I lost a little more faith in humanity today

[paradox0220]

Nugget sent me:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/04/09/brown-asian-names/

How did I know there would be an (R) next to her name as I read that? I'm not sure if I'm done counting how many ways this is wrong yet...

Comments

[nugget]

I seriously thought it was theonion or borowitz report when I first read it. Beyond parody.

I liked this comment though:
"My first girlfriend’s last name was Jaroszenko. The second one was Theodossiades. The third was Li. Tell me which one is easiest to pronounce."

[paradox0220]

Yeah, words in Chinese are all 1 syllable (to my knowledge) and aside from the inflection which you can just ignore (cause they are used to it) for names they are probably easier to say that "American" names.

Let's see some real names from Elaine's friends and my co-workers:
Jing
Ping
Rong
Ching
Dong

Yep... those are pronounced exactly like you'd think. No problem there! Weird, they all end in "ng" now that I think about it. Hrm...

[goulo]

I'm guessing she's thinking of longer and less obvious Vietnamese names like Nguyen and Indian names like Rangarajan, and just doesn't know the difference between Chinese, Vietnamese, Indian, etc, because it's all just Asian to her.

[reanimated]

ah texas. you just won't let us overcome the redneck stereotypes, will you? bah. i've seen this posted a few times. that woman is a goddamn idiot. you think she'd tell me i should change my last name to make it easier for 'americans'? cuz you and i both know bitch couldn't pronounce it correctly.

[goulo]

I just visited the Jewish history museum in Berlin this weekend, where I learned that in 1930s Germany the Nazis passed a law that all Jewish men had to legally make their middle name "Israel". I'm struck by the similar disrespect for people's right to their own name.