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Comment by berneezy3 | Hacker News Reader

I think that points out the whole fallacy of PC culture: that Americans only will be ethnically thoughtful when being pressured into. For better or for worse, Asians get mocked simply because we are conditioned to deal with mockery with silence. I don't know whether we can just attribute that to Asians dealing with it well. But I definitely share your hopes that this quality will benefit us in the long run.

One of my white roommates who mocked me in the story was actually a hardcore Bernie supporter who stood up for black culture at the drop of a dime, so I found it curious that he viewed people of my culture so negatively.

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Isn't this just the perceived difference in source? i.e. mocking someone for what you believe is a positive character trait is generally seen as okay (the aforementioned "study a lot"). Another vein this happens in is with regards to Germans ("being precise").

I don't think you could say that there's a similar vein of humor with African-American culture that's developed, and that's principally historical: America's slave holding history is still an open-wound today, and its social concepts around African-Americans were widely based on making sure they were viewed as lesser.

EDIT: This isn't to say either is ultimately good. There's a pretty important difference between occasional good humor that transitions into something of more malevolent intent, but how people perceive them appropriateness very much matters.

Very good point. I do think the hardships that the African-American community have endured are far more severe than the ones Asians in America have. But my people did endure their share of hardships as well; the first Chinese immigrants in San Francisco were used as slaves to build the railways, many working to their deaths on the tracks. The conditions were extreme, but I guess the scale was much smaller than the African-American slaves.

But do people even know the types of hardships Asian Americans had to endure?

How many people know about the Chinese Massacre of 1871 in LA?

If we really are going to compare suffering, wouldn't Native Americans be on the top of the list? And yet their suffering isn't really something that is focused on.

Native Americans are probably the most unfortunate group. To put it in business terms, I think certain ethnic groups have just been more successful in their marketing than others ;)

Aren't there a lot of accepted jokes about black men being well endowed or otherwise physically gifted?

Really, in the USA? I wouldn't have guessed from the literature or movies. I'm a European, I've never actually visited the USA, so this is genuine question about whether these kind of jokes would be considered "politically correct".

> roommates who mocked me

Just curious, did you perceive a certain level of malice with their mocking, or was it more lighthearted? I can't speak for Americans, but here in Australia, mocking from your friends is a sign of acceptance and mateship. It's a way of indirectly indicating that you're comfortable enough with someone to knock them around a bit, it's a complimentary way of saying "I know you're strong enough to handle it".

I don't want to risk sidelining your experience, but is there a chance they may have seen you as one of the boys?

Yeah, we also love to give our friends shit here in America :) But to clarify, the group text began before they met me. They only told me about the texts after realizing I was Americanized and deciding I was "one of them". However, I do conclude that there was a degree of malice to their jokes. This is because while they were telling me about the texts, they voiced their legitimate concerns about living with asian people( But credit to them for being 100% honest and opening up discussion). A couple of my roommates even went on to say that the international students were ruining the social climate of the university, and ruining their chances of having a traditional, party-boy college lifestyle, and that colleges were accepting way too many Asians. (FYI I attended UC San Diego which had 50% asian people).

However, after this episode, we maintained great relationships as roommates, and yes, they still made fun of my driving, my small eyes etc., but at that point, I knew it was all in good spirits :)

"colleges were accepting way too many Asians"

Some of this is just kids being dumb, but some is Americans have a weird relationship with their Empire.

On one hand their parents and student loans are paying more money to fund the foreign exchange students and every foreign exchange student present is quite literally one local taxpayer who isn't getting an education yet is somehow supposed to pay for the system without an educated-level job. Even if the school accepts everyone, that just means the local taxpayers are on the hook for capex to make huge buildings that wouldn't be necessary without the demands of the Empire.

That sounds like a horrific deal for the local taxpayer, and it is, but Empires always suck at some level or another for pretty much everyone involved. However from a foreign aid and propaganda perspective that money is well spent, who else gets to propagandize the entire world's youth for practically no cost compared to military expenses? Its a lot cheaper to indoctrinate the world's kids at an American school than to wave expensive F-35 fighters at them in a threatening manner a decade later. In typical American corruption we officially spend like 0.1% of our federal budget on foreign aid and then bury things like state Uni budgets in the individual state budgets to pretend our Empire spends roughly nothing on foreign aid, but we really do spend lots of money on the Empire, for which we're theoretically running a profit, or if not "we" at least someone is running a profit.

I'd estimate the total cost to the GDP of empire has got to be something like 5% but its cheaper than the alternative, or so the people getting rich off the empire insist.

At any rate, my point is some of it is just kids being dumb, yet some of it is knowing for federal level foreign policy reasons their old high school buddy named XYZ can't go to college with them, despite his having to pay for it in taxes, because a foreigner is there in his place and supposedly everyone is better off for it, yet fundamentally on a personal level they still miss their old high school buddy XYZ.

> On one hand their parents and student loans are paying more money to fund the foreign exchange students and every foreign exchange student present is quite literally one local taxpayer who isn't getting an education yet is somehow supposed to pay for the system without an educated-level job.

A vast majority of foreign college students are not "exchange". They are just foreign students who pay full out-of-state tuition and don't qualify for any financial aid. That's why colleges are actively courting them as they bring in way more revenue.

Are you okay with being treated differently for being Asian though? I don't see how being silent to mockery helps us at all. Americans are well aware of how African-Americans feel about stereotypes and racially charged language, but can casually mock Asian-Americans because of the subservient attitude a lot of us display. Please don't just take mockery with silence, let people know how you feel because they won't know otherwise.

I don't think its the best solution, but I do think it is better than the way certain minority groups are using PC culture as a means to harass anyone with the different opinion. At least with the current Asian culture of remaining silent, we encourage there to be honest dialogue. Yes we will be mocked sometimes, but at least Americans won't act all polite and PC in front of us, then let all the beans spill we aren't listening.

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