This is from an ad by Carrefour promoting “Ramadan specials”: like peanuts. Or as some would say in Arabic: Fustuq Abeed (Slaves’ Peanuts), packed by Blue Sea.
What is life without some residual Arab racism?
This is a bit crazy. I don’t remember peanuts being called “slaves’ peanuts”. I mean, there is Fustuq which is peanuts and Fustuq Halabi (Aleppo Peanuts) meaning pistachios. Notice the English translation “Abeed Nuts”!
While we’re at it, why not also promote “Ras el Abed” (Head of the Slave)..
In Germany, these are now called Choco-kiss. The older generations called them Moor’s Heads. We still call them Slaves Heads.
Have a sweet Ramadan!
Comments
9 responses to “Wanna have some Slaves’ Nuts this Ramadan?”
it’s Carrefour…so really the french are too blame
racist bastards!
this is not racism. translating abeed as “slaves” is not a good choice.
the word abed is so used in our cultural on every body and everything (e.g. abdallah, abeed-allah, abed-lat, the word “I worship” is “abed” you can’t just translate i t as slave. it also means a name for african people (even though keep in mind mqany salaves were white)
it’s very common in Syria and Lebanon to call this kind of nuts like this.. As i understood, because they were imported from Senegal and west Africa, and that connects with the Senegaly troops in these land that were representing the French colonization..
Arrabi,
It’s not that easy my friend. Just because we have the concept of Abdullah (Servant/Worshipper of God) doesn’t make the use of the word Abeed to describe the nuts OK. It is indeed residual racism in Arab culture. The fact that many people easily describe colored people as ‘abeed’, even if innocently, shows you that there is a problem.
Let’s not get started on Arab anti indian and chinese racism. That is very prevalent too.
Arrabi,
I don’t see how you can make a comparison between the name Abdullah (slave of Allah) and “slave” nuts. We are all slaves/servants of Allah, so it makes sense that Abed/Abd appears in a typical name (Abdullah, Abdul-Rahman, etc.). When Arabs call Africans “slaves” (abeed), this is NOT okay, and it is not the proper Arabic term for people from Africa. To the contrary, it is very offensive, and so is the packaging on this product.
Isn’t it ‘fool soudani’?
maybe soudani = black = 3abed
how sad !
yeah i agree with Nas… it’s better to just pin it on the French… the country everyone loves to hate.
I know them as ‘fosto2 sudany’, which I think is a funny name anyway (its probably imported from sudan and other african countries as somne noted). the name ‘fosto2 abeed’ annoys me bcuz they mean sudany = slave = racism against blacks. I guess ppl in certain parts of the ME are used to the name and dont think much about the literal meaning of it.
on the other hand, ras il abed is not pronounced ras il abeed (head of slave), its ‘abed’ which was probably the name of some guy who sold them…
when are pple going to learn that when we r all of the same blood no one is greater than the other …….. only uncivilised pple think of racism in everything they do