Ginger and Re: Gingerism, gingerphobia

[Benjamin Barrett]

I cannot imagine that still existing (outside of the Northern Ireland conflict), but it is mentioned as a possibility on http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-red2.htm. I also recall sometime in the past decade a comedian saying that the Irish were the one people you can still make fun of.

Benjamin Barrett
Seattle, WA

Learn Ainu! https://sites.google.com/site/aynuitak1/videos

On Aug 11, 2013, at 8:48 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at ATT.NET> wrote:

> Any connection with anti-Irish hatred?
> 
> Joel
> 
> At 8/11/2013 12:37 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>> I received a kind e-mail this morning saying Nexis has "gingerism"
>> to 1998 apparently of British origin.
>> 
>> Wiktionary (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gingerism) has it to 1997
>> and labels it British.
>> 
>> My earliest recollection of hearing the word "ginger" is within the
>> past five years, so I suspect that "ginger" itself entered general
>> American English with the South Park episode "Ginger Kids"
>> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginger_Kids) in 2005, though maybe
>> I've just been out of the loop.
>> 
>> Gingerism/gingerphobia is interesting because AFAIK, unlike racism
>> and homophobia, nobody actually believes that people with red hair
>> are actually different, other than the red hair itself (and perhaps
>> accompanying sensitive skin). Nevertheless, http://gingerism.com/
>> chronicles cases of gingerism, including at least one that seems to
>> genuinely be fueled by nonginger supremacism (the attacker was drunk
>> at the time, "Random Assault for Being Ginger-haired"). My
>> grandmother certainly suffered a great deal of taunting due to her
>> red hair as a child that she never got over completely; taunters can
>> almost never be held accountable because people will simply say it
>> was "in good fun."
>> 
>> Benjamin Barrett
>> Seattle, WA
>> 
>> Learn Ainu! https://sites.google.com/site/aynuitak1/videos=
>> 
>> On Aug 11, 2013, at 1:46 AM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> In discussing the Ginger Pride Walk, Shawn Hitchins is quoted as saying, =
>>> "Even although it isn't a real word, gingerism exists and bullying =
>>> exists and you can't deny that kids are being subjected to taunts or =
>>> being bullied in schools just for having red hair." =
>>> (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-23643831)
>>> 
>>> On Google, that unreal word gets 41K raw hits.
>>> 
>>> Also worthy of note is "gingerphobia," which looks like it's coined =
>>> based on "homophobia."
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