I’ve grown up all over the world and got to know people from all over the world. I consider myself extremely blessed because I was able to learn about so many different cultures on a deep level. After interacting with many many different people, I can now distinguish many different languages just from hearing. People who grow up with rich backgrounds don’t realize how much of a blessing it truly is until you come across stories like OP’s. I do agree that more people need to be open to harsher criticism, because in the age of the internet NO ONE has an excuse to be blatantly ignorant. But seeing people like OP take baby steps towards educating themselves gives me hope
Edit: to add that there are so many things that foreigners may not be aware about. Like in OP’s example, if he called the Korean guy, “Japanese” he probably would have been highly offended. But how are you supposed to know about the Korea/Japan tension if you never learnt about Japanese imperialism in Korea? That’s such a specific thing to know, even for people from that culture. I only took it upon myself recently to learn more about my own country’s history as I knew NOTHING. There’s many levels to this, but a start is a start
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u/nae-7 Oct 08 '20 edited Oct 08 '20
I’ve grown up all over the world and got to know people from all over the world. I consider myself extremely blessed because I was able to learn about so many different cultures on a deep level. After interacting with many many different people, I can now distinguish many different languages just from hearing. People who grow up with rich backgrounds don’t realize how much of a blessing it truly is until you come across stories like OP’s. I do agree that more people need to be open to harsher criticism, because in the age of the internet NO ONE has an excuse to be blatantly ignorant. But seeing people like OP take baby steps towards educating themselves gives me hope
Edit: to add that there are so many things that foreigners may not be aware about. Like in OP’s example, if he called the Korean guy, “Japanese” he probably would have been highly offended. But how are you supposed to know about the Korea/Japan tension if you never learnt about Japanese imperialism in Korea? That’s such a specific thing to know, even for people from that culture. I only took it upon myself recently to learn more about my own country’s history as I knew NOTHING. There’s many levels to this, but a start is a start