That awkward moment when you call people racist in one breath, and then use a racial slur in the next.
lmao, do you know what racism is?
Racism is not liking a certain race. That's what it says in the dictionary, that was the universally understood definition until about 15 years ago, and that's how 90% still use the word.
There's a second definition that was made up by college professors very recently. It's basically prejudice but only when people in authority (White people, minority people in authority don't count for other reasons) do it.
No matter what definition you use though, it's basically a semantic argument. Non-White people may not be able to be "racist" but there's no denying they can be prejudiced (and again, 90% of the time the word racist is used, it's used to mean prejudiced) and honkie is undeniably a racial slur (you might be able to deny it's a RACIST racial slur but again, semantics).
Very true. The word "honkie" can be prejudiced or even racist, but as a white man I don't care about it in most situations, as a black person in most cases has no power or authority to cause me grief. Also, it has no historical weight behind it as a term. If I called a black person the "N-word", however, I would be throwing the weight of decades and centuries of hate upon the black person, and as I am a white man, I could use society's influence to cause grief for that individual black person.
Additionally, if someone called me "honkie" I could laugh and go about my day. When a black person is called the N-word, that evokes hostility and hate, as well as causing fear on the black person's part. Only if a black person with more authority and influence than I (say a boss, a military commander, or an elected official) said it would I have any reaction, since only they have any capability to cause me grief.
This is what white privilege is. I don't have to fear that someone has unkind intentions towards me just because they called me a frankly silly racial epithet. An ethnic minority tends to feel the brunt of white hostility if called a racial epithet, because of white people's greater influence in the US, and because of the historical weight and meaning of the epithets.
Call me a cracker, a white devil, whatever you want,
I don't need to care. The comedian Louis CK has a great bit pointing out white privilege in a similar way.
