A shocking story of verbal abuse suggests we should be more sensitive about using the word ‘ginger’
A couple of months ago, police were called in when red-haired pupils at an academy in Yorkshire were the victims of “kick a ginger kid day”. An isolated incident? Perhaps not.
“This letter is to respectfully ask that the word ‘ginger’ is not used interchangeably for redheads, as it a term that it is all too often used in a derogatory fashion and as a prelude to abuse.”
So begins a letter to the readers’ editor describing horrifying abuse the writer has been subjected to – and all because of the colour of her hair.
She continues: “Until about five years ago, if someone you knew used the term ‘ginger’ in front of you, they would immediately look embarrassed and mutter something along the lines of: ‘Oh, but you’re not a ginger – you’ve got lovely hair.’ It now seems to have slipped into common usage; perhaps it has the cachet of a naughty word.
“It is still the case that if you are out in public and hear it the word is usually followed by ‘minger’, sometimes by ‘freak’ and (unfortunately) sometimes the wet sound of someone spitting in your direction. In five years I’ve had redhead abuse upwards of a dozen times, and twice it included being actually spat on.
“Like many other attacks based on appearance, verbal abuse of redheads is often uncomfortably sexual in nature. A particularly horrible experience on a train began with three drunken men first hissing ‘ginger minger’ at me through the seats; then the abuse escalating to yelled offers to ‘wallpaper my head so they can fuck me’. (Apologies for the coarse language.) I had done nothing to attract their attention – I was actually travelling up to Perthshire for my mother’s memorial service. My Scottish cousins, who also have red hair, have actually had worse scenarios and now dye their hair.
“While there may be small pockets of the UK where the word is not used as abuse, I’ve travelled a lot across Britain and have yet to find them. As I suspect most of the abuse does not happen in middle-class areas (apart from the schoolyard), I can understand that many non-redheads simply do not realise just how much this term is used still as a weapon.”
The sexual element suggests that women are more likely to be victims of this kind of moronic treatment. I asked a red-haired man about his own experiences and he said: “I have never really been abused for my hair colour. I think it’s important to remember that sometimes, when people get abusing words thrown at them, they aren’t being abused because of what they look like. For example, if Peter Crouch bumped into you in the street, you might call him a ‘tall twat’ but you’re not abusing him because he’s tall. You’re just looking for any adjective that you can attach to the word ‘twat’.
“This may well happen to a lot of redheads and they convince themselves that if they weren’t a redhead, they wouldn’t be abused. But this is impossible to tell, as chavs on trains may well abuse you even if you’re a brunette. As with all forms of teasing, confidence and the ability to laugh off banter are important.
“The word ‘ginger’ does carry more negative connotations than redhead but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t use it. I believe that there is no such thing as an inherently bad word and that everything has a context. When the Guardian uses ‘ginger’ as a synonym for redhead in a piece where they have already used the word ‘redhead’ then clearly there is no negative intent. And all writers grasp at synonyms to avoid word repetition.
“To ban the word altogether would probably just make it worse and taboo words only become more powerful and more offensive.”
A (dark-haired) Observer columnist, while recognising that “ginger prejudice” exists, has suggested that red-haired people are perhaps oversensitive and wonders whether we are “getting our PC knickers in a twist”. To be fair, no one is asking for “ginger” to be banned altogether but the letter writer did suggest that we take more care over use of the term, and I think that’s good advice which I shall be passing on to my colleagues.
This recent article – Mapping redheads: which country has the most? – may have been tongue-in-cheek, but I can see that anyone who had been abused as a “ginger” would not find it very funny. (And as it’s not the 1950s, we don’t normally use “blondes” to describe people with blond hair.)
Over to you.
David Marsh, author of For Who the Bell Tolls: One Man’s Quest for Grammatical Perfection, will debate “Questions of Grammar” with NM Gwynne, author of Gwynne’s Grammar, at Kings Place, London, on Monday 17 February. Tickets here.
Media: Mind your language | theguardian.com http://ift.tt/1fh7d4T
