U.S. Army Deletes 'Chinks In Armor' Tweet
- 9 years ago
While posting about armor, the U.S. Army used the term "chinks" to describe faults within the suit, causing outrage amongst Twitter users.
In this day and age, anything shared online that's deemed politically incorrect can receive widespread backlash.
The United States Army experienced just that after tweeting a photo of a uniformed soldier along with the caption, "Chinks in special ops' digital and physical armor pose challenges, experts say."
They were referencing vulnerabilities within the armor, but to many of the Army's hundreds of thousands of followers, they were being racially offensive.
A chink is defined as a weak spot or a fissure, and has been in use for hundreds of years. It's also used as a derogatory slur meant for those of Chinese descent.
While the Army meant no harm in their use of it, the damage was done. One Twitter user said, "Um, excuse me, experts. We no longer refer to foreign people in such derogatory terms,"
Another wrote, "Today, I am truly saddene
In this day and age, anything shared online that's deemed politically incorrect can receive widespread backlash.
The United States Army experienced just that after tweeting a photo of a uniformed soldier along with the caption, "Chinks in special ops' digital and physical armor pose challenges, experts say."
They were referencing vulnerabilities within the armor, but to many of the Army's hundreds of thousands of followers, they were being racially offensive.
A chink is defined as a weak spot or a fissure, and has been in use for hundreds of years. It's also used as a derogatory slur meant for those of Chinese descent.
While the Army meant no harm in their use of it, the damage was done. One Twitter user said, "Um, excuse me, experts. We no longer refer to foreign people in such derogatory terms,"
Another wrote, "Today, I am truly saddene