What Rhymes With "Jap?" Crap.
And that's exactly what this is: crap. First check out the article. It seems Dallas Cowboys coach Bill Parcells made reference in a recent press conference to some of his team's surprise plays, calling them "Jap plays," a reference, as the article points out, to Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. Apparently, there were several asian journalists in the room and both took offense. Here's one quote:

"Bill Parcells is a brilliant coach," John Tateishi of the Japanese-American Citizen's League, a national civil rights group told DallasNews.com. "Unfortunately, he is ignorant about racial slurs. I take great offense by what he said. Parcells ought to know better. He sorely needs more education on what is offensive and non-offensive to Japanese-Americans. I am shocked that he would say this."

I don't know that I've seen a better example recently of political correctness run horribly, horribly amok. First of all, I'd like to know which part is most offensive to Mr Tateishi: Parcells' shortening of "Japanese" to "Jap", or was it Parcells' reference to the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

My assumption is that Tateishi doesn't like the word "Jap." My recommendation to Coach Parcells would be to change the name to a more PC term like "asian-american plays." Somehow I'd imagine that'd come off as slightly offensive too. Somewhere way down inside I doubt very seriously Mr Tateishi likes the Pearl Harbor reference either. As a "Japanese-American" I'm sure he finds his loyalties slightly divided whenever the subject comes up. [As an aside, I doubt Parcells was genuinely sorry anyway since he both started and finished his statement with, "No offense to anyone."]

It must be incredibly convenient to continue to acknowledge your asian heritage when it's convenient to educate the "uneducated" like Coach Parcells while at the same time straddling the fence by calling yourself "Japanese-American." In my opinion, Mr Tateishi sorely needs more education on what is offensive and non-offensive to American-Americans like me. What's offensive to me is the assload of naval vessels (I'm thinking of the Arizona in particular) at the bottom of Pearl Harbor as a direct result of his forefathers and this guy has the audacity to call himself a Japanese-American with a straight face and then demand on top of it that people like me educate ourselves on what he finds offensive. I say "Fuck You, guy."

You want to live in America? Fine. It's a free country. Move right in. Get a job. Be proud to be an American. But you can kiss my ass if you think for one minute I'm going to recognize your japanese ethnicity. Your right to get that kind of treatment sank to the bottom of the ocean back on December 7, 1941.

I think Jimmy Walker said it best when referring to groups that refer to themselves as "fill-in-the-blank" americans. Said Walker, "Ain't none of you motherfuckers going back. Just be American."