CHINESE WHISPERS: Fun game or racist term?

Have you ever played the game called Chinese whispers? In case you haven't, let The English Nut tell you all about it.

Episode #70 Title: Chinese whispers: A fun game with a bad name?

You think of a phrase and whisper it to a friend, who then whispers it to another friend, and so on, till the whisper reaches the last person in the group. That person says aloud what he or she heard. Then you reveal what you had originally whispered. When you compare the ‘input’ and ‘output’, you see that the chain of misheard whispers has led to a hilarious distortion of the original sentence.

Not everyone finds Chinese whispers funny though. Many Chinese certainly do not. It is not that they have an issue with the game per se, but its name sounds like a racial slur to them. As if distortion or confusion—the crux of the game—is an inherently Chinese trait.

Historians believe that the use of ‘Chinese’ to denote confusion or incomprehensibility originated in Westerners not being able to understand the Chinese language or culture at the time of their first contact in the 17th century.

The meaning of Chinese whispers goes beyond the game. It applies to the process by which facts turn into rumours or gossip or merely get garbled in retelling as they pass from one person to another.

A famous example of this is from World War I: An urgent message was sent from the frontline: ‘Send reinforcements, the Battalion is going to advance.’ It got relayed from one field telephone operator to another and eventually reached headquarters as ‘Send Three and Fourpence, the Battalion is going to a dance’.

The phrase Chinese whispers took on an ominous dimension in the pandemic. While experts believe that the virus jumped from bats to humans in a wet market in Wuhan, China, there were rumours about the virus being manufactured in a Chinese laboratory and deliberately spread around the planet as a part of China’s plans for global dominance. Unfortunately, these whispers led to verbal and physical violence against innocent Chinese immigrants and ‘Chinese-looking’ people around the world.

So, should one use terms that seem to suggest stereotypes for a nationality or race? Or should one use more neutral terms—such as ‘telephone’—the American name for the game of Chinese whispers?

As legendary musician Bob Dylan said, ‘The ants are my friends, they’re blowin’ in the wind.’

Oh, wait! Was that what he really said? Or is this another example of, um, telephone?

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[manandhiman]

Oh! Seems interesting. Waiting Curiously!

[petermuller]

This is a very confused video of a very confused mind.

[LouiesLog]

I always imagined it was becuase of the communision and friends / family always gossiping telling on their companions

[beagledebby]

this was a common game for kids back in my childhood days. in German it's called Stille Post (=silent mail). not sure if kindergarten kids nowadays still play it.
excuse my absence but I'm bugged by all the Covid stuff that's in the news every day. it's just way too much and I don't wanna waste more time with this topic than essential. hope you're well, greetings from Germany to Mumbai!