Racist or not

[xyzzy@bok]

What exactly is a 'Race'? Is it illegal, bad etc to be rude to a Jew? Is that a race or a religion - or both? So it's racist to insult a Jamaican if your White English, what if you're white Jamaican? Is Irish a race? Is Spanish? Is Russian? Of course it's not nice to be rude to your fellow man or woman [don't want to be sexist] but why racist, aren't we all the same race i.e. human? Where do Puerto Ricans sit on this issue, and half castes and Eskimos is a much nicer word than Inuit so what's wrong with that? And Indians.. will be in my next Q. :-)

[bubba_skinny]

Race is a genetic variation caused by geographic isolation

[flirty41]

Hi xyzzy - not an answer to your question, but can I just 'threadjack' as you call it, and say it's nice to see Einstein back again!!

[lisaj]

Let's not also forget that going too far the other way by deliberately being 'nice' to people of a different race is still differentiation by race and is just as bad!

[Hamish]

On the Jew point. Judaisum is the religion predominat withing the Isreali people. So a Jew is a religious lable, a follower of Jewdaisum, and an Isreali is a native of Isreal.

[woodpam]

You can be as rude as you like to people as long as it doesn't constitute racial abuse. Put in the same position, ie living in a country where the power is held by people who are discernably different from you and consider themselves superior to you, how would you feel to be on the receiving end of it? Choosing to call people by a name which they have rejected is patronising and done to express contempt. Remember some of the collective names for black people which thankfully we don't hear too often now. Racism usually has a power factor involved and as long as racial groups of people have less power, less access to jobs and services they are the victims of racism however "nice" you are to them. All the groups you refer to are distinct racial groups, but as Einstein says, mixed race is the correct term rather than half-caste.

[Gef]

Apologies to xyzzy and others as this does not answer the original question. I recently saw a TV program in which applicants were hoping to secure a Surgeons job in the UK. All of the applicants were from India/Pakistan and their spoken English was very poor. When one of the interviewing panel pointed this out he was told that this could not be taken into consideration as it would be seen as racist. Now, if I applied for a job in say, Spain, would I be able to claim "racism" if I was rejected on the grounds that my Spanish was difficult to understand?

[Squirrel]

People who wish to look politically correct in the eyes of others often take anti-racism to extreme lengths...I mean what if one of those people got the English word for "Appendectomy" mixed up with "Amputation"? Sounds horrible of me, but it would be more likely for someone who knows better English to get it right. Just an example.