this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2024
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Explain Like I'm Five

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[–] [email protected] 113 points 3 months ago (2 children)

the old wise tale

Old wives tale. There’s nothing wise about it…

[–] [email protected] 63 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Yes! Eggcorns is by far the superior term for “alteration of a word or phrase through the mishearing or reinterpretation of one or more of its elements, creating a new phrase having a different meaning from the original but which still makes sense and is plausible when used in the same context.”

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Boneappletea is also an excellent term for a similar thing, where the "new" word or phrase makes no sense and is not plausible when used in the same context.

There will certainly be reasonable disagreements about which description is more apt in a given situation. One that comes to mind is Joey Tribbiani's use and explanation of "a moo point."

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Yeah, I’m just partial to eggcorn (term and concept).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

What's the origin of the term eggcorn? A brief scan of the link didn't answer this for me. Is eggcorn itself an eggcorn?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

What is it an eggcorn of? Acorn? And what's the origin?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Oh awesome and very interesting thank you!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago
[–] [email protected] 70 points 3 months ago (1 children)

When I was growing up you'd hear stories about how the local Chinese immigrants would eat neighborhood cats when they caught them.

But our "Chinese" neighbours were actually Portuguese, and vegetarian.

Racists are going to be racist, regardless of reality

[–] [email protected] 24 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Chinese immigrants

I used to work at a Chinese restaurant an the number of people who came in there blithely asking me if we "really" cooked and served cats was astounding.

I got tired of answering the question so often that towards the end I gave up and my standard response was, "No, we only cook and serve idiots who go around saying we cook cats."

I think the very low percentage of lost business was worth it. And this only because my boss told me that this kind of thing did not meet the criteria wherein I was allowed to roundhouse kick patrons in the teeth. If you're going to be a dumbass, at least try to be original.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Should have just put up a sign for cat soup and silently point at it for anyone who still ask.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Because racism is learned. It's the same tired tropes they heard from their parents. Today's racists are racist against Central American and Caribbean immigrants. Twenty years ago it was the Middle East. In the 1970s it was southeast Asians. Before that were... everybody else. This is America. There's always some new cultural group to demonize.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I remember a comedian who once described it like you did saying America is just one big game of tag your it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

That's a clever and funny way of putting it. It's just one stupid moral panic after the other, and racism is frequently featured.

[–] Unquote0270 25 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Dehumanising people makes it easy to hate and persecute them, and to blame them for a bunch of stuff which isn't their fault. It really is a classic move with a rich history.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I was discussing this with my mom over the phone and we kind of both were wondering if this is the playbook that Hitler used.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 months ago (4 children)

ELI5 How come it seems now the old wise tale of Vietnamese eating pets and now its immigrants into the USA?

I don't understand that sentence.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

ELI5 How come it seems now the old [wives'] tale of Vietnamese eating pets and now its immigrants into the USA?

That's still a rather incomprehensible sentence.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Rephrased to it's intended meaning, that would be:

ELI5 how come it seems now [that] the old [wives'] tale about Vietnamese people eating pets [is now being applied to] immigrants into the USA?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

It was poorly constructed i too couldnt figure out the hell they were saying until i saw comments lol

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

This is funny as the Vietnamese joke about Chinese this way, they have a saying that translates as, 'the only thing they don't eat with 4 legs is a table'

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Even chairs?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Maybe OP is from some place with a high Vietnamese population so there were rumors about this? TX, LA, or CA maybe.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

These rumors/stories, whatever you want to call them, is all new to me, but its just a way to dehumanize a certain group and therefore helping to justify labelling them the new boogieman.

ELI5 Its a way to make a group of people appear less human and different from yourself. This makes it easier to not relate to them and use them as a bad/ evil example of something you want to avoid.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Nothing to do with pets, but in Korea there are places that serve dog. At least it was the case when I was there 20+ years ago. But, of course they're not pets, they're farmed like any other livestock I would expect, and these places were not exactly commonplace even then, so maybe now they're just not a thing? I've not really looked into it.

Now, saying "x" people eat pets is likely just what others have said, a slur used against whichever subset of people is the target of the month. Maybe it once had roots in facts like those I've mentioned, but they're far removed from them now.

No, I did not partake in eating dog.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Illegal only as of 2024. But still, it wasn't a widespread thing.

Cats, OTOH.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

The "immigrant" group to shit on changes every so often where I live.

But when it changes the SAME rumors get saddled on to the new group.

"X group eats pets, better be careful around them."

"Y group will take your dog and butcher it. Better be watchful"

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

Your question is confusing, but I think the answer is...

Racist people heard something. Racist people think it's a fact. Racist people extrapolate from that thing they heard and assume the extrapolation is also a fact.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

The 90s called, they want their dog whistle back

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

As you should expect, the truth is actually between the extremes of “facist trope that is completely false” and “all immigrants are evil.” A person in Ohio recently killed and ate a cat, but was not an immigrant.

For anyone who doesn’t want to click the link, it contains bodycam video of a police officer in Ohio recently arresting a US citizen with blood all over her, fur in her teeth, a dead cat nearby, and multiple eye witnesses saying she killed and ate the cat.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13844919/bodycam-eating-cat-Ohio-trup-pets.html

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It's an ancient fascist trope.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Well as a lesbian about eating cats i that pussy taste good.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Cats are/were eaten in Vietnam. I have no idea about Haiti and it's impossible to search it currently. So, this is people jumping to conclusions that immigrants are eating pets.