Racist Idiot!

[StarSong]

Since I don't post very often, I'll recap my job - admin assistant for the administrative office of a university library. I don't have to deal with "the public" much, thankfully, but on the rare occasion that I do, I sometimes get people like this:

SR = Sucky Racist
Me = Beleaguered Admin Assistant

Me: <answers phone with standard spiel>

SR: Yeah! I want to know who I would need to talk to that's in charge of the people in charge of the Reference Department.

Me: <confused> Did you need to speak to the Reference Department?

SR: Well, I don't know. My complaint is that whenever I call the Reference Desk to get someone to help me, I always get some FOREIGNER who doesn't know what they're talking about. It takes me 10 minutes to try and explain to them what it is that I want, and then they still don't understand, so it's just a complete waste of my time and I'm sick of it! I want to know who I can talk to about this!

Me: So you're saying you'd like to speak to the Head of the Reference Department?

SR: Yeah!

Me: <transfers call>

What an IDIOT. Racism pisses me off enough as it is, but I guarantee that whichever librarian was at the Reference Desk is more than qualified to help this moron with whatever ridiculous question he had. I bet the reason the librarian couldn't understand him is because he seemed to have trouble forming intelligent sentences and had a rather healthy dose of a "redneck" accent himself. It's hard to convey in the retelling, but his tone of voice was really obnoxious and he had a hard time articulating what he wanted. I'm a native English speaker and I found it difficult to decipher his idiotic ramblings. Grrrrr.

Ok, end rant. I feel better now. Kinda.

[DevilBoy]

I bet the reason the librarian couldn't understand him is because he seemed to have trouble forming intelligent sentences... and he had a hard time articulating what he wanted. I'm a native English speaker and I found it difficult to decipher his idiotic ramblings.

Sadly, then English language has been dying a slow death for many years now... bungled, butchered and bastardized for decades... at least here in the U.S.

It is even more upsetting to realize that many foreigners in the States speak (though some with thick accents) and write English more coherently than people born into the language.

[Golden Phoenix]

Not to mention that because he was talking to "Some foreigner" he was probably speaking veeeeeeery slooooooowly and exageratedly. (Like my uncle )

[Evil Queen]

I'll admit, I'm a racist person.


I hate racism. So.. I hate hate... I'm a neo nazi? I'm so confuzed now.

What is it called when you hate hate? I mean, other then a hypocrite?

[tropicsgoddess]

Ugh...people like that asshat make me wanna

[Nyx]

What is it called when you hate hate? I mean, other then a hypocrite?

I believe the term is "logical".

[tphillip]

Not racist

Technically he wasn't being racist. He was speaking against foreigners in general, not any specific attribute (Like skin color). That would make him a nationalist (In a bad way).

It must be confusing to non-native English speakers when words get twisted beyond anything a dictionary or formal language training could ever hope to cover.

[StarSong]

Sadly, then English language has been dying a slow death for many years now... bungled, butchered and bastardized for decades... at least here in the U.S.

I agree. I taught an introductory college class when I was a graduate student and was appalled on a daily basis by the papers the kids would turn in. They would be full of "internet-style abbreviations" like "OMG I srsly heart ppl who play jazz music!"

[Shards]

I hate to say it, but I can kinda understand the guy's point.

I mean, the person on the other end was probably more QUALIFIED for the job than anyone he knew, and probably UNDERSTOOD the topic better than anyone he knew, however, that doesn't make him as GOOD as anyone this customer know.

If the job has to do with conveying information there is a valid concern that someone who is a foreigner, and did learn formal English in a classroom environment, and therefore has a difficult to understand accent and no knowledge of how to simplify things via comparisons for less technically-minded folk, then maybe they aren't the right person for that job. I hate to sound like an asshole nationalist, but this is why I can never do well in classes taught by foreigners in college. I have difficulty understanding what they say the first time around, and when I ask to hear it again, they have no way of using comparisons or simplifications to make it easier for people who don't get it yet. I mean. I don't like to think of myself as a racist, but if thinking that native English-speakers make better conveyers of information to an English-speaking population makes me a racist, then fine, I'm a bloody racist.

[otakuneko]

@StarSong: Zomg I srsly hope u faild them all! (ouch that was painful, bad neko, bad!)

I would've laughed at the guy. I really would have. Racism is something to be ridiculed, especially if you're of a quick enough wit to do it on the fly.

[Evil Queen]

Otakuneko, that bad better be as painful to write as it was for me to read it.

No Pocky for you!

[otakuneko]

I am sadly used to it.

The part I hate most is the "u" instead of "you"... unfortunately my best friend types that way all the fracking time. Grrr. Really, I can tolerate "zomg" and "srsly" in context (kitten-pidgin wouldn't be the same without "srsly" and I loves me some lolcats. ) but "u" ...ugh.

Meh @ Pocky, at least the stuff I can buy around here. Now, try to take my Shuffle! away, and we'll have some words.

[Evil Queen]

"r" "u" and "ur" irritates me to no end.

"Srsly" I rarely, if ever, see. "OMG" and "ZOMG" are fine, along with "lol" and "rofl"

The rest.... still irritates me. -_-'

[StarSong]

@StarSong: Zomg I srsly hope u faild them all! (ouch that was painful, bad neko, bad!)

Ha! I did verbally eviscerate them and warned that such a writing style was inappropriate for essays. I did get to fail a fair few of them, though. The school's attendance policies get 'em every time.

[Jester]

That would make him a nationalist (In a bad way).

Actually, more of a xenophobe, one who is scared of things that are strange, alien, or foreign. Like, say, foreigners.

I did get to fail a fair few of them, though. The school's attendance policies get 'em every time.

Pretty sad when students can't write papers to save their lives, but they get failed not for that, but for bad attendance. And yet people wonder why the American educational system is in the toilet......