Political Correctness in Uruguay
01/19/08 12:19 PM Filed in: Uruguay
Q: How do you get a one-armed Pole out of a tree?
A: Wave to him.
Q: How do you take an Italian census?
A: Roll a quarter down the street.
Q: How did 18 Mexicans get into the Cadillac?
A: Picked the lock.
Q: Why did God create WASPs?
A: Someone has to buy retail.
Are any of these offensive? You could freely swap the nationalities in any of the first three jokes, and they’d be equally good. Or bad. The fourth joke works only if the subject is a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. You could make the argument that of the four, the last one is hurtful because the humor is dependent on a racial slur.
You would be wrong. Because WASPs are members of a privileged class and therefore fair game.
You can even get away with jokes about underprivileged racial groups:
A black guy walks into a bar with a beautiful parrot on his shoulder. The bartender says, “Wow! Where did you get him?”
The parrot says, “Africa.”
So why do I find this image, found on the corner of a restaurant in Colonia del Sacramento, objectionable?
We descendants of slaveholders have learned to be sensitive when making remarks about the descendants of slaves. Caricatures of black people in demeaning dress are not OK in the States.
But south of the border, I see images like this frequently—in Mexico and now in Uruguay and Argentina.
At the San Telmo Antique Fair in Buenos Aires, I ran across this shelf of antique dolls: frilly little white babies on the bottom, Aunt Jemimas above.
Latin America has race issues. Blacks were treated badly here in the Southern Cone as elsewhere in the Americas. Early black immigrants came here as slaves. But they represent smaller fractions of the populations of Uruguay and especially Argentina, where they are notably absent. Porteños aren’t frequently reminded of their society’s sins. Less guilt.
But something else is at work here. Latins don’t object to poking fun at physical or racial attributes. I am called “Baldy” by Mexican friends and even waiters. A friend of mine is called Gordo—fatso. Nobody gets offended.
The attitude seems to be that you are what you are—bald, fat, black, so why not get it out in the open? When I stand in the sun, the shine off my head make others squint. The most prominent aspect of my appearance is my lack of hair. So I learned to get over being called Calvo.
A: Wave to him.
Q: How do you take an Italian census?
A: Roll a quarter down the street.
Q: How did 18 Mexicans get into the Cadillac?
A: Picked the lock.
Q: Why did God create WASPs?
A: Someone has to buy retail.
Are any of these offensive? You could freely swap the nationalities in any of the first three jokes, and they’d be equally good. Or bad. The fourth joke works only if the subject is a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. You could make the argument that of the four, the last one is hurtful because the humor is dependent on a racial slur.
You would be wrong. Because WASPs are members of a privileged class and therefore fair game.
You can even get away with jokes about underprivileged racial groups:
A black guy walks into a bar with a beautiful parrot on his shoulder. The bartender says, “Wow! Where did you get him?”
The parrot says, “Africa.”
So why do I find this image, found on the corner of a restaurant in Colonia del Sacramento, objectionable?
We descendants of slaveholders have learned to be sensitive when making remarks about the descendants of slaves. Caricatures of black people in demeaning dress are not OK in the States.
But south of the border, I see images like this frequently—in Mexico and now in Uruguay and Argentina.
At the San Telmo Antique Fair in Buenos Aires, I ran across this shelf of antique dolls: frilly little white babies on the bottom, Aunt Jemimas above.
Latin America has race issues. Blacks were treated badly here in the Southern Cone as elsewhere in the Americas. Early black immigrants came here as slaves. But they represent smaller fractions of the populations of Uruguay and especially Argentina, where they are notably absent. Porteños aren’t frequently reminded of their society’s sins. Less guilt.
But something else is at work here. Latins don’t object to poking fun at physical or racial attributes. I am called “Baldy” by Mexican friends and even waiters. A friend of mine is called Gordo—fatso. Nobody gets offended.
The attitude seems to be that you are what you are—bald, fat, black, so why not get it out in the open? When I stand in the sun, the shine off my head make others squint. The most prominent aspect of my appearance is my lack of hair. So I learned to get over being called Calvo.
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