> Brown bags trace back to the “brown paper bag test,” which was traditionally used to judge skin color by certain African-American sororities and fraternities. References to a “brown bag” when we are really referencing a get-together over lunch surfaces an ugly period of American history that can alienate and offend people.
> (no can do) What might seem like a folksy, abbreviated version of “I can’t do it” is actually an imitation of Chinese Pidgin English. The phrase dates from the mid-nineteenth to early-twentieth centuries, an era when Western attitudes towards the Chinese were markedly racist.
> Using the word “pow wow” is cultural misappropriation, and ultimately racist.
> Referring to something as your spirit animal is cultural appropriation.
Some of these are pretty wild.