Rep. Eli Crane used the derogatory phrase in describing his proposed amendment to a military bill. Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty asked that his words be stricken from the record.
Rep. Eli Crane used the derogatory phrase in describing his proposed amendment to a military bill. Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty asked that his words be stricken from the record.
It isn’t a lot better and has a lot of the “brown people” problems with respect to grouping together wildly different groups with different experiences in ways that mostly just come down to “You aren’t a real person of color/minority/whatever” stupidity
But the big difference is that “colored people” has historically been used in an oppressive and derogatory manner. Whereas “people of color” is at least associated with making an effort. And when it comes to referring to people: if it pisses them off, don’t do it. You don’t need to do a deep analysis to understand why “blacks” is generally okay (even if it makes white folk uncomfortable to say) but “negroes” will get you some strong side eye even though “it is just the spanish word for ‘black’”.
I think a major aspect that seems to be ignored pretty often is that “people of colour” is used a lot by non-white people, while “coloured people” isn’t as much. Sometimes we need a shorthand for people who aren’t white but may or may not be black, and I generally think that going with the version that the people being referred to prefer is usually the more respectful choice.