Hacker News Reader

Comment by browsercoin | Hacker News Reader

I have a problem with your comment attempting to use a stereotype of a communist country to "Asian". First, what part of Asia, its literally 60% of the earth, its fucking huge. I mean, are you talking about Bangladesh or Indonesia? In the UK, Asians are dark-skinned folks, not the East/South Asian that American/Canadians are referring to.

The other issue here is misusing a neo-confucian value as a basis of China's corrupt system.

Again, attempting to conflate a single country's generalizations to a an erroneous and inappropriate label accepted by North American society.

You should've just used Oriental country.

View on HN

In India it’s the same so it’s not just oriental countries. This is an asian thing and by asian I mean asian in the most Asian sense.

I have the pleasure of being and indian being taught Indian values and then growing up to learn that the Chinese / Thai / Other Asians were pretty much taught the same bull crap about respecting elders, and asking questions as to why will get you into a lot of trouble. Just my personal experience.

They should've just said "China" and left it at that.

I live in "Asia" and that kind of usage annoys me, too.

"You should've just used Oriental country."

Among North Americans and perhaps native English speakers elsewhere, the term "Oriental" has been increasingly taboo and claimed to be offensive for decades now. I am not sure whether this is entirely down to Said’s Orientalism, or if opponents of the term have other grounds, but often saying “oriental” gets you a scolding these days and an encouragement to say “Asian” instead.

In the UK, "Asian" means people from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka.

In the US it seems to mean Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and a few others.

As for "Oriental" it's not universal that it's offensive. It's not used much in Britain, due to there not being a lot fewer Far Eastern people than Indians.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com