You want food? You look Biafran.

[Chicken Sandwich]

While watching the movie Animal Kingdom, this line came up:

You want food? You look Biafran.

I'm assuming that that the person means that the person she's talking to looks very thin and hasn't eaten much lately. Am I right?

If so, does anyone else agree that this is usage, outside of a movie, would be considered.. well...kind of offensive? I've never heard anyone use a particular country as an adjective to refer to a quality that is connected to that country. I feel like it's not exactly right to invoke a stereotype, particulary this one.

Does anyone else agree, or am I way off?

Thanks.

 

[abaka]

Your interpretation is correct.

Offensive? Rather old-fashioned. The Biafran crisis was forty or more years ago.

 

[emsr2d2]

You're right in both your understanding and that these days that would normally be considered distinctly un-PC.

It's not the first example I've heard though. In the late 80s and throughout the 90s, I heard people referring to extremely thin people as "Ethiopian".

In South Park, the satirical cartoon show, there was an entire episode based around a character called "Starvin' Marvin, the Ethipopian (sic)" - admittedly, in the cartoon, he was actually meant to be an Ethiopian national but the character was clearly intended as a stereotype of any African race which was enduring a famine.

 

[Chicken Sandwich]

Offensive? Rather old-fashioned. The Biafran crisis was forty or more years ago.

Perhaps "offensive" is too strong of a word, so in retrospect I would say that it's politically incorrect (as emsr2d2 has said).
The only settings in which I find stereotypes appropriate, are comedic/satiric/humourous ones, such as those in South Park (which I think is a great show).

Thank you for your responses.

 

[5jj]

Perhaps "offensive" is too strong of a word, so in retrospect I would say that it's politically incorrect (as emsr2d2 has said).

I find somrthing that makes a joke of hundreds of thousands of people starving to death very offensive.