I've been refining my take after reading some interpretation and explanations and this is final take:

Not every book will or should be for a white audience. It should cater to whoever they want. But the tweet also also seems to assume that every non white person has sufficient knowledge of their own culture to understand everything being written. Of course maybe that kind of person is not the intended audience which is also fine, but it's a bit alienating to be told that you're not entitled to learn about your own culture just because some random :lmayo: might benefit from a free translation

And no, this is not written by some mad white guy who doesn't understand what shawarma means. It's coming from an Asian immigrant who's far removed from his culture with little resources in English to learn about it.

  • BynarsAreOk [none/use name]
    ·
    2 years ago

    I don't know this must be the odd shitty chapo.chat day because I can't for the life of me understand how some people could possibly agree with this shit take.

    I image that not a single fucking second was spent reflecting on the fact that English is the default international language for decades now and so much stuff tends to be only available in English and not any other language. This means most people around the world can easily find themselves in a situation where they know English but not whatever random French or German shit word being used. Learning English by itself is already a privilege,

    This ultimately means putting even more barriers around literacy worldwide for what? Like the OP said to own the crackers I guess. Whatever anecdotes someone may have about their experiences with editors feels really petty behavior and this is punching down not up.

    Even when translations exist you have to deal with the fact very often they are inferior. Also by arguing for translations you already concede the author's intent isn't relevant anymore.

    Do you have a problem with your shitty editor demands? Take it up with them not your readers. English isn't just the language of chuds as much as it sucks to admit it. This is not a hill to die on unless your biggest concern in life was just how many words you can write a day.