Friday, December 11, 2009

"The Paks"?

If this Dawn report is to be believed, that's the word U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to describe us. To be fair, it does save the trouble of three additional syllables.

By the way, it's obviously true that "Paki" is a racially charged term -- especially in Britain -- but what about "Pak"? I've never even heard it, to be honest.

15 comments:

Umair Javed said...

I wonder if he used it in the same way that the Americans use 'Yanks' for Yankees....

Anonymous said...

I personally used to get offended by the word 'Paki' until I realised that it also means something or someone that is 'Pak'. So if someone uses it as a racial slur...it's actually not. It's more like yelling a compliment at someone.

Anonymous said...

How is "Paks" different from "Japs" - the latter being clearly offensive.

Anonymous said...

That certainly doesn't sound an endearing word to me.

Musaafir said...

Well, It's certainly better than 'NaPak' now isn't it?

There, someone was bound to say it :)

Musaafir said...

I am also happy they would stop calling it 'Packistan' at last.

takhalus said...

didn't Bush say the same some years back?

Anon_for_good_reason said...

Checkout Spiegel's awesome piece
How much allah can old continent bear?

Anonymous said...

How the hell is 'Paki' racist? Shouldn't you be proud to be a Paki?

Anonymous said...

@anon 12.12.09 3.50 am

'Paki' is an incredibly rude way of referring to someone of South Asian descent in British slang, and it's been one since at least the 1960s.
People in Pakistan use it because they think it's a cool way of shortening the country's name or whatever, but they have no idea what they're actually calling themselves because they don't know the history of the word.

FicusPipal said...

A term of endearment, folks - whence all this churlishness?

Anonymous said...

IMRAN FARHAT SCORING A TON!!!!

IN YOUR FACE 5 rupee!!

Barzakh81 said...

hehe. US officials are so used to saying Af-Pak that its probably rooted out of that.

Hukook al-Insan
http://tqa81.wordpress.com/

Kalsoom said...

I think I heard Chris Matthews saying that too - it's not technically wrong but it still made me a little indignant. Like we're an American football team or something.

Pak-is-Tan said...

so two of us would be 2paks?

im sorry ... i was tempted...

my verification word is gonders...