If seen folks on this board get excited upon seeing "Jap." However I
don't think anyone would get upset upon reading or hearing "Brit",
"Scott", "Aussie" (SP?), "Swede", "Turk" or "Yank."

Please explain the difference.

 

To me it isn't so much about the word. In different circumnstances it could just as easily be a term of endearment as a racist comment. However, to me, the term "Jap" is a reference that came about from conflict rather than friendship and therefore it is more the stigma of the word rather than the word itself that offends.

However, I'm not Japanese, so I cannot speak fully to why it is offensive, this is just my take on it.

 

It's probably some deep seated problem that will take many years for it to die, even though most of the folks today didn't experience what our fathers/grandfathers did.

 

I know! I'm still trying to get over those stinking Romans

But really, how many of us have heard the phrase "Jap" in a truly derogatory way in anything other than an American WW2 movie. We do realize that the propaganda machine in the US was turned on high during that time, and recorded on film forever...right?

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by ironwedge
[B]

I know!

 

yup, that's part of it Bieg. Brantshali has the roots correct mainly also.

 

I always get a bad feeling when I hear that term. The same feeling when I hear the "n" word. I remember some people where I worked using the "J" word and I thought "How could you be so insensitive". The Japanese were our biggest customers (that's a change of roles" and we wouldn't have any jobs if it weren't for them and some of our employees had to cut them down. It's very sad when we can't accept others without placing ourselves higher on a pedestal.

 

koreans had problems with the Japanese....but even we don't refer to them as "Japs". the term is used primarily as a derogatory one, so why use it, unless....?????

 

DarioManfretti, i think we'll never understand some ppl's reasons for the things they do. that is good in some way. i don't want to understand that sort of thing.

 

let's not get into the whole korea and japan thing....

japanese rewrote their history books to erase their past mistakes, now children learn some fiction instead of history. SHAME on them.