General Discussion

What is the utility of the phrase wypipo? How does using it benefit the interest of opposing racial oppression? And if people are insulted by it, if it's divisive in this online community, how do you justify saying it is harmless?

As you point out, 31% say it's offensive to some people, but just not to themselves. And 11% said it's offensive to them. That would be 42% saying it is offensive to some degree. I wasn't "trying" anything; I was just pointing out that a significant number of people understand it can be an insult.

The fact that it is controversial at all should tell you it's divisive to the community on DU. Not taunting people is, of course, just good manners.

If you want to call people out for bad behavior, by all means do so. I've done it many times on this website and I do so elsewhere on the internet... and in person. So I'm way ahead of you on your request that I tell people to stop the belittling of the political grievances of persons of color. We have a DU process for it by reporting rules violations to the moderators and I think it's been a pretty effective system.

I cannot explain to you why some people lack the historical awareness to see that wypipo isn't even close to being the equivalent of the n-word. I'm known for giving contextualizing historical lessons (I'm a history teacher) on the spot online and in-person and I would encourage you to do the same when you see people making this error.

I'll give you an example of me throwing education at someone. Yesterday online a friend (a libertarian lawyer) was trying to rationalize Trump's horrible comments insulting all Latino immigrants by saying the "context of his comments were about the MS-13 gang". But I was having none of that, I pointed out, because Trump has a history, a context, of sweeping hateful generalizations about immigrants and Latinos. It's disgusting and racist to jump from discussing gang members to talking about immigrants in general. I told him he's been a Texan long enough to recognize a dog whistle when he hears it. And sweeping generalizations are categorically hurtful and unethical. I called my friend out and after few go rounds he conceded that Trump left the door open for racist interpretations.

In that same spirit, I am respectfully requesting that you not ascribe to white people in general (with the slur 'wypipo') the bad behaviors of whatever group of people you're intending to denounce. Let's leave the race-based insulting to the experts.