why Americans think it is racist to call them ?

Question

gringos, its not a pejorative word, like when british call them yankies, and they dont get angry when they are called that way.

Answer 1

I have some americans male friends and the first time I spoke to them they THEY told me, hola I am a gringo.

So I don´t call them a gringo, they say to me that.

What I know is that a gringo is a word used to describe an american, a person who born in usa.

Answer 2

I used to call my bf gringo and he didn't mind :-) he actually thought it was sexy...

What I would like to know is why African Americans tell each other the N word all the time, is used all the time in their music and that is OK (along with bit** and hos), but if another race says the N word, even if it's not in a racists context, THEY find it racist?

Answer 3

People need to grow up and get a life. Folks are too thin skinned and take things too personally. Call me a gringo, I don't care. I have a Mexican friend who refers to gringos all the time and I just remind her that its MR. Gringo to you...it ain't no big deal. And to the southerners....to the bloody Brits we are all yanks....

Answer 4

I agree with you gringo is not a pejorative word. Well, in my country nobody means to offend when they use that word.

Answer 5

Gringo to me is much like Va to' (vah - toe) to them. Besides I laugh when called a gringo knowing that for tens of thousands of years everyone is of mixed blood. Basically and quite frankly related to each and everyone of us on this poor old planet.

Answer 6

Well, look at the defination:

grin·go (grngg) KEY

NOUN:
Offensive Slang pl. grin·gos
Used as a disparaging term for a foreigner in Latin America, especially an American or English person.

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ETYMOLOGY:
Spanish, foreign, foreign language, gibberish, probably alteration of griego, Greek, from Latin Graecus ; see Greek

WORD HISTORY:
In Latin America the word gringo is an offensive term for a foreigner, particularly an American or English person. But the word existed in Spanish before this particular sense came into being. In fact, gringo may be an alteration of the word griego, the Spanish development of Latin Graecus, "Greek." Griego first meant "Greek, Grecian," as an adjective and "Greek, Greek language," as a noun. The saying "It's Greek to me" exists in Spanish, as it does in English, and helps us understand why griego came to mean "unintelligible language" and perhaps, by further extension of this idea, "stranger, that is, one who speaks a foreign language." The altered form gringo lost touch with Greek but has the senses "unintelligible language," "foreigner, especially an English person," and in Latin America, "North American or Britisher." Its first recorded English use (1849) is in John Woodhouse Audubon's Western Journal: "We were hooted and shouted at as we passed through, and called 'Gringoes.'"



While I don't think the term is actually racist, it is insulting.

Answer 7

So call me a gringo . Words are just words but my background and Nationality well make up for some made up word. -- Geez I have heard worse words about other races that are nasty.

Answer 8

People get offended WAY too easilly. Words are so powerful to them. Gringo isn't offensive to me. Yankee is just plain funny.

Answer 9

You can call me a gringo if I can call you a beaner. Deal?

(I'm not offended if I'm called a gringo or a honky or a cracker. Unlike *some* thin-skinned people, I know they're only words!)

Answer 10

they think its racist? i usually hear them call themselves that in a laughing way, its all good