I completely know what you're talking about! Especially - over here at least - with race. I occasionally want to say in an anecdote "this white person..." but then, since it's an unusual thing to say, there follows the assumption that it will matter that the person is white.
The other time it comes up for me is when you are trying to specify a person from a group. If that person is black or Asian, is that an acceptable characteristic to use to distinguish them (assuming they are the only person of that race in the group) or is that racist? And if you instead say "the one with the black hair" will you instead just get confused looks - since the assumption then is that you *don't* mean the person of unique skin tone - since a different/unique color of skin is way more obvious than a different/slightly unique hair color. *shrug*
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Date: 2008-09-24 06:44 pm (UTC)The other time it comes up for me is when you are trying to specify a person from a group. If that person is black or Asian, is that an acceptable characteristic to use to distinguish them (assuming they are the only person of that race in the group) or is that racist? And if you instead say "the one with the black hair" will you instead just get confused looks - since the assumption then is that you *don't* mean the person of unique skin tone - since a different/unique color of skin is way more obvious than a different/slightly unique hair color. *shrug*