Several months ago, my blood went cold when I saw what I perceived to be a photoshopped mockery of a horrific incident during the Vietnam War.  I’m confident a portion of my reaction was a bundle of projections motivated by the no good very bad way in which my ethnicity was treated by many of my Protestant Caucasian hometownfolk.  Regardless, that post inspired the following comment from one quasi-literate lurker self-dubbed BillyBob:

Wow you are the most oversensitive person on the entire internet. Get over yourself…you are not a victim. That Starbucks picture is FUNNY.

Well, okay BillyBob.  You have a point there.  If you numb yourself out to the history of the photograph, it is kind of funny.  I get it.

Several weeks ago, though, I was reading a review of banh mi (a Vietnamese sammich) in Edible Manhattan. The glowing review ended with

Banh mi po’boy, me love you long time.

Now, when I read this, I was a little annoyed.  So naturally, I checked the article author’s name to see if it was Asian.  Then I thought, “Wait, people wouldn’t know that I’m Asian …” so I let it slide.

In the May/June 2009 Edible Manhattan, however, a reader named Kim from Manhattan ain’t gonna take it.  She writes:

Your last line … was extremely offensive and made me glad to have read the bigger articles first, because I immediately wanted to put your publication down and never read it again.

I understand that you were trying to praise the food and tie your blurb together.  However, those words to me, as an Asian-American woman, represent some of the worst racist and sexist stereotypes on the planet.  Let me put it to you another way:  If you were praising a soul food restaurant’s fare, I’m sure you would think twice before printing something like, “Fried chicken?  Yessuh, mastuh!” In the same token, “Me love you long time” is used to reduce Asian-Americans into flat, appalling stereotypes.  For you to use that to “praise” an item of food only makes it worse.

Phew; thank pork-bellied Buddha Kim wrote in because she was more articulate than I’d have been (You dirty honkey bitches, etc. etc.).  Now, of course, I use that line mockingly but it’s allowed; I already checked with the Yellow Consulate consisting of me, myself, and I.  But if you’re not a card-carrying member, the rules are different.

Sadly, the reply of Gabrielle Langholtz, Edible Manhattan’s Editor, makes me wonder if she actually understood what Kim was trying to say.  She replied:

Before printing this line we asked friends whether they considered it offensive, and none knew the original Full Metal Jacket prostitute reference, only the 2 Live Crew lyric or the later Mariah Carey lyric.  We finally were persuaded by a diversityinc.com article that pondered whether the phrase is “empowering or insensitive.”  You clearly found it to be the latter, for which we apologize.

So basically, Ms. Langholtz

1. Asked her (likely) white friends what they thought
2. Ultimately decided that she was going to use the phrase to empower that little banh mi
3. Is really only apologizing to Kim for the fact that Kim took the phrase as “insensitive”

Furthermore, Ms. Langholtz fails to acknowledge that the phrase might be inherently insensitive, nor does she apologize for having included it — she only says, “I’m sorry, Kim, that you found it insensitive.”

Well, I’m sorry, Ms. Langholtz, that you’re a dumb cunt.

And I’m allowed to say that.  I’m a card-carrying member of the Cunt Consolate.

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In other news, I highly recommend the $8 spicy catfish banh mi at Baoguette on the east side of Lexington, just north of 25th Street.

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Should you include that potentially insensitive, racially-charged line in your content?

1. If you’re not sure, there might be a problem
2. If you’re not a card-carrying member of the race infused in the line, there might be a problem
3. If the first three card-carrying members of the race in question that you ask about that line don’t give you the thumbs up, then it is definitely controversial

Remember: Racial Sensitivity Cunt Happen Overnight