I always thought of it as an old saying used as a substitute for swearing and never considered it racist. I guess it must be of southern origin and probably started as a slight to slaves. Still, over 300 years later, does it really mean the same thing?
it might to people whose ancestors were slaves just over 150 years ago.
Did some research. Apparently the saying "No can do" was a way to mock Asians in America during the mid 1800s. Does that saying really mean what it was started as? What about "Sold down the river"? which nowadays has a completely different meaning than that first used?
I am a pretty liberal guy and think highly of being politically correct. But is this going too far when meanings of sayings completely change their meaning hundreds of years later? I think maybe so.
Are you onboard with the expression “tar baby”?
But more to the point,who gets to declare the acceptability of such phrases that emerge from a time of rancid racism?
If you call somebody a tar baby, you’re racist.
If you refer to a situation as a tar baby, you were probably read Br’er Rabbit as a kid.
C'mon guys. A little sensitivity for our other users, please?! (just kidding)
I’ve gotta say, I have no idea what a Tar Heel is.
It's a term given to terrible basketball players....j/k
It's mainly because tar was one of NC's earliest and most lucrative exports, and well, lots of people were barefoot back then. During the Civil War people from the north used it as derogatory term to describe North Carolinian Confederate soldiers, but later on North Carolinians took it on as a term of pride.
I guess somehow that must make it racist. Slaves once lived in NC, and worked in the tar industry, so.....
Also, while we're at it, no more calling potatoes 'red skin'. That's racist too.