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"Jap"

hmm..
Jap could be kinda offensive I think, kinda like calling americans for yankees. But I just use it sometimes as a shorter version of japanese, and untill now nobody has ever cared.
In norway we often reefer to them as japser instead of japanere, and I've never heard of anybody gotten offended by it..
 
Originally posted by Elizabeth
A couple of articles I just came across this morning on the efforts by a Japanese-American citizens group to petition for the renaming of what is now officially "Jap Road".....and not very surprisingly it is in rural Texas :D

CNN.com - Groups sue to change name of 'Jap Road' - Dec. 3, 2003

http://www.asahi.com/international/update/1206/016.html

There was a same kind of movement in the early '80s to change the name of the sports teams at a high school in a town called Pekin, Illinois. The teams were called Pekin Chinks. I kid you not. Many townspeople said they were proud to be a "Pekin Chink," and did not want to change it.
 
Originally posted by Golgo_13
Or a Japanese exchange student in Louisiana who was going to a Halloween party but ended up at the wrong address, and was shot dead because he was a "Jap." Things like that happen to foreignors in Japan all the time

Sorry i may be bringing up an ancient thread, but since I am from Louisiana and did happen to know the guy who got shot I do know the story. And that by far is not what happened.

The kid was givin the address to a house in Zachary, LA where there was a halloween party and he ended up going to the wrong house.1 or 2 streets away, he then proceeded to walk-up the driveway and the woman who lived there was in the kitchen looking out the window, being 1:00 A.M. a person might be uneasy of an unknown trespasser walking down their driveway. The woman began to hollar for her husband to get the gun there is a trespasser! Well the guy walked outside with the gun and began to tell the kid to STOP and dont come any closer! well the kid not speaking good english began to keep walking thinking it was a joke (It is halloween and all) the kid began to walk closer and waving his hands joking in his mind with the guy, Once the kid got to close the guy shot him and then realized what had happened and called the authorities.

Now I do not agree with this, or any of the racial slurs of names because I am not racisist but Louisiana does have a high crime rate (That being why people are paranoid enough to get a gun).
 
EXTRA POLITE !!

A new law in Maine says if someone breaks into your home; you must ask them to leave and not to interfere with their leaving. Then you can shoot em !! (But only if they refuse to leave.)

Frank

:D
 
What does a JAP make for dinner?
A reservation

What's a JAP horror movie?
Debbie does dishes

What's a JAP's favorite position?
Facing Bloomingdale's
 
I am glad to find this thread because I did get offended when I saw the word 'Jap' in a post in another thread, which I was sure not to be meant as an insult.

I don't really care if sombody uses it to their friends as long as they are not spreading out the idea that it's OK to use the term, but by using it you are making yourself look controversial and uneducated.

In a forum, particulary this one, I assume the members are interested in Japan at least and would expect to see basic manners since your words can be seen by so many people. I mean, come on, there are more words with longer syllable, what does it take to type a proper word to not be disrespectful?


:eek: :eek:
 
In another thread someone said it's perfectly acceptable in the UK to use the word "Jap."

I replied they probably still use the word "Darkie" as well.
 
dryfus said:
hmm..
Jap could be kinda offensive I think, kinda like calling americans for yankees.

Calling an "American" a Yankee is more correct than calling them an "American" in my opinion. The "Real Americans" are the natives.

Golgo_13 said:
In another thread someone said it's perfectly acceptable in the UK to use the word "Jap."

I'm not sure if it's perfectly acceptable or not, but from what i know the racist tones of the word are not realised so much over here.
The word Jap. was made racist by America soldiers, you cant expect the Brits to be keeping up with every new word you guys seem to invent. :p I mean what the hell is Jello :D
 
Frank D. White said:
I always thought JAP stood for Jewish American Princess??

Frank

:? :eek: 😊

In all caps, it does.

How does a JAP give a natural childbirth?
With no makeup on. :D
 
I hadn't actually ever heard the word used much before*. Then one day my Japanese buddy said it and I didn't know what to feel. Should I tell him he shouldn't say it; or tell him where it came from? He had been here for maybe 1 year, but I understood why he used it. Because it was shorter, and easier to write/say.

Anywho, I guess it made me think about racial slurs and words all together. If you use a word, any word, to inflict damage upon another person it's wrong. I don't think people should be persecuted for ignorance in use of the word, but educated. You can also say that same word to a friend you've known for years and it won't be that bad**. As long as you know the intention wasn't to belittle him.

-Jeff

*I've lived my whole life near Long Beach, where there isn't a majority race. Everyone here lives together as friends. I'd never heard a racial slur until around the age of 15, except for 'guero culero' but it never affected me cause I didn't fully understand it.

**Except for the 'N' word, which I believe no one outside of blacks in the U.S. can use mainly because of controversy. It's a gross word anywho (IMO).
 
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I think it sometimes depends on who uses the words

just like black people call themselves 'nigga',
but if a non-black person calls a black person a 'nigga'.that would be considered racist

the famous Japanese rock band B'z actually have a song name 'Jap The Ripper'
 
Frank D. White said:
I always thought JAP stood for Jewish American Princess??
Actually, it's "Jinglebells Agony Perception", the agony you perceive when hearing too much Jinglebells :D
 
misa.j said:
I am glad to find this thread because I did get offended when I saw the word 'Jap' in a post in another thread, which I was sure not to be meant as an insult.

I don't really care if sombody uses it to their friends as long as they are not spreading out the idea that it's OK to use the term, but by using it you are making yourself look controversial and uneducated.

The thing that makes this word different from, say, the N-word is that a lot of people really don't know that it is offensive. It is an abbreviation of Japanese that is going to occur naturally in language no matter what you do. I personally don't use it because I realize some people find it offensive but hopefully if people continue to use it in a benign way, it will once again return to being a harmless word like it was prior to ww2.

In any case it's best to take context & intent into consideration before deeming something to be offensive.

--
playaa, you actually knew Hattori-san? Did he go to your school? What was the deal with his host-brother? I thought he was with him at the time. Was he parking the car or something?
 
I don't see why it is "racist". Calling me a Brit is not racist because I am British.

In both cases, the first syllable is just being used.

If someone is sensitive then they may take offence to it, if I said "arse" most people would not think I said a naughty word, but someone might, who is in the wrong? If someone called me an arse, I would laugh because to me it is not rude. There are going to be Japanese people who think it is rude, and ones that don't, it is probably best to avoid using it anyway just incase.

As for you arguing about these race hate crimes and whatnot, I do believe an english girl was murdered a while back in Japan, she was working in a hostess bar. Was it because she was a gaijin or because the murderer was a nutcase to begin with? That case does not suddenly make the entire of Japan unsafe.

Accidents happen, the Japanese guy who got shot was unlucky, It was clearly not a race crime, but as usual certain people will ignore the truth or twist it to suit their arguement.

There is no doubt in my mind that many more people (of all races) were killed in the same year in similar circumstances, but it would be hard to find those stats because there is nothing "special" about that.

Every country has bad people, don't go sterotyping a state/race/country due to a few unfortunate events.
 
Spaceghost said:
I don't see why it is "racist". Calling me a Brit is not racist because I am British.

In both cases, the first syllable is just being used.
Racism in a word is based on
- Intent
- Usage
and
- History
(in order of decreasing importance).

Intent : Practically _any_ word can be offensive if it is used by someone trying to be offensive.
Usage : 'Jap' is still currently used as a slur by a significant number of people, although it's probably more often used in partial or complete ignorance.
[ e.g. NFL will not discipline Parcells for remark for a 'partial', IMO]
History : 'Jap' came to be used as a perjoritive term in the WW II. If you don't know what went on with both sides at that time you really should look into it. The point here is that this is still near history - people are still around of Japanese desecent who were persecuted in that period or whose parents were.
 
Yes, you are right, upon thinking further, I guess it is the same as someone calling a Pakistani, a "paki".

Two of my uni flat mates are Pakistani, and when my friends from home ask about them, I say they are Pakistani and not "pakis" because although I am tempted to say "paki" purely to shorten my sentence, it is not proper to do so incase someone takes offence.
 
my brother refers to japanese people as "japs" would anyone take offence if he said it?
he just does that because its less vocabulary to pronounce.
 
if everyone just used and accepted a word like jap or nigger as a common word instead of as an insult, over a hundred years or so it would lose it's power as an insult. but hey, thinking people will do that is sort of like thinking communism will work or thinking the hippie movement will change the world

what could be done and what can be done are not the same... personally i would only call a friend a jap and even then only if i knew he could take it without getting sad or kicking my ***.
 
My grandfather in-law was an officer of a ship during WWll, who had befriended with Japanese prisoners that were on his ship, had used the word 'Jap' in front of my husband who was about 8 yrs old at the time.

My husband who always had been such a smart a** told his grandfather not to use the word because it was a bad word, which made his grandfather very angry.

My husband is my hero! :samurai:
 
"Jap" is equivalent to "Chink" in both usage and intent.

Name one Chinese person who likes being called a Chink.
 
wow :eek: this thread is still active after all this time :D
wouldn't they be calling themselves paj, because they do everything in reverse? shiro kuro for black and white, drive on the other side of the road, as well as walking on the left rather than the right....where their liberal party is actually the conservative one :D
 
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