While sitting at the urban coffee table, I mused about a few offensive terms that some Americans throw around with reckless abandon. Such words, or terms that come to mind are “Indian giving”; “Jewing down”, and the term “Blackmail”.
The vernacular trickery that embeds itself in these terms may seem obvious—but is it? Indian giving is a derogatory term that means simply to give someone a gift, and then take that gift back. To the best of my knowledge, the Native American never reneged on any treaties to the American government, or took back any gifts they had given in good faith. So why, then, has the term of taking back been labeled “Indian giving”? Simple: to denigrate Native Americans. Never mind the inherent denigration that comes from calling them Indians; that’s another story (and Christopher Columbus has a holiday!).
When bartering for a better price on an item, or attempting to secure the best possible deal for oneself, one has been said to have “Jewed down” another. With the predominant recollection of Jewish history (to Gentiles) generally being the Holocaust, how is it that a total race of people has been denigrated to being cheap? Simple: to humiliate and infuriate people of the Jewish faith.
That leads us to the term “blackmail”. Webster’s Dictionary defines the term as extortion through intimidation. Hmmmm, with exception to what we do in our own communities to each other, when has the Black male been in a position to extort anything through intimidation? This term has nothing to do with the mail, and it has nothing to do with the color black…is it mere vernacular trickery in an effort to denigrate the Black male, as such terms have done to “Indians” and “Jews”? It begs consideration. What has the Black male done to deserve such a charge from English vernacular? If anything at all, the Black male has been the victim of blackmail for over 200 years!! What a funny concept! When your land; family; dignity; religion; name, and culture have been taken from you by force and intimidation, how appropriate it becomes to juxtapose that feeling back to the Black male.
It should be incumbent upon American people to purge these terms from the common vocabulary. That, would be mighty White of you!!
