this post was submitted on 28 Jan 2025
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I was really enjoying the video until he used the word "ricing". While the creator may not know, that word is fairly racist.
A lot of people seem to argue about ricing and the "original" meaning of it. But honestly as an Asian I don't really think any Asian(at least in my country) actually care or even know the meaning of it. The ricing term of the Linux community is far from racism. What so wrong with rice? cuz we love it? I honestly don't get it.
im asian, i like rice. i like linux. im not offended.
Don't shoot the messenger, I'm just sharing what was taught to me. I don't really have the spoons to sit here and debate or defend it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rice_burner
¿que?
Sorry sweaty, it’s 2025 and we’re anti-woke now 💅 /s
It is clearly racist. "Ricing" comes from a derogatory term for Asian racing vehicles. You cannot excuse the racism inherent to it by personal ignorance. It's the same logic as black face being racist, whether you're personally aware of the history behind it or not.
Though I no longer live in the US, as an Asian computer scientist, I am quite aware of how it is clearly perceived as a racist term by many Asian Americans. To me, it will also never stop being offensive. So, please, stop with this "ricing" stuff.
So it is an American thing then? I feel sorry for you to experience that. But I personally never see anyone even use it in a racism way. Probably because of my own ignorance like you said. The internet is open tho. It is not just for US culture/culture issue. So honestly for the rest of the world, I do not think it is an issue at all. Maybe we can try to resolve it in some way? Idk
The term "rice burner" originated in the Anglo-American context, and the word "ricing" cannot be divorced from the way people use "rice" as a versatile and generic racial epithet in varied context outside of the software world. As in people going, "haha, rice" something when being racist against Asians. It's a long and ignominious American tradition to demean racial minorities with food. As in insulting Mexicans with "bean". Anecdotally, some older Italians still remember being made to feel bad for eating pasta, when Italians weren't white yet. The term "ricing" will certainly remain racist due to the way anti-Asian racism continues to work. Hence my point that the term must be abandoned, if one wishes to not be racist. Just find a different word for it. it ain't that hard. It is certainly not possible to use an American word with racist origins without divorcing it from the cultural context from which it came.
burger
have you seen anyone offended by it?
Precisely one person, here in this thread, on behalf of imagined others.
Could you please explain how is ricing racist?
It was a term for modded crappy japanese motorcycles and cars, that derived from a slur for asian people.
I think the important bit people miss here is "was", language changes, it was an insult, now it just means adding shiny stuff to your desktop.
I think the modern usage also has the nuance of fragility and temporality.
You wouldn't call a polished and extremely stable customisation a 'rice', you'd probably call it a theme
I'm all for using "theme" as a replacement.
I just said 'theme' has different connotations?
How about "farkle" to take another term from the motoring world?
Plenty of people still know or use the other meanings, and it's still based on common stereotypes. Reclaiming slurs only really works when it's done by the targeted group, and when the word is being used with positive connotations.
It isn't cool if it's offending people, though. And clearly it is.
Mental Outlaw is a reich-wing freak, so that's par for the course. Unfortunately, there are a fair amount of these shitheads in the Linux YouTube space.
he definitely leans right but he still supports foss and all the important stuff around that so does it actually matter much as a Linux YouTuber?
also his level of schizo is pretty funny
We have seen where just not caring about someone being the right wing nut job has led. Are we really going to keep using that excuse?
dictators will dictate whatever their political alignment is
Aw, that sucks that they're infesting Linux, too. I thought that free/open source would be too commie-socialist for them.
What is socialist to Linus is libertarian to Eric Raymond. In huge collaborative communities people need to learn to get along and be tolerant but if they can't handle that they also have the freedom to fork so there is room for everyone to find their own space.
OK, I have to save this for the next time I see this shit again.