"Go back to your country!" o.O

[MinimaMagistra]

My Bossman (of indian or middle-eastern looks, will matter later) told me how he'd gotten HATE MAIL, the other day. I never found out what it contained, but that was the lead-in to discussing an SW who had told him "Go back to whatever country you're from."

The bossman's wife had caught the lady smoking in a non-smoking room and was charged $100. She complained bitterly and backpedaled all over the place.

"I wasn't smoking!" to "I was only smoking outside" to "I wasn't smoking in the room, I was just putting that out." and... so on. Her husband had already paid the fine, and they were checking out as this woman was bitching up a storm. Bossman was exquisitely polite throughout all this, but had to keep telling the woman that she'd been seen smoking, she'd paid the fine, and eventually said that she would have to leave now, he had other customers behind her he needed to take care of. She wouldn't move, so he told her (still very politely) that he'd asked her to leave, and now she was trespassing. And she said "Oh go back to whatever country you came from!"

Bossman: "What..? But I'm from Canada..."

[MrSunshineState]

When people backpedal enough and realize they are caught, they resort to pure ignorance.

[BookstoreEscapee]

What? You mean there are non-white people in the Great White North?!

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

A picture says a thousand words, and I didn't feel like writing 9,000 of them. Or 10,000. Or...oh, piss it

[Rapscallion]

What? You mean there are non-white people in the Great White North?!

Fortunately, yes. I had a rather fine meal at a Mongolian restaurant on Yonge Road abolut eighteen months back. Some of the finest bhajis I've ever had!

Rapscallion

[Jester]

I have had some racist ignorant people in my time tell me to go back to Israel.

Okay.......I'm not from Israel. Neither are my parents or any of my ancestors. But since the family is Jewish, I guess to them it all makes sense.

The irony goes beyond the fact that my family is not from Israel.
My ancestors came here approximately seventy years before Israel even existed.
They were from nowhere near the area of Israel either, being Polish, Russian, Romanian, and Austrian.

And perhaps the ultimate irony that I love throwing in these people's faces is that my ancestors came here in the 1880's.....about 125 years ago. Sometimes long before THEIR ancestors got here. And THEY are telling ME to leave MY country?

Listen, you ignorant racist yahoos, this is America. The Melting Pot, as it is sometimes called. Just because I don't fit into your preconceived image of what an American is or should be, i.e., White Anglo-Saxon Protestant, does NOT mean you own this country or have final say on who gets to stay or go. Why don't YOU leave, and go back to under whatever rock you crawled out from?

Thank you, drive unsafely.

[earl colby pottinger]

Grinding gears

Sometimes I thing I can hear the gears in their heads stripping as they kick into reverse when they tell me to go back where I came from and I reply that "I hate the fogs in London".

Just because I am Black, and talk with a slight Jamaican accent does not make me Jamaican. It just means my parents are, I was born and raised in England!

[MinimaMagistra]

I'm pretty unremarkable, pigment-wise, but I both widely go by my nickname of "Anya" and have the bad habit of absorbing whatever accents I hear around me, so I occasionally sound strange. The question of where my accent's from doesn't crop up so much anymore, as I've discovered I fall into what I call "customer service southern", which is pretty much just as round and friendly as I can make it. They always guess russian or ukranian or something, though, with my name. "Your name sounds russian, where's it from?" "West Virginia."

[Pagan]

I occasionally will get the "go back to where you came from" comment here in ABQ. To which I respond, "You mean Las Cruces?" (largest city in the southern part of NM and the 2nd largest city in the state) Some people can't wrap their minds around the fact that there are some anglo native New Mexicans (I think we're now officially majority Hispanic).

Of course, sometimes, especially when I'm really tired, my accent will come out and I wind up sounding like a chola. Then I get people asking if I'm from the South Valley. Which, technically, I am....just happens to be the Mesilla Valley and not the South Valley part of ABQ!

[Imogene]

"You mean Las Cruces?"

I thought Las Cruces was one of those places they went in Pirates of the Carribean? Oh, no, that's Isla De Cruxes, isn't it?

[Gurndigarn]

I thought Las Cruces was one of those places they went in Pirates of the Carribean? Oh, no, that's Isla De Cruxes, isn't it?

You would be amazed by the number of Cruces floating around the Spanish-conquered Americas.

[slick]

Thats really weird to hear since I have had that happen to me before (customer upset even though we, the hotel, are right and instead of accepting it they resort to childesh behavior). I once asked the moron that told me to go back to my country, "which country? the one I was born in?". He replied "yea, where ever you come from!" to which I had to reply "then I guess I come from Canada. Its a great country thats full of colored folk, you'd love it up there!" He left.

When people say that to my father, it pisses me off, if I hear someone say that to him around me, thats it, that person is automatically ejected from the hotel. I don't care if its 2am, there is no reason to lash out at someone who is try to help you.

But when it happens to me, I have fun with it, common responses to "GO BACK TO YOUR COUNTRY!":

"like, right now?"
"maybe later, I'm tired"
"well, I get off my shift at 11"
"my apartment lease is still active until the end of the year, what should I do?"

this last one really pisses them off:

"How do I go back to here?"

[Pagan]

I thought Las Cruces was one of those places they went in Pirates of the Carribean? Oh, no, that's Isla De Cruxes, isn't it?

Close, it was Isla Cruces! Las Cruces - the crosses; Isla Cruces - Cross Island

You would be amazed by the number of Cruces floating around the Spanish-conquered Americas.

About as surprising at how many places start with San/Santa around here!

this last one really pisses them off:

"How do I go back to here?"

I have got to remember that! May I use it sometime?