But Will Names Never Hurt?

Recently very good friend who happens to be an educator in the New York City public school system sent me this article and I was blown away. This further reiterates the point I was trying to make in my previous post regarding the Imus/Scarlet Knights Women's Basketball Team remarks. This has got to stop! The fact that it was a 7-year-old child that found this is unacceptable. When will people learn that racial epithets can harm! Of course the bigger question is really who is a fault? Do other countries describe people of color in terms like this? If we, living in the United States (or all of North America for that matter), don't stop using language such as this, how can we expect people on the other side of the world to stop using it too?

Twenty years ago I traveled to Italy and was amazed at the depiction of African-Americans on television there. Now I don't want you think that I went to Italy to watch television the entire time I was there! No I didn't! It was a rainy day and my host and I had just gotten back from a long trip on a train from Venice, but I digress. The dubbed voices used for African-Americans sounded like they came from the "Amos N Andy" shows. It was totally degrading and, in my eyes (and ears), disrespectful. I don't know what its like today in Italy, but if anybody does know please comment to this post and share your opinions. But the underlying thought at the time was: is this how the rest of the world sees me? Needless to say I was determined to prove any native Italian I met during my stay in their country WRONG! I learned as much of the language I could while there to keep me from sounding like a total tourist. (When in Rome...) I had hoped that by the time I left the country, the people I came into contact with over there, had a different perception of African-Americans just by my actions and speech. I certainly didn't go there with the perception that everyone I came across there was "connected", "made" or any of the other stereotypes that American television and film have portrayed Italian-Americans to be like.

The reason I tell this story is because I believe that perception breeds ignorance. The way to break that chain of ignorance from spiraling out of control is to promote positivity and to educate that this type of language is not acceptable! I'm sure the person or persons in China who were responsible for deciding to call the color on the label in question by this name, only did it because that was his or her perception of the color brown. Maybe no one ever told them that this word is a extremely offensive term used to describe people of color? Who knows? Maybe they heard the name used in American Hip-hop lyrics? Who's to say for sure. But we do know one thing for sure: They heard it spoken somewhere.

Any thoughts?