Ed Do you like your cheese?

[bluesjnr]

It won’t ride a salty reactionary Facebook wave that is for sure.

Just an observation and no offence meant but have you just learned how to use "salt" and "salty" in this way or are you getting paid per mention.

 

[bluesjnr]

Repeating the word "reactionary" all the time isn't making much of a point. It's really an ad hominem.

You only noticed the constant repetition of "reactionary".... you're slipping.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Come on people. I know it was a grandad joke but it's funny still......or stilton

Brie honest, it wasn't that gouda joke.

 

[The Greater Fool]

Not that I want to encourage barracking your wife but would you be willing to ask her exactly why she wouldn't buy it?

What is the specific reason?

I'm genuinely interested as the only reason I can think of (in my limited capacity as a white person) is that she thinks it supports a racist agenda on the part of the manufacturer.

Because 'coon' is insulting.

She is uninterested in the professed history because such 'reasonable reasons' why a racial insult isn't insulting in this case because... whatever are so common and insincere. Such stories come down to "You are too stupid to understand how you are being insulted." Pretty much exactly what is going on in this thread.

Even *IF* the owner was sincerely unaware of the impact of "coon" in the casually racist atmosphere of the time, the people going on and on in this thread about how not offended they are, are in fact aware of the insult and seem to delight in repeating a racist slur over and over, because you know, they do not intend to be insulting at all

You'd also be shocked how often 'non-racists' find ways to insert "niggardly" and "niggling" and, as in this thread, "coon" over and over in so obviously non-racist ways. You know, because my family is just so stupid they believe the rational reasons it's not insulting as obviously intended, and how discussion of Raccoons and people with names like Coon seem to come up so often in casual conversation.

Of course, how a cheese being renamed from a perceived racist insult deserves 10 pages of thread so non-racists can repeat how coon cheese shouldn't or isn't insulting to blacks because they, being white, don't find it insulting because of the story.

My wife, however, is grateful that white folks such as in this thread don't see "coon cheese" as a problem because of the plausible deniability of the origin story. She is ever so concerned that white folks not feel insulted by racist crap thrown at her.

 

[Elagabalus]

OK. How does it stop some low level school yard racism by changing a brand name

I don't want to sound like Joe Morgue, but check this out. Saying "yeah, but it won't stop some low level school yard racism by changing a brand name stop all of the world's problems" isn't really an answer for the people who object to that particular name being used. The bottom line is they don't like that name being used because they find it offensive.

And seriously, blowing off the concerns of people who find something objectionable and offensive is kind of the reason why people are protesting in the streets at the present time.

 

[Meadmaker]

Disclaimer: Have not read thread. Just a few posts here and there.


Obviously, the people who market the stuff have to make a decision, and people's perceptions play a role in sales, so they have to keep all of that in mind when it comes to naming their cheese, whether or not it makes sense in a rational way.

That being said, it's a man's name. It is not racist in the least. Anyone who refuses to buy that cheese because of its name is being ridiculous.

 

[zooterkin]

Many years ago in Fort Wayne we had long-serving and well-respected mayor named Harry Baals^WP, whose name was pronounced like "hairy balls."

That's a strange way to pronounce 'Harry'.

 

[Meadmaker]

Yes, I agree, because it's a good move and because these are the times we're in. People will still find and eat their cheese! It can't possibly hurt cheese sales overall. People want their cheese, and fans of the product will adapt.

I learned the word has racist connotations while working at a dog start up. People would tell me the kinds of dogs they had. Many people had a particular kind of hound. But one person told me that they didn't refer to their breed by the common name, as it was racist. I appreciate having been told that. I never uttered that dog breed name again.

What? A coon hound? Named because the dog is a breed used to hunt racoons?

There is zero racism involved. None.



Ahhh......but......someone will say.....people would joke about using dogs to chase down black people, and would say that's what the name meant and.....Oh for pete's sake.

I see this happen so often, especially with sexual terms, but often with race-related terms as well. You take a perfectly fine word, and then people start using that word in a different way, and because that other use of the word is in some way naughty it becomes prominent, and suddenly you aren't supposed to use the word in its original meaning anymore because it "really" means the naughty thing. The most obvious example is "gay".

A coon dog is a dog used to hunt racoons, which animal's name is frequently shortened to "coon". Nothing racist about it.

 

[Elagabalus]

Disclaimer: Have not read thread. Just a few posts here and there.


Obviously, the people who market the stuff have to make a decision, and people's perceptions play a role in sales, so they have to keep all of that in mind when it comes to naming their cheese, whether or not it makes sense in a rational way.

That being said, it's a man's name. It is not racist in the least. Anyone who refuses to buy that cheese because of its name is being ridiculous.

Yeah, you missed this.

According to this, the company was founded by Fred Walker, an Australian businessman who created Vegemite. The cheese is made by a process invented by the American Edward Coon, who apparently operated dairies but didn't sell cheese under that name. So the Australian Coon brand was not created by anybody named Coon, the name has no Australian connection, and the company has been through several changes of ownership, including getting sold by Kraft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coon_cheese

Is Coon really the only name they can use for cheddar cheese in Australia? Or is it maybe smart for a marketer not to make consumers mad?

You left out the best part.

...Coon cheese is named after its American creator, Edward William Coon (1871–1934) of Philadelphia, who patented a method, subsequently known as the Cooning process, for fast maturation of cheese via high temperature and humidity...

Which means the cheese sucks so change the name already.

Also, apparently, this isn't the first time this has come up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coon_cheese

So why not name it Fred Walker?

 

[Meadmaker]

Yeah, you missed this.






So why not name it Fred Walker?

No I didn't.

This is ridiculous. Some guy made up a new way of cheese making, and someone named a type of cheese for his process and......what? Because it wasn't the owner's name that means it wasn't named for him? What are we to believe? The cheesemaking process story was some sort of cover story to hide the "real" racist meaning?

Honi soit qui mal y pense.

 

[CORed]

Coon cheese's name to be changed over racism concerns

Do you agree?

Since it appears that the name is an unfortunate coincidence of the name of the founder with an American racial slur, I would not blame them if they chose to keep the name, but I can understand that they don't want people to assume that the name is intended as a racial slur. Given the current cultural environment, it's probably a smart business decision to change the name, so as to avoid any appearance of a racial slur.

 

[Elagabalus]

No I didn't.

This is ridiculous. Some guy made up a new way of cheese making, and someone named a type of cheese for his process and......what? Because it wasn't the owner's name that means it wasn't named for him? What are we to believe? The cheesemaking process story was some sort of cover story to hide the "real" racist meaning?

Honi soit qui mal y pense.

No, that the cheese wasn't named after the guy who started the company (as some have asserted in this thread) so it remains just a brand name, and as such, can be changed to something else if the company deems it necessary and/or advantageous to do so.*

You also missed the guy who has objected to the name for twenty years.

The product name, which it shares with a racial slur, was defended by previous manufacturers Kraft and Dairy Farmers despite decades-long campaigns to change it,[8][9] including through challenges to the Australian Human Rights Commission in 1999 and Advertising Standards Bureau in 2001 by activist Stephen Hagan

*they are also under no obligation to change the name for purely rational reasons. They could also do it for purely irrational reasons just for the **** of it.

 

[Meadmaker]

No, that the cheese wasn't named after the guy who started the company (as some have asserted in this thread) so it remains just a brand name, and as such, can be changed to something else if the company deems it necessary and/or advantageous to do so.*

Sure. It's a marketing decision. They have to take into account consumer sentiment, no matter how stupid that sentiment is. If the name is hurting cheese sales, then change the name of the cheese.

It's just not a moral choice. There's nothing wrong with the name, but there might be something wrong with their customers.

You also missed the guy who has objected to the name for twenty years.

No, i just didn't care. He's been on some sort of stupid crusade, seeking racism where none exists? Ahh...but he's been doing it for 20 years so......connect the dots for me. What did I miss?

 

[Bob001]

What? A coon hound? Named because the dog is a breed used to hunt racoons?

There is zero racism involved. None.

Ahhh......but......someone will say.....people would joke about using dogs to chase down black people, and would say that's what the name meant and.....Oh for pete's sake.

I see this happen so often, especially with sexual terms, but often with race-related terms as well. You take a perfectly fine word, and then people start using that word in a different way, and because that other use of the word is in some way naughty it becomes prominent, and suddenly you aren't supposed to use the word in its original meaning anymore because it "really" means the naughty thing. The most obvious example is "gay".

A coon dog is a dog used to hunt racoons, which animal's name is frequently shortened to "coon". Nothing racist about it.

But language is a living thing, and words change meaning and usage over time. According to this, there are six varieties of coonhound. They were used as general hunting dogs, not just to hunt raccoons. Calling them "red bone hound," "black and tan hound," etc., takes nothing away from communication -- in fact, improves it with specificity -- and avoids giving even unintentional offense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coonhound

Here's a list of antiquated English words. Some have a current meaning different from the original (assay, caboose, cleanse, freak, marry, usher); others are gone from our vocabulary. I might want to slap the darbies on a peterman, but nobody would understand.
https://www.lexico.com/explore/archaic-words

Changing Coon cheese to something current in smart marketing, not a sociopolitical commentary.

 

[Meadmaker]

But language is a living thing, and words change meaning and usage over time. According to this, there are six varieties of coonhound. They were used as general hunting dogs, not just to hunt raccoons. Calling them "red bone hound," "black and tan hound," etc., takes nothing away from communication -- in fact, improves it with specificity -- and avoids giving even unintentional offense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coonhound

Here's a list of antiquated English words. Some have a current meaning different from the original (assay, caboose, cleanse, freak, marry, usher); others are gone from our vocabulary. I might want to slap the darbies on a peterman, but nobody would understand.
https://www.lexico.com/explore/archaic-words

Wait. A black and tan hound wouldn't give unintentional offense? Seriously?

But I'm sure the people offended would get over it, unless they were the sort of people who were looking for an excuse to get offended. I've heard those people are out there.

Changing Coon cheese to something current in smart marketing, not a sociopolitical commentary.

On this, we agree. There is nothing sociopolitical about the brand name "Coon". If it helps them sell cheese, then they should change the name.

 

[MoeFaux]

Sometimes you have to change things. That's evolution.

Personally, pointing to the breed name as referring to a dog who hunts raccoons sounds rather lame. It's how the words together are perceived *now* that matters.

So it needs to change.

This reminds me of "The circle game." The circle game involved making the "OK" hand gesture. You try to place it near your crotch, so someone looks, and you can either then make fun of them or punch them in the arm, depending on how you play. It's a schoolyard game. But, that symbol, the "OK" symbol, which even has an emoji, and is purely innocent, has now been appropriated by racists as part of the White Power movement, as "OK" can also look like the letters W and P.

Do you want to keep going around making the OK sign or playing a silly schoolyard game and be conflated with the White Power movement? I sure as hell don't. So I'll stop making the OK gesture. I'll stop holding up three fingers the "carney way" when saying the number three because I would be absolutely mortified if anyone were to think I was doing something racist. It's an easy change. What's so hard about doing it? Yeah, it's too freakin' bad some bad people have taken over something innocent. But I'm not going to keep doing something when it's a simple change of habit to avoid perpetuating a hateful ideology.

 

[Meadmaker]

Sometimes you have to change things. That's evolution.

Personally, pointing to the breed name as referring to a dog who hunts raccoons sounds rather lame.

That's so weird. They were named because they were used to hunt raccoons, but it's lame to say that they refer to a dog that hunts raccoons.

I suppose no one hunts raccoons anymore, so people don't know that in the not very distant past, people used to send a bunch of dogs out in an attempt to find and tree a raccoon, and those big nosed dogs were really good at it.

It's how the words together are perceived *now* that matters.

I perceive "coon hound" to be a dog that is used to hunt raccoons, or which is of the same breed that used to be used to hunt raccoons. And if you happen to use a beagle to hunt raccoons, it's ok to refer to that as a coon dog anywhere except a dog breeder or when drawing up a dog pedigree, but, here's the thing. No one who hunts raccoons cares about pedigree, so, really, it's ok to call a beagle a coon dog.

So it needs to change.

This reminds me of "The circle game." The circle game involved making the "OK" hand gesture.

That is an excellent example. Someone took a a perfectly good gesture, which has an agreed upon meaning, and is recognizable all over the place, and then insisted that it "really" means something else, because someone saw it on youtube. So everyone who uses the agreed upon meaning has to stop. Bah. If I make the ok sign, and someone informs me that it's a white power gesture, I am very likely to respond with some other gesture that might be familiar in our culture, and I will explain that I have appropriated it to mean "Peace be with you."

 

[rockinkt]

My father always used to say: "Even a dog knows the difference between being tripped over and kicked."

There seems to be a lot of people looking for ways to turn everything into a kick whether it was meant that way or not.

 

[bluesjnr]

Because 'coon' is insulting.

She is uninterested in the professed history because such 'reasonable reasons' why a racial insult isn't insulting in this case because... whatever are so common and insincere. Such stories come down to "You are too stupid to understand how you are being insulted." Pretty much exactly what is going on in this thread.

Even *IF* the owner was sincerely unaware of the impact of "coon" in the casually racist atmosphere of the time, the people going on and on in this thread about how not offended they are, are in fact aware of the insult and seem to delight in repeating a racist slur over and over, because you know, they do not intend to be insulting at all

You'd also be shocked how often 'non-racists' find ways to insert "niggardly" and "niggling" and, as in this thread, "coon" over and over in so obviously non-racist ways. You know, because my family is just so stupid they believe the rational reasons it's not insulting as obviously intended, and how discussion of Raccoons and people with names like Coon seem to come up so often in casual conversation.

Of course, how a cheese being renamed from a perceived racist insult deserves 10 pages of thread so non-racists can repeat how coon cheese shouldn't or isn't insulting to blacks because they, being white, don't find it insulting because of the story.

My wife, however, is grateful that white folks such as in this thread don't see "coon cheese" as a problem because of the plausible deniability of the origin story. She is ever so concerned that white folks not feel insulted by racist crap thrown at her.

Thank you for taking the time to respond. I hope those responses are hers and not yours. I'm somewhat inebriated right now and will respond later.

 

[rockinkt]

Because 'coon' is insulting.

She is uninterested in the professed history because such 'reasonable reasons' why a racial insult isn't insulting in this case because... whatever are so common and insincere. Such stories come down to "You are too stupid to understand how you are being insulted." Pretty much exactly what is going on in this thread.

Even *IF* the owner was sincerely unaware of the impact of "coon" in the casually racist atmosphere of the time, the people going on and on in this thread about how not offended they are, are in fact aware of the insult and seem to delight in repeating a racist slur over and over, because you know, they do not intend to be insulting at all

You'd also be shocked how often 'non-racists' find ways to insert "niggardly" and "niggling" and, as in this thread, "coon" over and over in so obviously non-racist ways. You know, because my family is just so stupid they believe the rational reasons it's not insulting as obviously intended, and how discussion of Raccoons and people with names like Coon seem to come up so often in casual conversation.

Of course, how a cheese being renamed from a perceived racist insult deserves 10 pages of thread so non-racists can repeat how coon cheese shouldn't or isn't insulting to blacks because they, being white, don't find it insulting because of the story.

My wife, however, is grateful that white folks such as in this thread don't see "coon cheese" as a problem because of the plausible deniability of the origin story. She is ever so concerned that white folks not feel insulted by racist crap thrown at her.

Your wife sounds pretty sensitive.
She needs to relax and learn that it always isn't about her or her skin tone.
If you look for hidden meanings and try and analyze every word or statement for some indication of ulterior motive you will never find peace.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.