this post was submitted on 23 Nov 2023
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There's more nuance to this subject than you're implying. It is not the case that either we can't make any reference to race/ethnicity or else Lemmings don't care about racism. Making reference to race or cultural insignia doesn't automatically make something racist.
In other words, there is a middle ground here. Blackface is an obviously hurtful representation of black people that harkens back to when white people saw them as inferior. On the other hand, many middle eastern men wear this particular head covering and there is nothing hateful about it's inclusion into the picture.
I'm guessing that it is being construed as racist because the meme depicts a negative scenario while also including a keffiyeh.
If this was done frequently where a keffiyeh were included in memes or jokes with negative scenarios involving people from Arabic countries it could imply a connection between negative things and Arab people. In that case it could reasonably be considered a racist caricature.
I am wondering if there needs to be an established connection between a depiction and a negative aspect first for it to be racist, or does any depiction of a race or culture in a negative scenario inherently make something racist?
After typing that out I am inclined to believe the latter shouldn't be the case, otherwise essentially any depiction of any negative scenario would be racist.
I think Psyched is just looking for any excuse to get offended and act righteous on the internet.
I can understand that thought, but I think it's wise to first think things through on the assumption that is not the case.
Though, it sure seems that Occam's razor points to this being the case, along with the other user's point of rampant racism towards Arab people causing some to be primed to assume racism.
I will just throw my 2 cents worth of opinion here and gonna say that i think the reason someone might be mad here is that middle easterns do actually face disproportionate racism and I don’t think i need to elaborate on that
The problem is that shitheads see it and go like ‘yA tHese PpL ARe tErrOriSt aND blah blah’, which you can clearly see on other sites
Not to say that other minorities and ethnic groups don’t face the same issue
It’s really more of a problem with ppl than any meme
Yeah, that's a very good point. It does prime people to be particularly sensitive, even if there's not really any racism in the situation.
But the problem is using the whole ethnicity's cultural wear on a meme about a group of people being bad or evil makes people associate all middle eastern people as bad people.
It's just something our brain does, and that's why it's best not to do it in the first place. I'm sure a lot of people have terrible opinions about certain minorities because their friend or their aunt told them about how one person from that race treated them poorly. People always extrapolate that across the whole race.
See, I agree as well that the government in the post is absolutely awful. But just looking at the picture, it just seems to look like a rather insulting caricature of middle eastern people; even if that was something you didn't do intentionally
I think this is a completely logical reasoning. I'd wager that if you had led with this explanation instead of jumping into calling people racist you would have made a better impact.
Also, this reasoning is more along the lines of "may add to racist caricatures" rather than "this is a racist caricature". In that case it makes sense to "avoid just in case" rather than a directly racist act in itself.
If your goal is to educate people to make an actual impact, then avoiding jumping into hyperbole and attacking people directly should be your goal.
Remember to attack the argument or action, rather than the individuals.
Additionally, when someone jumps right into hyperbole and aggressive language towards people, it becomes more of a show as if the goal to be seen as righteous rather than being focused on education and making a real impact.
Wow, I'm amazed that you're having to explain this to people?! I thought we knew this already?? Good on you for taking the time to patiently explain it so clearly for those that somehow missed that memo! Legend! :-)