That was an education.

We've recently got a group of Eastern European students starting their degree in my department, and the little cultural things are sort of endearing.

Trying to be a good guy I got everybody together for drinks.  They had all sorts of questions.  For the Russian and the Ukrainian girls it was more on the lines of, "Why did Fulbright stick me here?"

It's actually a great school as far as Eastern European studies.  We've got the #2 center for the area in the United States, which is surprising, because it's not a big school.

So I got them into the local German style rathskeller and we're throwing down liter steins. Somehow the conversation steers to this thing about stereotypes, and I thinking about how to explain what a gold digger is, and the stereotype about Slavic women.  

Both of the new students, super nice.  Intelligent.  The Russian used to be a correspondent for Ria Novosti in the US.

So about this time, one of the new American has a bout of what I'll call racist Tourette's dropping the word which shall not be repeated like 6 times in a row, loud, in a bar. So I'm thinking to myself, should I even try to explain to the new foreign students what was just said, and why it's bad.  Before I can even get anything out but, "Dude, not ok." This jerkoff starts in with the steroetypes about black folks in America.

Remember how I said some cultural things are endearing?  This wasn't so much. So I'm still wondering to myself.

When you are with people from another culture that may not fully understand what's being said when someone has a bout of racist Tourette's how much should you try to explain?

Is it better to understand the horrible stuff being said?  Or is ignorance bliss in this case?

And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg