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So does it? Especially if you are a white American in you own country?
Someone brought the word up on the Politics forum and it got me wondering...
Doesn't bother me one bit. If someone uses that as an attempt at ruffling my feathers, then I know what kind of a person they are. But it doesn't bother me. People get far too upset over words anymore.
It depends on how the word is used. I live in Austin, Texas, so I'm around mexicans a lot. If it's one of mis amigos who says it, kiddingly to me, with a grin, I take no offense. I DO get a bit perturbed if, however, it's some illegal alien (we call 'em "exchange students" down here) who is ticked-off at me because, maybe I didn'y understand his rapid-fire spanish, or I, with my three itms in the express line at the store, cut in front of him and his family of eight with 17 items.
But I've always gotten along pretty well with the Mexicans, and in fact enjoy speaking spanish and am pretty proficient with it. And if I ever find myself getting a little frustrated with the sheer propensity of them down here, and with getting called a pinche gringo once in awhile, I just remind myself that I'm living in what was once northeastern Mexico, before we took it away from them in that famous Yankee landgrab that was called the Mexican-American War in 1846.
Paz, hombres.
Just wondering, because it was my understanding when I travelled in America de sur that it wasn't meant to be derrogatory; it just meant a white guy that wasn't from there. There was a nickname for everyone it seemed, and it fit right in. Nobody one got all uppity when they were called a Mestizo, or Indio, or chino, ect, as none of them were intended as insults.
Back in the USA though, some latinos seem to throw it around in a very derrogatory way, right along with all the other choice racial slurs. So why the double standard?
I'm Hispanic and they call me Gringa if I go visit a Latin American country because I'm "American." So it's not so much a racial term, more like a term of endearment (ha, ha) to describe an American person.
So does it? Especially if you are a white American in you own country?
Someone brought the word up on the Politics forum and it got me wondering...
I'm going to quote something my dad told me once.
"There are going to be so many things in life that will p--s you off that you could spend your whole life trying to stop them."
So to clarify within a better context: to an extend I hold this philosophy because it really is this way. We really could spend our entire lives fighting the things that we don't like, confronting the people that say things things about us. I guess it's really just picking your battles. But this being said, I do think it's pretty interesting to think of. How many names like this can you think up for any given minority. Of course I mean just think them out, please don't actually post such a list.
Now how many names like this can we think up for white people? I hate to be the "your own medicine type" But I think it's good for white people to see this kind of thing aimed toward them. It is sad that there will be many people who won't deserve to taste this proverbial medicine but nonetheless at least some of the white people who still breed this mentality have that "mile in another's shoes" experience. For the most part white people minimalize, trivialize and grossly underestimate the nature of this kind of thing.
I guess where I am going with all this is that I hate to see a situation where there's just another name to label a group with because it's just the same problem with a different face. But the cynical wise-guy kind of likes to see the top dog learning about repercussions, reactions and consequences the hard way. Like all forms of discomfort: the right amount of it keeps people in reality.
The term gringo is actually becoming a bit passe these days, and does not seem to be used quite as much as in years past. The more up to date term that many of the reconquista illegal alien crowd tosses at white Americans is "Gabacho",and is often used in an insulting manner. I do resent being addressed in this manner in my own country by these criminals and usually respond with "pinche mojado" or some other nasty slur in Spanish, unless it was delivered in a friendly non threatening way, in which case will ignore it and let it slide.
I do resent being addressed in this manner in my own country by these criminals
The origin of Gabacho dated back to the 16th century, when Catalan speakers in northern Spain used Gavatx to refer to mountain folk who spoke the language with an accent.
People will always have a genaral term for "foreigners", and how offended foreigners become is the yardstick by which the offensiveness of th word is measured. The angrier the foreigners become, when called a foregner, the more fun it is to call them that.
[MOD CUT/innapropriate]
If your default aggregation of all hispanic-accented bystanders is to call them "criminals" until they prove their immigration status, you deserve everything they call you. I've been called Gringo by people whose ancestors were "in my own country" before mine were.
Never bothered me, not when I was in South America or in the U.S.
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