casualracism

I don’t have a copy of the cartoon, and I haven’t read anything about this story other than what’s in the article. But that the article is very vague about the cartoon is rather telling in itself: if it is innocuous enough why isn’t it included or at least described in more detail as ammunition? The author wasn’t shy about including the full tweet they’d like you to believe was the smoking gun. It’s also impossible to tell “actual intent” even if the image is provided; pushing a political message is not at all mutually exclusive with contempt against an entire people.

Anyway, this jollybean poster apparently also doesn’t have a copy and posted in bad faith just to mislead people who didn’t actually read the article, or only read what the author intended to highlight. Really tried of this bad faith engagement.

I posted multiple quotes from the very article being discussed as a reply to another misinformation comment from you: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28097088 If this very one-sided article says it was racist, it was, or they would have used it as ammunition instead of being as vague as possible.

At this point it is very clear you’re deliberately pushing bs in bad faith. You should be ashamed of yourself.

This is a straw man because that’s not what the cartoon was about, at least not according to TFA.

Maybe you read about the incident elsewhere but TFA vaguely hints at a drawing of a Chinese person with offensively stereotyped features, which doesn’t sound compatible with your Winnie the Pooh theory.

In any case TFA deliberately made it hard for readers to form their own judgement.

TFA tried very hard to bury and brush off this detail but had to include

> It depicted a comic character that had been altered and had stereotyped Chinese features, with yellow skin tone and slit eyes. This drawing circulated on social media in the spring of 2020, and was deemed racist by some users.

The student reluctantly admitted

> In retrospect, I realize I didn't question the rendering of the Chinese person enough

Given TFA’s clear sympathy for the student and intentional omission of what the cartoon actually is, one simply has to assume it’s at least as racist as TFA claims (oh who am I kidding, it’s more racist). It’s clearly not a case of “the notion of cartoon which has ‘Chinese character’ as inherently racist.” Asking “have you read the article” is frowned upon on HN but this is a case where the question justified. It’s either that or you’re arguing in bad faith.

What are you even talking about? Posting racist cartoon depicting stereotypes about Chinese is exactly what the Chinese studies PhD student did, so this is an exact parallel.

As I said in another comment, in the U.S., if you’re an African American studies PhD student and you post a racist cartoon depicting black stereotypes, it’s not hard to imagine losing your doctorate candidacy.

Not sure what the timeline is here. TFA strongly implies it’s a tweet on March 21 inciting a response on March 28, but buries the lede about the racist cartoon posted at an unknown time that the professor claims to have received an email about.

I’m sure political factors play the leading role here, but it’s long past the point where you can casually post racist cartoons and act surprised when you’re hit by undesirable consequences. Imagine an African American studies PhD student casually posting racist cartoons depicting black stereotypes. People have been disciplined for much less (e.g. that professor who spoke a common Chinese phrase resembling the n word several times to caution students and later got suspended).

And before you accuse me of things, I’m a long time HN user and I’m not paid to comment. Using a throwaway for radioactive topics.