I'm not trying to be racist?

Question

But do white people really get offended when someone calls them a honky or a cracker? Me and a friend of mine (who happens to be white) were discussing this and she said that it dosen't bother her when she hears other races saying it.

Answer 1

I don't think it bothers them. I can't say from personally experience, but I do have a lot of white people in my family and I have heard people joking call them names like cracker, but they just laugh, but it does depend on the person saying it and the person its being said to.

Answer 2

If someone was to call me a honky or a cracker, quite honestly, I would probably roll on the floor and split my sides laughing at their complete ignorance! What the words mean, or where they came from means little to me..it's the fact that they are used with the intent of being a racial slur that bothers people, but the thing is if you are a member of a race that generally has better opportunites afforded to them than most minorities, why would you find such a thing insulting? After-all, if a cracker is a low-life white person...I don't qualify, and neither do 95% of the white people I know. Maybe, if you are insulted, it's because you don't like the fact that you might indeed qualify as one..and in that case..you have no-one to blame but yourself, but on the other hand there's no-where to go but up!!!. So have faith in the fact that you can crawl you way on up out of it. I've honked a few horns in my time...so maybe I am a honky (although I've never actually been to the red-light district in Holland.) I don't see though how it could possibly be taken as insulting..I mean..if I started calling Asians 'rice eaters', even if I said or meant it in a condescending way, would it bother them unduly? I doubt it, they would probably laugh at me the way I do at the terms honky and cracker. I for one find it fascinating that any person that truly has self-esteem could find such a thing anything less than amusing. As if simple words can really make me less than anyone else in this world..they can't..it's my actions that define who and what I am..not some words bandied about by complete and utter idiots.

If you think about it..it's all about the old addage that many people think they can bring themselves up by pushing others down.. that has never worked in actuality and never will....people that resort to racial slurs and insults are keeping themselves right down there in the same category that they were attempting to make us believe we are in...So, before offering up some kind of racial insult, maybe people should think a little more about who it is that is really coming off as less than....

Answer 3

No, I think it is funny!
And I may be a cracker,
but I ain't no honky!
Did you know "honky" was a term given to the white men who used to roll thru red light districts. the way that they would get the attention of a prospective date is to honk their horn. hence the term "honky"

And here is Wikipedia's definition of cracker (partial):

"The term "cracker" was and is used most frequently in the southern U.S., especially in Georgia and Florida. Since the 1870s, a nickname for Georgia is "The Cracker State".

Usage of the term "cracker" generally differs from "hick" and "hillbilly" because crackers reject or resist assimilation into the dominant culture, while hicks and hillbillies theoretically are isolated from the dominant culture. In this way, the cracker is similar to the redneck. In the African American community, "cracker" is a disparaging term for whites.

Since 1900 "cracker" has also been used as a proud or jocular self-description. With the huge influx of new residents from the North, "cracker" is now used informally by some white residents of Florida and Georgia ("Florida cracker" or "Georgia cracker") to indicate that their family has lived there for many generations. However, the term "white cracker" is not always used self-referentially and remains a disparaging term to many in the region."

Answer 4

Good question would be how happy you are being called terms you'd consider racist. Honky and cracker are generally terms used to put-down low-class whites. But then again how happy would you be hering ******, chink, go**, jap, and so on.

Ultimately, people shouldn't have to get censored by every imaginable state authority, but only in political speech. In prvate contexts, like a classy restaurant, I doubt many people in the croud are aching to hear racist slander. Otherwise, when I'm out and in a croud of people that I know aren't too sensitive, I don't really mind a racist exchange of words. Besides that, no one likes to get picked-on because of race, gender.

Though honky is really only 50% race-specific. I guess you could create racial-economic insults for all race groups. That would be pretty comical. Like yellow-trash, ghetto-bunnies. Goes along pretty well with honky or whatever.

Answer 5

it depends on history and the context of which it is sent.

for example, American blacks have an oppressed history by the white people at the time, so would find it offensive if a white person said it.

brown people in the UK are often referred to a Pakis by white racists and some have been attacked and suffered abuse by it, so find it offensive if a white person said it.

It white people were constantly being attacked by blacks and getting called honkie in the process, white people would sooner or later start taking offense.

Answer 6

I think of honkey as a car horn and cracker as something to eat with my soup, but now trailer trash and hillbilly. Those I like but redneck, that, they made a joke of. The one I like the most and use with no apprehension is "you kkk mutherfkr" usually shuts white folks up pretty dam quick. White folks have turned negative words about them into jokes and funny words because they want to make sure there is nothing said that is as virulent about them as they say about others. It's all in the translation.

Answer 7

Using those terms is just like using any racial term which is detremental or demeaning to that said culture.

Honky and Cracker are demeaning to the Caucasion culture and that is why "White" people are offended by it. As a white man I can say that to other white people and it is taken in a different context.

Just as other cultures can use terms within that race and it is taken differently than if another person of different race uses that term.

Answer 8

Why would she. These are insults for black people:

Jig.aboo; ***.ger, night rider, darkness, Pickaninny, coon...

Insults for white people:
Honkey and cracker....I mean, how can you even muster up offense, they are just so weak. Even on the Jeffersons, George looked cute and funny saying it not threatening or insulting.

NOW, Asians and Latinos and Arabs and whoever may have better ones, but your friend is right...she'd be a FOOL to be upset.

Answer 9

White people don't offended by that. Mostly they look puzzled and wonder what the hell you are talking about. Those two racial slurs were used in a limited fashion generations ago against certain types of immigrants but never for white people in general.

Plus, there has to be some sort of negative trait the slur is able to imply for it to mean anything at all.

"You...you...white people with your EDUCATION and your happy lives and high paying jobs....oooooh, your good values and the way you are so nice to people"

Doesn't quite cut it, does it. Racial remarks against whites are pointless. It's hard to shame people who have good reason to be proud of themselves.

Answer 10

I don't mind it at all. Because if a person was really racist towards a white person they could really use a better term than "cracker."