there wasn't a problem. But when the played teams that were from Scottsdale, AZ (mostly white). If our boys would lose, there wasn't any problem. But if they won, the other team would tell them to go back where the came from, and the words wetback could be heard. There was no mistake or mixed message, it was racism pure and simple.
No, you said essentially "context matters when I say it matters." So, chanting "USA, USA": During an international soccer game In the center of Pyongyang At a game between two US high schools All the same?
So which of the two schools did you attend? Or did you just live in the neighborhood? Or are you just applying the "they're Mexican, aren't they?" rule?
We knew these kids since little league. Most if not all the team stayed together when they became a club ball team. We had birthday parties together, picnics together, and really blended well together. This was really more than the average club baseball team, the coaches and moms really went otu of their way to keep thiese kids together. So yeah I kew they were all U.S. citizens. (They all had to have a passport when they played in Hermosillo.) But thank you for demonstrating the sterotype thinking that was so obvious from the other team.
This clearly false. Where are you getting such a ridiculous notion? It's been explained to you in this thread. The chant was specifically being used as a racial taunt. There's nothing to decide. Message sent, message received.
"Specifically being used" = Intent. "Received" = Perception. Minus either, it has no racial connotation. Doesn't compare to words that only exist as racial slurs, words that slander or words that cause material harm. Intent and perception are not enough. The CONTEXT is not enough. You can come up with objective situational standards for obvious racial slurs, a "shouting fire" scenario, or slandering someone's good name. You can't do that with "USA!". That requires a willful buy-in from all angles, and that's just the case with all the bullshit comparisons made in this thread.
It doesn't require buy-in. It requires understanding the message being sent. Willfully refusing to understand the message does not change the message. We are talking about communication and you cannot just toss out intent and context as irrelevant. Intent and context convey meaning. Connotation is the associated meaning of an expression beyond it's text book definition. Associated meanings can be created through context. In this case, the expression is a chant used for international competition which is instead being used in the context of a domestic competition to convey a racist meaning. That is all that is relevant. The fact that the USA chant, to our knowledge, has never been used for this purpose before is irrelevant.
I had forgotten about this, but last year in the playoffs, Cedar Park high school fans taunted the basketball team from a different SAISD school with chants of "USA! USA!" and "Arizona! Arizona! Arizona!"
It absolutely fucking does. People are just pretending they can take the buy-in as a given. "Understanding" the way you're using it is just another phrasing of "choose to see it as offensive. I'm not refusing to understand the message. I'm refusing to accept one chosen interpretation of the message as the one that drives policy. Irrelevant for the purpose of setting one consistent rule to cover chanting "USA!" That's be cause popular perception is irrelevant. How you choose to see it is irrelevant, because if you must choose to see the offensive connotation, then you can choose not to see it that way, and that relegates it to a purely subjective topic that should not dictate the rules.
Would it be deemed racist if the students chanted this against another team comprised of mostly Canadian players?
No, see, you can't restrict this to something rational and consistent. All that matters is how the speakers FEEEEEEL , how the listener FEEEEEELS . "Have a nice day" can now have an offensive racial connotation if the weather is right.
I don't get this. Why would someone chant USA! USA! at a game between two schools in the US? I get why you'd chant it at, say a US vs. Brazil soccer game. Or at an LA Galaxy vs. Manchester United game. But would you shout it at an LA Dodgers vs. Chicago Cubs game? I wouldn't. It wouldn't make any sense. Unless... ...no, it can't be. Racism doesn't exist. So what is it? EDIT: Grammar mistake.
Haters gonna hate. Let's dig into sandbagger's dictionary and find a synonym. Call it bias, bigotry, or simply hostile bullshit. Not to mention stupidity, prejudice, and unsportsmanlike behavior.
Here's a better question: Why would anyone care long enough to give a fuck? Why do such comically oversensitive people merit official recognition?
Maybe it's the backlash of citizens born in this country lashing out at not being able to show their patriotism by having American Flags banned while Mexican flags are allowed. Maybe it's just people tired of all the PC horseshit and getting back to the old days where you could call a spade a spade. c:
Because every kid has a cell phone and every moment of their lives has to be captured and shared with EVERYBODY. And antiquated sites like Yahoo! News comb through every bit of social media to find HOT BUTTON TOPICS like this one. And then there are people who comb through Yahoo! News to create viral emails that they send to people like Sokar so they can't start threads like this.
Wow, some people here really are trying to play dumb in an attempt to avoid admitting the obvious. The elephant is still in the room even if you refuse to look at it.
Well, to give you an actual answer as opposed to throwing shit like the rest of the monkeys, it's become something of a tradition now in the US to chant "USA! USA!" when something cool happens, like your team winning a sports event, or like that.
