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REISHUNGER issues apology over "CHING CHANG CHONG" product
- Thread starter Pet
- Start date
Oof. It's that overwhelmingly anachronistic racist bit Colbert(character) used to do, but not at all in a satirical way.
Like, what were they thinking? This stuff in 2020 always floors me that people can still be so insensitive and overtly racist. How many quality assurance steps did the product go through, it makes you wonder.
Like, what were they thinking? This stuff in 2020 always floors me that people can still be so insensitive and overtly racist. How many quality assurance steps did the product go through, it makes you wonder.
Trying to play this off as "it's a children's game therefore not racist" is dumb because:
a. What does rock-paper-scissors have to do with rice/Asian proverbs if the phrase is "innocent" on its own without any racist context, and
b. A racist word/phrase/imagery being used for children's entertainment doesn't make it any less racist and hurtful. Maybe there's no longer intentional racism, but... okay why does that matter at all?
Dark Knight - I've seen that bit before and I get it's satire but yeah it's kinda weird to see. It's nice he's trying to... I guess, highlight racism against Asians and the dismissals of it, but definitely as an Asian there's a bit of this ... o_O meh gut feeling.
a. What does rock-paper-scissors have to do with rice/Asian proverbs if the phrase is "innocent" on its own without any racist context, and
b. A racist word/phrase/imagery being used for children's entertainment doesn't make it any less racist and hurtful. Maybe there's no longer intentional racism, but... okay why does that matter at all?
Dark Knight - I've seen that bit before and I get it's satire but yeah it's kinda weird to see. It's nice he's trying to... I guess, highlight racism against Asians and the dismissals of it, but definitely as an Asian there's a bit of this ... o_O meh gut feeling.
Oh I'm not saying that bit was okay at all, it rubbed me the wrong way back in the day too. It was one of his laziest jokes, and not worth the effort to air it. It was intended to be a shock laugh I think. You got to imagine that wouldn't have even been a bit if Colbert Report were on today.
You know literally nothing about me other than my nationality. How about you check your own way of thinking in stereotypes for a moment.
The translation is fairly poor here. What he is saying is that everyone at Reishunger (the company) shares those values
This has nothing to do with America. This is racist against Chinese people.
Even on era we frequently get "actually, racism doesn't exist in europe, it's an America only problem" types of posts
edit: lmao, should have read the thread:
I see we've entered the phase of discussions about racism on Era where once it's pointed out to them, someone's claimed it's an American problem and not a European one. Getting flashbacks to zwarte piet discussions.
Also, unsurprisingly, this is just this poster's blindspot speaking and isn't true for Germany as a whole:
No, you don't understand, its just an American thing, and totally not a globalized derogatory term against people of Asian descent~
so...the company behind the racist product admits it's racist, apologizes for it, and promise to do better. But then you have people in this very thread going
"well, back in my days, it's not racism" or "Where I'm from, it's not racism"
Word of advice for anyone trying to defend the phrase. Be like the company, apologize, admit it's racism, and promise to do better. Do not double down, whitesplain, or dismiss concerns from minorities affected by those phrases.
"well, back in my days, it's not racism" or "Where I'm from, it's not racism"
Word of advice for anyone trying to defend the phrase. Be like the company, apologize, admit it's racism, and promise to do better. Do not double down, whitesplain, or dismiss concerns from minorities affected by those phrases.
German here, as kids we constantly used "Ching Chang Chong" for Rock Paper Scissors. Back then i wasn't even aware that this was associated with insults against Chinese people or the language. I just thought that's the expression that goes along with the game without any futher meaning to it.
I don't know why you are talking about "considered racist in America", which implies that it's not racist in Germany and elsewhere in the world. That's not how racism works. Just because large parts of a population are still ignorant to certain issues doesn't mean that these issues don't exist in that country. Just ask any "Asian looking" German how often in their lives they had to endure hurtful "ching chang chong" jokes.
Also, I haven't heard anyone referring to the game as "ching chang chong" in ages. It's almost always "schnick schnack schnuck" these days.
That's often how racist thoughts and concepts persist, by allowing time and ubiquity to whittle them down to the point that they're completely innocuous. We're all guilty of using racist terminology that we didn't know was racist at the time, but what really matters is that once you're made aware of it you stop using the phrase and educate others.
As far as I'm aware, this nursery rhyme is German.
(Via https://www.gemi-berlin.de/2016/06/06/ching-chang-chong-nein-danke/, though it's easy to find elsewhere.)
Those sounds are not a coincidence, clearly.
But of course, I'm sure anti-Asian racism is non-existent in Germany. /s
Reishunger's apology even makes note of this insidious nature of everyday racism, but certain people don't hear past the first word in that phrase because, in their minds, if something happens every day it can't be racist.
I was wondering if this was german completly missing reishunger as a german brand. But yeah i remember playing rpc with those words, but years have passed but a lot of old people still have high positions without quite understanding some social changes. I would posit that i've seen german folk being as clueless about blackface as some japanese television shows.
TBH I'm not sure if it would not be on Colbert Report before.
You're right about that, and I do apologize for assuming. I made an assumption that a minority in a place where they are not the hegemonic color would not be so dismissive about racist comments, thus I assumed you were part of the white hegemony. But, I agree, that is an assumption so my bad.
Yeah, "they have better social status", when a lot of my Asian friends came from Vietnam, from really poor backgrounds. Infuriating really.
Yeah, just bc it was normalized somewhere in the past doesn't mean it isn't racist crap. Back in my days some people still said "kannste vergasen" (you can gas/forget that, background being the gas chambers in concentration camps). Sure lots of people didn't make that comnection but I knew it was crap and anyone could. People should educate themselves.