I got called a f***ing chink yesterday

[Anonymous]

The man was homeless and highly likely mentally ill.
It's not like your boss said it, or your girlfriend, or the grocery store check out clerk.

Mad people say shit.

[Anonymous]

I don’t know if this makes you feel better or not but I work downtown and it’s incredibly common for the mentally ill homeless to yell racist and sexist things at each other, passerby’s etc. one of the worst I saw was a black man yelling racist things at an elderly black woman trying to go to work, and also what was nearly a race riot among people at a huge encampment outside my office.

It’s very upsetting on a lot of levels.

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry, OP. I am Asian and have been called racial slurs by all sorts of people. It hurts regardless who is saying it. I also used to work directly with homeless people at a homeless shelter and was both physically and verbally assaulted by my clients.

Yes, these people are not in good places and most have addiction and mental health issues. However, none of that is an excuse for their abusive actions. You didn't deserve to be abused, and the person who said that to you was wrong. The end.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A man who was either homeless and/or has substance abuse issues/mental illness was walking towards me last night on a semi isolated street, in that unsteady halting way. I was trying to walk around him with my head bent down to stay out of his way when he snarled "stop staring at me, you f****ing chink".

I kept walking ahead. For a split second I thought he would turn around and start following me. There were other people ahead of me so I just started walking faster to catch up to them and then I was in an area where there were many more people.

I've been called "chink" by all sorts of people since I was a kid in elementary school. "Go back to your country". [My country? I was born here.]

So it surprises me how much it still stings when someone calls me a chink. It's even hard to write that. That a man who was probably homeless thinks I'm less than him because of my skin color. It shouldn't bother me, after all this time! Right?!

So I'm just trying to get this out of my system. Weirdly I feel ashamed and couldn't even tell anyone IRL that this happened.

Thanks for listening, strangers on an anonymous messaging board.

It is upsetting, but bring so so so surprised that these things happen is not going to serve you--Asian people are people just like everyone else and will be subject to human bias at times just like any other group of humans. And no, Asians are not going to be treated like white people in the United States, meaning bring seen as the default Americans. This is not good, but if you are unaware of this you are going to be shocked daily.

DP, and a little off-topic, but the weird thing for me was that in my high school / college / grad school / NYC bubbles, it was really rare to be automatically “othered” or feel like I was being treated differently from anyone else on the daily things. It was kind of a surprise to have to relearn that once I moved to Va.

Anyway OP I’m sorry that happened to you. It must have been especially jarring coming from (1) a man (2) walking towards you (vs seated) and (3) visibly “off,” because those things together alerted your self-protection instincts. And then he came up to you and yelled something that was clearly targeted at you specifically, of course you felt attacked in the moment. It’s also the realization that only he knew in the moment whether he was going to raise a hand to you—to be willing to yell a slur like that means he is already partially unbound by the rules of civility that we all abide by—and the feeling that your appearance, which you cannot change, somehow catalyzed this.

Ignore all the hopeless PPs who are too busy fixating on how your post could be edited for political correctness to offer you a word of compassion. They are using this post to pile on with their own anger, and most of us are seeing how that is very sad and not okay.

Feel better and cocoon yourself with good people if you can. Also talk to someone about it. Next time you’re out with your friends, just share that it happened. You can use a light tone while still mentioning that it hurt and was scary at the time.

Meaning not being seen as white and the default? Because we all are going to be seen as "something". We can't pick and and choose, only to be seen as "something" when it benefits us. Or we all can just decide to not talk about skin color, country of origin, culture at all. No talk about "well in my culture we are family oriented...ect". We are all the same from now on, right?

[Anonymous]

Who cares?

Seriously. Is it worse than me being called an @sshole?

Is it?

Nope.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The man was homeless and highly likely mentally ill.
It's not like your boss said it, or your girlfriend, or the grocery store check out clerk.

Mad people say shit.

Agree, it was someone with mental illness OP. Move on. Don't need to make a thread about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A man who was either homeless and/or has substance abuse issues/mental illness was walking towards me last night on a semi isolated street, in that unsteady halting way. I was trying to walk around him with my head bent down to stay out of his way when he snarled "stop staring at me, you f****ing chink".

I kept walking ahead. For a split second I thought he would turn around and start following me. There were other people ahead of me so I just started walking faster to catch up to them and then I was in an area where there were many more people.

I've been called "chink" by all sorts of people since I was a kid in elementary school. "Go back to your country". [My country? I was born here.]

So it surprises me how much it still stings when someone calls me a chink. It's even hard to write that. That a man who was probably homeless thinks I'm less than him because of my skin color. It shouldn't bother me, after all this time! Right?!

So I'm just trying to get this out of my system. Weirdly I feel ashamed and couldn't even tell anyone IRL that this happened.

Thanks for listening, strangers on an anonymous messaging board.

I’m assuming this was a white man, probably a Trump supporter most likely.

Of course it was a white man and a Trump supporter. After being screwed over by Biden, every homeless person in the United States made sure they could fill out a vote by mail form or get to a polling place just to vote for Trump. They don't have enough sense to get to a shelter, but they can easily make sure they vote. If the homeless man were a Harris supporter, he would have told OP to "spread joy throughout the land."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The man was homeless and highly likely mentally ill.
It's not like your boss said it, or your girlfriend, or the grocery store check out clerk.

Mad people say shit.

Agree, it was someone with mental illness OP. Move on. Don't need to make a thread about it.

OP has every right to make a thread about it. This isn't a workplace and there are extremely stupid and useless threads all over this forum, and this one had more pathos than most. OP, I'm sorry for what happened to you-that must have made you feel terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A good retort would be At least I’m gainfully employed and not some sack of sh**, Loser.

Anyone who does this is a lowest common denominator. Same with the person that suggested it.

[Anonymous]

We travelled abroad and we're taken back on how little homeless there are elsewhere. DC is disgusting they need to put them away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not sure why you think you’re better than someone just because they’re homeless. If anything after feeling the sting of an insult like you did I would think you might be more sensitive to being labeled for something beyond your control. Obviously this person is mentally ill. Also not something they can help.

Give me a break. Not OP, but I am definitely better than a homeless person spewing racist quips. Saying racist garbage at someone does not automatically mean you are mentally ill and/or you can use that as an excuse to be an a$$hole. Get a job and support yourself.

[Anonymous]

I am sorry that happened to you. I had a homeless woman call me names and threaten to kill me. She was nuts and I was near other people, so part of me knew it was not a real threat. But it really shook me up.

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry that happened to you. I assume you know he was likely mentally ill, but it sounds like it was triggering due to similar earlier events with more sane individuals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A man who was either homeless and/or has substance abuse issues/mental illness was walking towards me last night on a semi isolated street, in that unsteady halting way. I was trying to walk around him with my head bent down to stay out of his way when he snarled "stop staring at me, you f****ing chink".

I kept walking ahead. For a split second I thought he would turn around and start following me. There were other people ahead of me so I just started walking faster to catch up to them and then I was in an area where there were many more people.

I've been called "chink" by all sorts of people since I was a kid in elementary school. "Go back to your country". [My country? I was born here.]

So it surprises me how much it still stings when someone calls me a chink. It's even hard to write that. That a man who was probably homeless thinks I'm less than him because of my skin color. It shouldn't bother me, after all this time! Right?!

So I'm just trying to get this out of my system. Weirdly I feel ashamed and couldn't even tell anyone IRL that this happened.

Thanks for listening, strangers on an anonymous messaging board.

I’m assuming this was a white man, probably a Trump supporter most likely.

Just a messed up loser.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To everyone lecturing OP - she didn't say she was better than the homeless person - i took the implication to be that the man yelling the insult who is very down and out thought the fact that she was asian made him better than her even though he was in a rough place and probably feels like he is not on a high run in society - really don't think pompous lecturing of someone who's been verbally assaulted is very kind or understanding at all

She is better than the racist loser.