[ekianjo]

> As in you, a German born in Germany, get addressed in English every now and then by strangers, because if you're not white,

Not sure why you find that surprising. Being German is not written on your face. Since most Germans are white, most people will make the correct assumption that if someone is not white, there is a stronger likelihood that they are not German. The same happens in Japan with mixed race kids who get treated like foreigners even though they were born and spent their whole life in Japan. That's just how brains work.

If you had no prior assumption you could assume that nobody is who they seem to be and that would make things very complicated for everyday life.

[portaouflop]

The easy fix is to stop assuming and start talking to people in German - it’s really easy to do. If they don’t understand the language you will notice immediately.

A bit of an aside but I find it very condescending by fellow Germans to address people immediately in English if they don’t speak perfect fluent German - give the people some chance to learn and practice the language for god sakes

[AYBABTME]

You know it's the same everywhere? It's hopeless to wish for all of humanity to change their common intuitions and independently reproduced heuristics.

I'm white and spend a lot of time in Korea. I can get around in Korean. Do I take offence when a Korean talks to me in English first? No, it wouldn't make sense. If they switch to English when they notice that my Korean is imperfect? Neither. I'd have unrealistic expectations about my fellow humans if I blamed people for easily explainable interactions. Better to presume good intentions than to take offence at the banality of such interactions.

[gottorf]

There's a white Korean member of the National Assembly[0], whose existence I find fascinating. I have no doubt that he would also get spoken to in English on the streets, if the speaker does not know who he is. And even more funnily, supposedly his Korean has a thick Jeolla accent!

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ihn_Yo-han

[lazide]

Also, born and grew up in Korea to missionaries, only to be deported to the US by the Japanese when they took over Korea. Then moved back later in life.

Talk about an unusual life!

[portaouflop]

You are correct of course.

I’m not saying you should take offence - I just know that it can be corrosive for people in that position. Being never seen as part of the culture does something to you, you feel apart, forever, even across generations.

I’m saying to give your fellow humans more consideration when you interact with them.

It might not affect you much because you didn’t build your whole life in Korea.

But imagine you are 3rd generation living there, your parents have been born in Korea but you still aren’t seen as part of the country. It builds resentment and segregates the citizens which makes life harder for everyone.

[gottorf]

> I just know that it can be corrosive for people in that position

The reverse is also true: it can be corrosive for the people on the other side of that equation. Of course the 3rd generation "foreign" descendant had no choice on where to be born, but you can imagine that for the generation of the "natives" that took in the immigrants, it might have felt strange to see among their community people that looked different, spoke a different language, and had different cultural customs. It's hard not to think that this was corrosive to the social fabric, especially for the people who didn't feel that they had agreed to that particular change in the social contract.

> your parents have been born in Korea but you still aren’t seen as part of the country

Some immigrant groups don't integrate very well, even after generations. Naturally, it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem; do the immigrants not integrate because the natives reject them, or do the natives reject them because the immigrants don't integrate?

As an immigrant myself, I believe the onus is on the immigrant to integrate, and to raise one's children to be even further integrated. Again, it sucks for those who had no choice but to be born in a country as the descendants of immigrants, who nevertheless get judged as an immigrant unwilling to integrate; but that's not a problem particular to immigration. It always sucks to be judged not as an individual but as a member of a group.

We should all strive to judge people by who they are and not what group they belong to, which I suppose was your overall message; but I just want to point out that everything is a two-way street.

[rayiner]

Nobody owes you anything.

[portaouflop]

And?

[thunky]

> The easy fix is to stop assuming and start talking to people in German

If 9 times out of 10 English is actually the correct choice, then it probably makes less sense to do this.

[portaouflop]

Even if that number would hold up - Why? It’s still more dignified for all involved. Not every human interaction needs to be made as efficient as possible.

[lazide]

Clearly as evidenced by your irritation, most people don’t work the way you think they should? At least by default. If they’re German.

Honestly, being part German, I’m surprised there isn’t a law about this already! Though I guess there was an attempt that ended badly not that long ago…

[portaouflop]

Yes there is something deeply wrong in German society - as evidenced by the recent stellar rise of a popular racist and facist party and the more and more common casual racism that is just accepted by the majority of the population.

I for one am sad that Germany once again seems to head toward embracing some death-cult ideology that in the past did unimaginable damage to the people it was supposed to serve.

It makes me feel that all the progress we made in the past 80 years is built on sand and we can slide back anytime in a highly fragmented, tribalistic and cruel society.

[nec4b]

>> Yes there is something deeply wrong in German society - as evidenced by the recent stellar rise of a popular racist and facist party and the more and more common casual racism that is just accepted by the majority of the population.

I guess you mean the party which led by a women in a relationship with another women from Sri Lanka. You should probably start looking for other insults, racist and fascist are getting kind of boring.

[AdrianB1]

Because probability and logic says it is the best way.

[ashoeafoot]

If they started talking german first, you would rant about "Incestdorfhinterwäldler".. whatever you do you are cooked and thats by intent

[boringg]

It’s honestly like an odds calculation in those environment. The odds of someone who looks different that is local is incredibly low so they default to assuming said individual is a tourist.

[portaouflop]

It might be the case in certain Asian countries but in Germany the odds are definitely not incredibly low - something around 40% of the population don’t look like what most people think of when speaking of Germans.