So I’m having an argument at the moment with people who are saying my name on Discord is disrespectful and racist to Japan/Japanese people. My name on Discord is 𝓈𝑒𝓂𝓅𝒶𝒾 (センパイ) and these people are calling me racist for having Kanji in my name and also saying that changing a Japanese word is disrespectful because they had to fight for their language or something. So I am kind of curious to know, would my name be racist/disrespectful to Japan?
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Honestly I’m only making this because they won’t shut up about so please someone help me out here.
7 comments
Lololol
No, the Japanese have never had to fight for their language, in fact they were the forcing others to learn it during the occupation of countries in WW2.
Also, Japan is full of other countries’ languages being used a decoration.
Finally, these people don’t even know Japanese because there isn’t kanji in your name, it’s katakana.
As long as you aren’t trying to pass yourself off as Japanese, Japanese people don’t care about foreigners having Japanese screenames.
For some people, the word センパイ may call up the image of an old senior grader as a horrifying ruler in high school or college in Japan. They controlled young graders and made them do anything for them. I know in the past newcomers in high school belonging to the competitive sports club, such as a baseball club, were not allowed to say “No” to orders from センパイ. But this was the case in the good old days in Japan, not now. I believe you don’t have such intention in using the online name.
They sound like snowflakes. There are much better actual acts of linguistic conflict to fight against than someone using a foreign word in their name. Hell, *tons* of Japanese institutions use foreign words (romaji included) as their names. If you’re not doing it to be offensive and it’s not negatively affecting people then they don’t really have any business acting like their (weird and unfounded) feelings are your responsibility.
You could also ask them what they’ve done to fight for the Okinawan (aka Ryuukyuu) and Hokkaido native languages recently. Oh, or are they just happy to let those languages die out under linguistic oppression from Japan?
You’re. . .concerned about what other people think. . .on the Internet?
LMFAO
Discord doesn’t have a block function?
How stupid can they be?! Some people want so desperately to appear woke that they look for every single way a person *might* get offended. Which is itself so demeaning to the people they think they’re helping. Instead of talking to them to find out what bothers them, they’re, in a sense, saying “no, I know what you need. No need to communicate what your problems are, I am superior and I just know already. Only I can help you.”
These are the same type of morons who are trying to be so progressive and anti racist that they swing all the way back around to racist again. The kind who think learning another language is racist or cultural appropriation.
It’s like that episode of community where Dean Pelton and Pierce Hawthorne are trying to avoid offending anyone with the mascot design, so they make a list of race-facial features to not use.
People in any country much prefer you attempt to learn and use their language instead of coming into their home and telling them they should speak yours.
And who the hell “cares what might offend other races” so much, but just makes up facts about that race’s history?! No one fought for a language. Some people may have been forbidden to speak their language, and been forced to adopt another at times. Like Japanese Americans in interment camps. But that had to do with race and acceptance, nothing to do with language.
Second, if they knew anything about the language that they’re gate-keeping they’d know it wasn’t kanji it is katakana. An entire alphabet that they created *mainly to write out foreign loan words*. That shows that they don’t mind using other languages, so no one should care if you use theirs.
give the children a sippy drink and send them home for a nap