Cass' Haunt

I'm having trouble writing a more constructive post so have instead a linguistic deconstruction of an incredibly stupid racist 'joke'. (It's not even really a joke. The punchline is "Haha Chinese restaurant owners can't speak Dutch very well".)

So. The situation is that you'll be discussing Chinese restaurants and some wholly original person will jump up and shout "SAMBAL BIJ?!" ("hot sauce with?") and everyone will laugh* because haha, those crazy Chinese people and their inability to speak Dutch, right?

Watch me magically fix this quote into perfect Dutch now: "Sambal erbij?" ("[do you want] hot sauce with that?"), by simply adding a tiny simple little element OH HEY WAIT. I mean, let me explain how "er"** is one of Dutch's strangest features and probably one of the most difficult to come to master as an  L2 speaker and that mistakes like this one are probably common and in no way restricted to any singular group of language learning.

And here's the final thing: "sambal bij?" is an easily intelligible sentence. There's no misunderstanding. The entire extent of the thing is "lol stupid foreigners can't get this stupidly complicated particle right; let's mock them! :D"

It's so full of fail and stupid it actually makes me want to punch things when hearing it. Especially from people who know something about Dutch linguistics and should at least know better from theory.

* My family is strangely fond of this one, despite being part Chinese. The fail can be strong with my family, understand.
** Ok, maybe I lied a bit about explaining. "Er" is a particle with several functions and in this case, it's acting as a reference back to whatever the hell you've ordered that you might want hot sauce with.

I guess I should've put this in the post I wrote last night, as it's also related to language and this is in a commercial from the government. I'm sorry, but it was three AM by the time I wrote that. This is one of a series of commercial from the national government (I've looked around on the site and it seemed like there was at least one more but the videos won't play for me -- nm, I found the others) which are meant to highlight the need for L2-speakers to have enough of a grasp on the language to get by in daily life, but mostly manage to show an obstacle no L2-speaker can avoid themselves: the asshole native speaker who doesn't in any way attempt to make themselves clearer.

Asshole: So you want to work at the hospital again, mister Youssuf? As a nurse¹ or as a doctor?
Mr. Youssuf: I² one brother³ one two sister⁴ but [can't make this out] I want to work⁵ in hospital.
Asshole: Yes, I know, but as a nurse⁶ or as a doctor?
Mr. Youssuf: [can't make this out again] My brother not a doctor, my brother is a cook. He work. I want work⁷ as well!
Stupid Commercial Narrator: It's hard to explain what kind of work you want when you don't speak the language!

I think my little army of footnotes makes it clear I don't this is any kind of realistic portayal of someone with only a basic grasp of the language (and that Asshole is, in fact, an asshole). It should be possible, dear government, to make the point you want to make without resorting to a caricature of a second language learner.

¹ For an extra layer of fail... I noticed when translating that I wasn't even sure if the word they use ("broeder" lit. brother but in this case nurse) referred to a nurse or a paramedic, so I asked my brother, who didn't immediately know either. We're native speakers. You go, government! I should add that broeder isn't even the preferred term for nurse, which is the much more gender neutral "verpleger" (caretaker).
² He uses the informal form of this pronoun, ikke instead of ik, which as far as I can recall I've never heard an L2-speaker use in this way, because it's used by kids and in extremely informal contexts (because it reads a bit childishly).
³ Using the full form "broeder" instead of the reduced form "broer" is as ridiculously formal as "ikke" is informal.
⁴ Here we do get the reduced form "zus"...
⁵ My doubts that beginning L2-speakers would get both the modals and the word order right to this degree given Mr. Youssuf's fictional (lack of) proficiency, let me show you them!
⁶ Despite both the nonstandardness of this word for nurse and the obvious misunderstanding (which are probably linked, at that), Asshole keeps using "broeder" and doesn't even bother to clarify.
⁷ Not sure if this is supposed to be a noun or a verb. If it's a noun, it's another perfectly formed clause which seems out of place considering the scripted mess the rest of his Dutch is. If it's a verb, the mistake makes no damn sense even considering the stupidity with regard to the rules of Dutch the makers of this thing have already shown.

I just listened to another one. This one is a kid's school mentor mentioning his trouble in Math class to the kid's mother, who first confuses the "concern" ("care", in Dutch) with "caretaking" and his trouble to follow Maths ("to come with"), with a schooltrip. No transcript this time, and no Asshole either, but again "hilarious" but IMO completely unrealistic misunderstandings crop up between the teacher and the mother.

So. I just wanted to draw attention to the fact that linguistically speaking, these commercials make no sense at all.

I don't get it. Don't they even want to try to get into the CL (not that there's anything there for us, but it's the effort thought that should count). Or even want to maintain their position in the top 3? (Oh hai H'veen, fancy seeing you on one point behind us!)

Feh.

ADO Angstgegner. -.-