May 13, 2013: A thread was begun about the new Fox show Almost Human. One nonny writes, “Let me guess how the character relationships will play out,” and their predictions include the following: “ATWG [Any Two White Guys] are Kennex and Paul who have lots of antagonistic UST…”

Another nonny points out that Michael Irby, who plays Richard Paul, isn't white (his father is African American and his mother is Mexican American). The anon they responded to comes back with this:

Okay, I obviously should've said Any Two White(r Looking) Guys. To me, Irby looks a lot whiter than Ealy, this based on a quick pic googling before I made the original comment. I don't remember seeing them anywhere else so IDK how clear it is that Irby isn't white when he's actually on screen.

My original point still stands.

After getting flamed, that nonny asserts that Irby looks southern European, which in their European country is considered white. And adds, “This seems to be one of those cases where everyone should think like an American.” The immediate reply: “Considering you're talking about an American actor on an American-produced show, perhaps you should consider it, yeah.”

Nonny continued to backpedal in this vein:

I didn't try to start a wank or continue it, I was trying to explain why I thought what I thought. Clearly my English isn't good enough and I don't know how I should've replied so that people wouldn't have jumped to “clearly you're a horrible racist!” assumptions. It honestly didn't occur to me that I should think these characters' races in America terms. I'll keep that in mind in the future.

Another commenter: “That is kind of hilarious, someone giving sarcastic 'ugh, Americans' implications while doing the exact thing that causes most of those 'ugh, Americans' feelings in the first place.”

The European nonny's apology led to an extended ethnicity discussion:

“Is he even white by European standards, though? Do Europeans really not consider some of mixed Mexican and African background a different ethnicity than white? I find it hard to believe that 'I can always tell by looking (regardless of actual ethnic background or self-identification)' is the absolute standard for race identity in all of Europe.”

In the next thread down, European Nonny is flamed thusly: “I like how you've decided he's not black enough to count as a POC for shipping purposes, so it's okay to say any pairing with him is a “ATWG pairing”. (And also, I google imaged him too, and you're really blind.)” When EN repeats what they said in the previous thread, the anon they responded to comes back with, //"You're more full of shit than a port-a-potty in a construction site,"// and shortly thereafter explains why:

“Because all of your furious scrambling around to justify and explain invalidating his racial identity doesn't change that you don't consider him POC enough. All the backpedaling in the world doesn't change that he isn't non-white enough for you, confirmed by your immediate dismissal and doubling down when confronted.

“Tossing out claims of oh well I wasn't thinking of it in American terms because reasons is even stupider because he's American, in an American show. Honestly you're coming off as completely insincere and still dismissive.”

But not everyone agrees:

“Perhaps to you. To a random flatmemer who's seen this blow up over the past two pages, the anon you're going all Shame! Shame! at has apologized, explained enough for a reader to know that it was a non-malign mistake, and been reasonable and polite. You, on the other hand, have started to come off like a tumblr SJW from hell.”

An insightful comment from a DA:

“Here is me being a gigantic hypocrite because I just posted that I wanted to let this drop. I believe the OP is sorry and I don't want to keep rubbing salt in the wound.

“But here's the thing that utterly frustrates me and has on occasion upset me when the meme talks about race, racism, US centrism and even the concept of whiteness, we don't ever seem to learn from the conversations.

“…There is a lot of loaded history there, it's a painful topic and the anon accidentally stepped into it. But the thing that made me angry was that we almost immediately went to the coutnry wank place. The mistake was understandable, the defensiveness was understandable, but the person almost immediately made a crack about not being American. And honestly how am I supposed to read that as something other than an attempt to divert attention away from their mistake and onto the fact that meme is being US centric and make the countrywank happen instead. And here you are stepping right into the role of their defender.”