A Spanish feminazi I’ve had the misfortune of working with lately scolded me (after she politely said hello to me) when I playfully responded with “Hola, señorita!”
As an Irishman, I see nothing wrong with this greeting as I hear it all the time, used as a fun phrase. But from any Spaniard’s perspective, is it considered sexist really? Or is she just one of those nutjobs?
By the way, it surprised me when she said it that I didn’t even have a proper response ready other than “Okay...”, but I’m left wondering if I should keep the peace by moving on or should I intimidate her next time by asking why it was sexist 😂
Yes, it’s sexist, you straight white male piece of crap
No, it’s not. Trigger that hoe in future
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@Unit1 Feminazis and white knights downvoted trina3’s truthful opinion; they also conspired to make the “Yes, it’s sexist” vote in my poll actually win 😤😤😤
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Apologies @Unit1, that was supposed to be a response to your comment, but somehow became an “Update”
Spanish girls! Is the greeting “Hola, Señorita” sexist?
It could be perceived as sexist. Anything could be. You should keep in mind that people are emotional creatures, not rational ones. That goes double for women.
Make a person feel good, most of what you say is forgivable.
Make a person feel bad, most of what you say is unforgivable.
It's not what you say, it's how you say it. You can say virtually anything if you say it the right way. According to Dr. Albert Mehrabian, only 7% of the word's meaning get across. 38% is tone (which makes online communication a hassle); and, 55% is body language.
The greeting by itself, no, I wouldn't call it sexist. But, what was said is only 7% of the equation.
I've been studying Spanish and one of the courses I've been using says to use the word señorita. I think that course was made in 2012. I've seen something on some people thinking that word is offensive though now since the world has changed so I would avoid using it if I don't know the person. It translates to "Miss" or "young lady."
I have wondered this too I just asked a girl I know from Mexico whose first language is Spanish. She said it is polite to call a woman that if they are unmarried or young. So I suspect the lady who thinks that is on the extreme in terms of being a feminist. Is that girl from Spain?
Yes, she’s from Madrid, Spain. It’s surprising she’d find it sexist though (being called “Miss” or “young lady”) since I nor anyone else I know has ever had an issue with being called “Sir” or “young man”
We'll here in the United States white men own the label "white boy" by black people. It does sound kind of degrading I think but nobody acts like it's offensive.
It's not like you called her a swear word so I think if you don't speak Spanish and she corrects you on that, she's probably just quite a feminist herself and it is offended by things other woman may not be. A lot of women would probably find that to be a compliment. You can just use the word señora instead though. Some younger women might think you're calling them old though so can you really win 😂😂 Avoid calling the feminist senoritas lol
The term "señorita" corresponds to the "Fräulein" in German or "mademoiselle" in French which have been abolished for any teenagers older than 13 (16 in some cases).
Authorities in German and French speaking countries address teenagers above the age of 13 with "Frau" (Mrs.) or "madame" (Mrs.).
Actually, you could even be fined if you address a 16 or 17 year old girl as Fräulein/mademoiselle. The same would apply to the Spanish "señorita".
I wonder how a person would know a girl is 16 or 17 and not younger? I can hardly believe a western country would have a law like that but I don't think you guys are really have the freedom over in Europe as I'm used to in the US. We have complete freedom of speech unless it is a threat.
@cavmanier I presume you know what a mistress is right? Miss is the abbreviation for mistress and I don't think a 13 year old would like to be associated to what nowadays is considered a woman of low morale.
Definition of mistress: "a woman having an extramarital sexual relationship, especially with a married man"
It's a contraction of the word mistress but that was a word from 300 years ago so I don't think it has the same meaning as we give it today. I mean that wouldn't make sense if it did because I was just asking my Spanish speaking friend from Mexico and she said it would be weird to not call her señorita. They use the word as a sign of respect.
@cavmanier Apparently, the Spaniards are a little more educated than the Mexicans since they also seem to have adopted the señora vs. señorita title for young teens since the asker was scolded for using an old fashioned way of addressing a young girl.
The entire polemic arose because the inappropriate term referred to girls that are not yet mothers or are not yet married.
In our society, it is not unusual to be pregnant with 13, thus a mother and therefore to be called Mrs. rather than Miss.
This is not about education. What you don't understand is that words 300 years ago don't necessarily mean what they do today. You think of mistress as a bad word but it probably wasn't seen as a bad word back then. I don't know if you understand when I say that? I get the feeling you have a mental block where you can't take that point in.
The point of all this is that the word is a sign of respect now. It doesn't matter if it came from a word 300 years ago that is now considered an insult. I'm not sure how you're seeing that it as an insult.
People get pregnant at 13 but my friend is 37 and still wants to be called señorita. I'm sure that some people can find anything to be offended by if they look hard enough. For a person to be offended by that they are splitting hairs. I mean think about it. They're mad because a thirteen-year-old may be called the word inappropriately. Well I think the word is for people who mainly know if the woman is single and without children.
@cavmanier Well then you have an old fashioned acquaintance and if she is the one that wants to feel that she is still a kid, then let her do it. Just don't call everyone miss because not everyone wants to be labeled a kid.
I'll just not listen to a little feminazi like yourself. You guys can have fun and your cynical worlds. I'm not going to be dragged down to your way of thinking. Think that you're so much more evolved if you want. I don't care.
@cavmanier Oh you will be dragged down, whether you like it or not. Perhaps not today or tomorrow but don't forget that you will get old one day too and that most likely women (feminazi) will take care of your case in the retirement home or elsewhere.
If all goes according to plan, perhaps even in less than 5 years. You can knock on my door again.
Then I would not want to be in your shoes! Have yourself a nice Saturday,
@cavmanier Well look at it this way. You guys took advantage of the girls for more than 60,000 years, since homo erectus.
You imposed your views and a number of other things, you prevented girls from getting education, you misused us for your own sexual pleasure and you made slaves out of us and that only so you can dominate wo (man) kind.
This is now about to stop and the the trend is being reversed. And what happens? You don't like it at all and you revolt by calling women Nazi for claiming their fair rights and the rights to dominate men for the next 60,000 years.
Yes, it is time to get scared. As scared as we were when you oppressed us all that time.
I never took advantage of women. That is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. You're justifying bad behavior to an individual based on what previous people related to them did. I seriously cannot stand you bigot liberals for this. You want to basically put children in jail for what their parents did effectively. Homo erectus has nothing to do with me nor does any other man.
Logic is not your people's friend. It's really scary how brainwashed you are into these distortions. You're an idiot. Wow you people are pathetic.
@ChefCurry actually I do enjoy downvotes because it shows that I managed to stir up something! But I also enjoy the upvotes whereas your downvotes also tell that a number of people with common sense disapprove your comments ;-)
"Spanish girls! Is the greeting “Hola, Señorita” sexist?" you asked. NO, im not a Spanish girl but i don't think it's about being Spanish. and "Hola, Señorita" means "hello mrs." and i don't think it's sexist. She is just fool like you have said to me. There is nothing about being sexist
@SueShe I live in the US and I've never heard somebody say the term Miss is sexist. Miss is not used where I live in California but basically no polite words are used here. No one uses the word ma'am either.
It varies in Spanish-speaking cultures. In Spain, "señorita" has dissappeared from everyday speech except for addressing teachers. I've never heard of it being treated as sexist instead of old-fashioned, but she may have miscommunicated. By contrast, in Peru, it's still a common way to address girls and young women.
Also, consider the context of the remark. In English-speaking cultures, it is rare that calling someone "young lady" would come across as sexist. But it *can* in some very specific contexts.
A good way to react to being accused of sexism is to say "I try to treat people equally but I don't claim to be perfect."
I work with a bunch of people of all type of races. But then again most of the people I work with are a lot older than me and have families.
Saying something like that to one of my female Spanish speaking co workers would not be seen as offensive. I'm a bit surprised that this even needs to be asked.
I'm assuming your Co worker is probably a millennial. Which could be why she's so easily butt hurt.
She said “No, don’t be saying that please! It’s sexist” & a few other words she mumbled in her fractured English. We continued working close to each other for a few moments, but she was gone by the time I felt like I should respond better than just a false agreement “Okay...”).
I shouldn’t let these brainwashed, degenerate snowflakes berate me over good intentions 🤬
Yeah she's nutty and probably watching way too many BuzzFeed videos.
If she wants to think something like that is being sexist then let her. I mean she's free to think whatever she wants even if it's something dumb. Just stay away from her people like this are not worth impressing.
I'm not Spanish, but "Ciao signora" seems to be an exact equivalent. It's not sexist at all. It's pretty similar to "Hello ma'am" or "Hi lady". It's flirty at best, depending how it is said. It's usually just a respectful but still inviting way to greet someone
I'm spaniard. It's not sexist and there's no reason for her to scold you, but if someone it's not my friend greeted me like that way I would think he's trying to flirt.
"Señorita" is a word that was very used in the past, and is not that common to use nowadays, specially for a spaniard (maybe in some other Spanish speaking countries is more common to refer like that to a woman). "Señorita" just means woman who's not married. I think the proper translation would be "miss".
I don't know about Spain and I know this question was about Spanish girls and no I am not Spanish but in Latin America it's not considered sexist at all, why would it be? That just sounds ridiculous. And yeah I don't want to say wrong about Spanish girls but some Spanish guys say many of them are too feminists and have an attitude but I don't know those are just the rumors.
Is Spanish commonly spoken in your office? If not, it probably wasn't sexism but the assumption that she speaks Spanish that pissed her off.
I talked with a Latino dude who was pissed that when he walked into a temp employment office they greeted him in Spanish. He was like, yeah, I know Spanish, but my grandfather was born in this country so don't make assumptions.
It’s not an office, it’s a supermarket. And we only have a handful of Spaniards working there. And it wasn’t a presumption, we know she’s Spanish (from Madrid) including her ancestors.
And to specify, this was a sexism accusation, a whole different ball game to getting annoyed about me speaking Spanish in general
I'm Hispanic male, My Spanish is not the best but if "señorita" is an offlically a word then is not sexist, even if it's not a really word, it can easily be believable since Spanish male and female pronouns are spell almost the same with a different ending (niño=boy and niña=girl). but if is has be any -ist, it maybe racist and that very long screch. If we condemn everyone for speaking a different language to learn or trying to friendlier then we're just looking for reason to hated people.
different dialects the words can mean different, I knew a Mexican and he described senorita different than just girl/woman, there's usually something attached to it. I don't remember what exactly it was but I believe that might be the issue
Actually, this girl was one of very few feminazis I didn’t assume was feminist at all. I worked with another feminist before who I rarely had an issue with, & I figured this Spaniard would be the same... until she used the S-word on me & another employee beforehand 😒
@ChefCurry And many are under the sheepish influence of pretentious celebrities who only adopt feminism to appeal to more millennial fans. They don’t actually care about social & economic equality; for them, it’s all about the green green & more green 💵💵💵💵💵💵
I got no respect for people who follow that nonsense feminist ideology so yes I would keep bugging her by saying that, and of course it doesn’t make sense their entire ideologie is based of false statistics and emotions...
I don't understand the downvotes.. Could someone at least explain why senorita is sexist? I'm both a feminist and a Spanish native speaker and honestly that's the first time I hear of this
@Asker Maybe this Spanish girl individually is just strange. She exhibits signs of OCD too, I’ve noticed, so she’s psychologically affected in some way 🤷🏻♂️
She might not like other races speaking shit Spanish to her like a cartoon. Are you into folks making stupid lucky charms jokes? Some people get annoyed by that stuff.
This is a retarded comment. Speaking basic Spanish can’t be compared to lucky charm jokes. If a Spanish person in Spain said “Hello, sir” to me, I wouldn’t cry about it... but maybe you would, by the sound of it
Yeah, that I don’t get but I’m not Spanish. I’m trying to explain it can be something other than words as they appear in print like tone or some kind of implication you didn’t necessarily mean.
Well, what if when you said hi I responded in an Irish accent or said "diddly-dee potatoes to you"? If in person, you'd probably see the good-natured look on my face and be fine with it (if you don't have paper-thin skin), but text lacks that nuance. Remember that when you get playful with people.
@TreelonMusk I didn’t even put on an accent or use any stereotypical slang, I just said the words in my normal voice. And even if I did say it with an accent or whatever, her calling me a sexist for it wouldn’t be justified. A normal person would say “Don’t mock me” or something similar (I mean if they lacked humour).
How could you compare the Spanish translation of “Hello, lady” to “Diddly-dee potatoes to you”?
It was more to illustrate that she may have been offended and to get you to think back and see if you could interpret the exchange a different way. It was for your own ponderation. I didn't witness this exchange, nor am I omnipresent. All I have to go on is the words you typed, which are biased with your experience and interpretation of the event. I also thought that this exchange was over text.
Besides that, I wanted to push back about this behavior you're doing where you seem to have your mind already made up about the situation and would rather argue online with Opinion Owner about it rather than talk to this woman and come to an understanding.
At least that's MY interpretation of THIS situation. I may be wrong, but I thought you were asking for help in finding new ways to interpret your situation.
Look man, just go speak to this woman about it and don't debate the shit out of her even if she's super irrational and some type of feminazi. Just try to understand her feelings and share that your feelings were disrupted when all you wanted to do was be friends.
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