Over the weekend during a press conference, Green Bay Packers receiver Devin Funchess used the word "chinky" to describe the smiling eyes of reporters. He clearly wasn't directing the slur at anyone; he wasn't even referring to any actual Asian person. It was, on the surface, a word uttered out of ignorance.
More here: Green Bay Packers WR Devin Funches apologizes for anti-Asian remark
But this incident, and the similarly casually racist Juventus slant-eye photo debacle, point to a bigger issue, as sports commentator Pablo Torre points out in this excerpt from the ESPN Daily podcast.
The most disturbing thing about the Devin Funchess and Juventus stories is that so many people still have no idea what the most obvious anti-Asian racial slurs even are. #ESPNDaily: https://t.co/s9VXL0UirD pic.twitter.com/dE1nyuTVx6
— Pablo S. Torre (@PabloTorre) August 10, 2021
"The term "chink" stands atop the medal stand of the most classic, and I mean textbook, anti-Asian racial slurs. And the whole squinty slant-eye stuff? That's not some obscure thing to us, either. That's basically the "Free Bird" of anti-Asian racist gestures. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that pretty much every Asian American person I know has been disrespected -- degraded, honestly -- in these ways, intentionally or not, in our own lives.
So the most disturbing thing about Funchess and Juventus innocently doing that stuff is not that we Asians may have heard those words and seen those gestures and instantly been triggered into some kind of emotional devastation. It's actually just the simple fact that so many people still have zero functional idea what the most "obvious" forms of anti-Asian racism even are. I mean, just think about how small the ask is, because nobody's even being asked to know why this stuff is insanely disrespectful -- although, sure, it would be nice if people read up on the history of anti-Asiabn racism, from the Chinese Exclusion Act, to Vincent Chin to, you know, everything this year. But instead, all people are really being asked to know is... an Asian person. You know, like, in real life. And they truly don't. Because we could probably cut down on stuff exatly like this happening again and again and again, ir people would just consider what an actual Asian person might think about whatever it is you happen to be saying. Almost as if we're here, too. And looking at you right in the eye."
More here: ESPN Daily