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This is why I no longer let micro-aggressions go buy. Call me a loud black woman if you want, I don't care. But, like I said in another thread I have to learn to pick my battles and language very carefully. One thing that struck me about Europe is that it is quite racist, xenophobic, and sexist but somehow they think of themselves as more enlightened then those lowly Americans and I just want to scream internally because the issue is global not local. People like trump are getting elected throughout Europe.
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I think that it's your to do so. I don't think that sexism or racism gets fixed by people keeping quiet. No. On the contrary. People should say when something bothers them.
The issues are global
. One thing that I think did Europe really bad joke is the overall society. I think that in USA people emigrated earlier on and as a result had to deal with racism earlier on. In Europe the process started later and I think that in most places they now have to face this and deal with this. The problem is that they do not want to admit it. Most people isolate themselves and do not even think how someone might get offended or react to something.
Let me give you example. Remember this joined team that we have? Well in the French part of the team there is mix of cultures - one guy from Madagascar, one guy from China and a woman from China as well I think. All good and it's normal for people to say that they are not from France. A former co-worker had to work with the guy from China. So when she would talk about him instead of mentioning his name she would say something like "The Chinese boy" (it was not even a man). Someone jokingly told her that this is racist and she got really offended. I told her that in general they are correct. The guy would not want to be referred as "Chinese boy" because he has name. Not only she did not get how this is racist, but she also got offended when people tried to point out why this is racist.
She also sometimes makes xenophobic comments that I dislike. For example when we were in Italy we saw two guys hugging each other in the public transportation. Usually when I see such things I just move along. I do not like people making out in front of me no matter the sex they have (just at some point goes into live porno territory and I feel uncomfortable) but for anything else I just see it and continue. She started commenting there, then she would mention it to everyone like it's something so unique that has to be discussed. But again she would not see how this might offend people.