Is this racist of me?

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I was with my friends and one of them is American. She is from Colorado, and has quite a dry, witty sense of humour. She made a comment, I think as a joke, about how "all Americans are fat and practical" but obviously she was playing into the stereotype and mocking it. I laughed and said, "no!" as if to play into the joke, but then I asked, "is it true American and British people are very different?"

Is this racist? They looked at me as if I were really bad and stupid, and then it got really awkward and felt the urgent need to leave. Was I being racist? I have a huge fear of being racist and would hate to be anything prejudiced.

To be fair I think I didn't fully get the depth of the sarcasm she was making, as it was said in the same tone she usually speaks, and she has the tone of voice where she will say things in a sarcastic voice that aren't meant to be ironic, which made me think she actually believed it partly, which is why I said "no" a bit reassuringly.

I have been worrying I'm racist recently, but it makes me sick to my stomach to think I am, as I love people of all nationalities and have friends of all different countries. I used to not think about it much but for some reason ever since starting university I've become more cogniscent of racism and now I'm scared I'm racist (I am diagnosed with OCD).



Thank you!

It doesn't sound racist... you didn't intend it to be racist... so, no, it wasn't racist.
I've said things that have been met with a shocked silence and I'll never understand why.

"American" is not a race. Neither is "British". These are nationalities.

Referring to a person's nationality in a bad way is not necessarily racism, but it could be considered nationalism.

Of course, if a nation's citizens are one homogeneous race, then it could be racism.

Last edited by Fnord on 16 Oct 2019, 1:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Racist isn't really the best word, but I can see how someone might apply it. That said, it's clear that no hostile intentions existed and that you understood yourself to be mocking a stereotype more than genuinely embracing it.

Let's ignore nomenclature and just examine it dryly. You made a sarcastically bigoted comment stereotyping your audience and your audience failed to get 'the joke'. Don't beat yourself up over it, but learn from the experience. In general you've gotta be careful when making jokes that rely on insulting your audience.


Edit: Not is, isn't.

Last edited by funeralxempire on 16 Oct 2019, 2:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Hi funeralxempire, don't worry I didn't make the comment, my friend did! I was the one who responded to the joke. I was wondering if asking whether there are differences between American people and English people is suggesting I believed in the stereotypes, when I didn't!!

After re-reading it seems just like an awkward pause occurred. Forget it and move on with life.

I am always hearing about how British and Americans are different, mostly about the way they speak and their perceived conflicting mannerisms, just like I'm always hearing how Canadians are different from Americans even though we're technically not that different and it shouldn't make any difference. But it does.

Americans are fat.

There's temptation everywhere here.

Are you sure they didn't just dislike you? Obviously I don't know you so since you were in a group of girls to begin with your situation is probably a lot better than mine. But in my case it happens sometimes that people pretend not to hear me just to avoid me -- and it has nothing to do with the content of what I am saying.

To be fair, there were FEW instances when I was told I was racist (far fewer than the number of instances I just described) but it was more like a brushoff. Sort of like

THEM: I don't like you because you have Asperger
ME: Its unfair plus you are making all these assumptions about Asperger that are not true
THEM: Okay I stand corrected on this. But what about all those racist things you been saying?
ME: Others are just as racist as me or more so, you are just using it as an alternate reason since I didn't accept your original reason.

When I ask what makes up our Canadian identity, most of my countrymen fail to offer up more than 'hockey', 'Timmies' and 'not being American'.

I dont think the OP was being xenophobic, but I tend to think of a prejudice between different countries (esp ones of the same race) as "xenophobia". Like Japan and their prejudice attitudes towards other Asian countries like China and Korea.

Xenophobia is basically a hatred or distrust of foreigners, regardless if they are the same race as you or not.

Different places and eras have different concepts of 'race'. It'd be fair to call the prejudice some Japanese sometimes display to Korean and Chinese peoples as racist in the same way it would be fair to call the stereotypical prejudice that Anglo-American (and Aussie) 'WASPs' had towards 'wops' in the 1800s and 1900s, since the contemporary norm didn't consider southern Europeans to be 'white' even though nowadays that's no longer true.

Considering the prejudice in Japan you describe is also shown towards long settled immigrants from those backgrounds, it's really not the same as typical xenophobia. In this case it's understood that they're immersed, but they'll never be accepted as true citizens. It's more like white nationalists have in white majority countries where they view assimilated, long settled non-whites as still never able to fully be members of their nation.

Last edited by funeralxempire on 16 Oct 2019, 3:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The word racist has no meaning these days.

Everything is racist.
For something to be racist, I mean properly racist, there has to be intent, you have to hate or feel them inferior to the point of being sub-human.

Did you feel that?

This is a common trope people use to attempt to dismiss the concept of racism. I guess pretending it doesn't exist feels nice?

Not what I said.

Virtue signal much?