The Wikipedia definition seems to indicate it has origins as a racist term and I’ve never understood why unix users have adopted this terms instead of something benign like “themes” or “theming” which I remember being in use long before I ever heard “rice”. So what gives? Why use “rice” instead of “theme”?
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@const_void nobody cares. If you enter the Linux customization community, see the word “ricer” or “rice”, and get offended, you probably need a break from the internet.
You can just say that you don’t care. You don’t need to frame your opinion as belonging to hundreds of people, none of whom asked you to.
And of course people in the community don’t care. If they did, they wouldn’t have joined the community.
dude, you need a break from the internet
Why do you say that?
Here what you did:
- take a word used within a community to refer to personalised desktop environments;
- strip its context;
- add a completely different context;
- ask if using that word, with a completely different context, is racist;
Which is weird af
Master branch is racist!!!
People who don’t have anything better to do find anything to be offended by.
Hey nice strawman.
Referring to modifications as Rice or Riced is actually racist. Master branch doesn’t have an origin in racism.
We used to refer to hard drives in hierarchy as being either Master or Slave and we’ve moved away from that terminology because it was offensive.
It’s not that hard to understand or have some empathy, unless you’re an idiot who can’t recognize your own privilege.
Wrong.
The word wasn’t coined by the Linux community. It was taken from the automotive community where it was used as a derogatory term to refer to car modifications.
You can’t pretend it doesn’t have shitty origins just because you aren’t familiar with the source.
derogatory 😂
I mean it’s not a compliment to say that someone car is “riced out.” If you think so, you might be an idiot.
That’s entirely your own opinion
No, that’s a fact. The term is not complementary. Period.
First time I’m hearing of this, how would this possibly be racist?
Decades ago it (in my experience) originated from the use of usually gaudy non-performance enhancements to Japanese or other foreign cars (mostly originally Hondas IIRC) to make them look fast or faster without actually doing anything to make them fast. (gigantic rear spoilers, loud exhaust, neon underlights, etc)
In a pretty short time it bled into doing the same to any slow car (I think it was mostly Hondas to start because so many people were doing it to Honda Civics at the time), then I think (again this is just in my own usage at the time) into usually gaudy non-performance enhancements to ANY car.
There’s probably also some connection to “rice burners” which I think predates the word, which I first heard applied to motorcycles, again Japanese brands like Honda, Yamaha, Suzuki, and then later sometimes to cars from similar brands.
The racism in “ricing” comes from the idea that since the original targets of the term tended to be Japanese or other asian cars (Kia, hyundai) and with the perception that rice is closely associated with those cultures – “ricing out” your car essentially meant “covering it with gaudy fripperies like those Japanese cars.”
I understand why some folks think it’s racist, and I understand why some folks don’t, but I don’t use the term anymore because I decided it wasn’t that hard to use another word, and just because I don’t think it’s hurtful that doesn’t mean it isn’t to someone.
Edit - moved parenthesis
This is a really well thought out post, cheers. I think your choice is fair in the end, but I also think that it becomes impossible to do this for every word that people decide is racist or offensive to someone.
Especially because it all comes from american internet culture and it’s hard for non americans to keep track. By this point, every few days some word or internet term or even the name of something in everyday life that I thought was perfectly normal is suddenly deemed immoral by american users. English is a secondary language to me, a lot of my knowledge of it comes from internet forums and such which only makes it even harder because I don’t have a deep knowledge of the roots of the language, especially when it comes to slang or “internet terms” I mostly copy what I see. And while my stance used to be the same as yours, that I could just avoid using that word and it wasn’t a big deal, I feel like at some point I started losing track of the list of words and I just gave up.
I remember there being a big fuss around a similar situation in home gardening subreddits because the most common worldwide name of some flower offended someone in the States, and a similar situation in baking communities, and it’s just… I give up. There’s no winning this fight. Someone is bound to be offended by something eventually. If people are refusing to look at context and intent, too bad I guess.
Also, on a side note, I noticed you tagged me while scrolling through the thread, but I didn’t get a notification or anything, I don’t know if tagged users are supposed to be notified? Just as an FYI as you might’ve expected that I would get a notification.
I remember there being a big fuss around a similar situation in home gardening subreddits because the most common worldwide name of some flower offended someone in the States, and a similar situation in baking communities, and it’s just… I give up.
rapeseed oil has entered the chat.
Yes, it is a derogatory term from car modification. Taking away the context doesn’t make it any less racist.
Race Inspired Cosmetic Enhancements
I’m surprised to see it suddenly in wide use here, honestly. I’ve been ‘in the linux community’ for 25 years or so and only started seeing people use it in this context in the last month. Jarring isn’t the right word but it seems sudden to me knowing the connotations from the mid-to-late 90s car culture.
I personally don’t see it as racist in the context it’s used (to me, context and how something is used is everything), then again, when I first heard the term a few years back, it was in the context of an acronym: Racing Inspired Cosmetic Enhancements. Nothing racist about that, I mean…I see several cars owners, racing or otherwise, tricking their rides up with spoilers or annoying loud exhausts all the time. All ethnicities, not just strictly asian. It might have come from a racist thing*, and if it did, that doesn’t mean that that’s what has to define it for all time.
I also agree with tables; you can’t exactly choose a “nicer” alternative for something everytime a couple of people get offended by a word. It’s just not feasible, IMO. IDK, I was raised with the mindset of: There’s going to be people in life that are going to take offense to something you do or say even if you didn’t mean to offend in the slightest.
*it could have, but I’m not entirely sure personally. I checked out the wiki article you linked, and find it odd that when originally looked up the term RICE on wikipedia, there was no racist conotations at all (and i know this because i often used to refer to that article when i explained what the acronym meant to others), or if there were, it was a footnote, but now it’s front and center. Not saying you’re wrong and this is some revisionist piece at all, just noticing that, is all. Like I said, this very well could be the original meaning.
I’m not a part of the demographic who would experience racism around this. So, I can’t comment there.
I am a white hipster though. So, I usually call my window manager customizations “artisanally hand crafted”.
You should stop focusing on vocabulary and get your mind on intent, this is getting stupid.
Why is it stupid to discuss whether the language we use could be harming people? If you’re not interested in joining that discussion productively, you could simply scroll on.
The language used is not going to harm people. The intent is, which was my point.
Read -> Parse the meaning -> React accordingly. Is a correct way to communicate.
Read -> React to trigger word -> Disregard meaning Is not. It’s just conditioned response.If you do not think disagreement is a productive contribution, maybe you’re not looking for a discussion.
Let me get this straight:
In the following scenario, the app developer is in the right?
- App dev: Here’s my new app! It’s called F----T, for FAntastic Gnome Game On Terminal.
- Me: Hey, that word is offensive to me and others like me, it’s a word we hear before being beaten, bullied, killed, or discriminated against. Do you think you could change it?
- App dev: No. My intent was not to discriminate. You’re being unreasonable.
- Me: The fact that you are unwilling to even entertain changing the app name from a well known slur used against people like me makes me feel completely unwelcome.
- App dev: Sounds like your problem, sticks and stones.
I’ve been living with this term for a decade now and this is literally the first time I hear someone gets offended from that word.
Are you const_void asian by yourself?
I don’t think OP said they were offended.
Just because no one you know gets offended doesn’t mean it’s not racist.
Lol. But if it was the case, I bet I’ve seen this word offending someone or being racist would’ve occured at least once during the decade?
Linux users still brigs up wifi and SystemD regurarly so if there were a room for this particular word being offensive I’m 100% sure it would be discussed at least twice during a decade.
I could accept op being right if this was discussed more than zero times before, even though I don’t get how and why people gets offended by any word. Even less I get why on earth anybody would get offended for some 3rd person and I accept it just being me who don’t gets it.
Again, just because no one in the room you were talking in thought it was offensive doesnt mean it’s not outside of that room.
After all, you’re here, in a different room with new people and the new people are offering you new perspectives. One of those new perspectives is that that is a racist term.
I thought it had to do with the fact that most themes on Linux consist of a large collection of dotfiles, dots, rice. But that might just be me
No, it originally was a derogatory term for people who modify japanese cars. Then it began to apply to shoddy or garish modifications to any car. Then people started using it to mean modifying something to their own tastes.
