Why is grape juice offending to black people?

Answer 1

Tightly knit groups have always had their own words for things for ease of communication among the group or sometimes even for "call back humor" in reference to a shared funny event in the past or for various other reasons. These figures of speech or colloquialisms are part of what form the group's culture and help bind the group together. Other such cultural components belonging to groups can be their traditional stories, clothing, music, rituals, cuisine, dance, art, industry, etc. Groups can be as small as a family or as large as an ethnic group such as Latinos, African-Americans, or Italian-Americans, or they can be subgroups within a larger group, such as Sicilian Italian-Americans, or financially depressed socioeconomic groups within larger groups.

An example of a family group's way of calling something a different name than usual is my family's use of the word "skillet" to mean "spaghetti". Someone outside the family will tilt their head, and say, "Huh?". The family members, who understand completely, giggle when they are reminded that only they understand what was meant, because it is a "comedy call back" to the time at a large family gathering when one of the youngsters at the "kids' table" when seeing the Turkey and vegetables put on the table for the meal said, "Can't we just have skillet?" This caught the attention of everyone and tickled funny bones, especially as the young working mother squirmed as she had to admit to all the grandmothers and aunts and to explain that just about the only thing she ever cooked at home from "almost scratch" was spaghetti, and she made it in the nonreactive skillet that was otherwise almost never seen. So our little boy had confused the name of the skillet with the food. From then on our family fell into the habit of sometimes, especially during later family gatherings, calling spaghetti "skillet" to get a laugh, and then it just stuck.

An example of a geographical group's "inside" way of talking about something is when someone in the American South calls a carbonated drink of any kind "Coke", while someone in the Midwest calls the same "Pop", and often those in the North East and California say, "Soda". After years of those local differences in speech, eventually which word people used could be interpreted by some as an indication of the origins of the person, and a generalization might have resulted leading someone to guess that the speaker was from that certain region of the US.

So, calling Grape Juice "Grape Drink" is just the way some people in some groups in some places have become used to speaking. It has been theorized that it comes originally from the speech of some members of lower economic groups who were more used to drinking drink mixes like Kool-Aid or similar drink mixes (which really contain no juice) instead of real juice due to the cost differences and their economic pressures. To call it a drink instead of juice is a more correct description anyway. With time, it became a term used to label any drink that looks like that, including grape juice, as "grape drink" by some people in some locations and groups.

In proper formal reference, grape drink and grape juice are two different things. Juice implies that it is actually made from the juice of grapes. Grape drink is more commonly thought of as a purple beverage whose flavor resembles "grape" to an extent but is not actually made from grapes. It is significantly cheaper than real juice.

Using grape drink as a "generic" term for any purple drink, is the same as calling all tissues "Kleenex", all soft drinks "Pop", all lip balms "Chapstick", or all sweet breakfast fried dough goodies Donuts.

However, there are bigoted people, who generalize and use some group differences (especially ethnic group differences), including differences in speech, to promote racism or other ethnically slurred rhetoric and beliefs. For that reason, when you use this term, it is important to be sure that your use, if you use it at all, is not interpreted as a similar racial affront.

Some people might consider just the asking of this question to be a generalization and a bigoted act. I tend to believe that the asking of these types of questions in an inoffensive way by a person, who is genuinely seeking to understand and improve their education on a particular ethnic group culture, and even to understand the misuse by racist bigots in some discussions of the group's differences, or by others who would malign the group, is appropriate and a means to understand and appreciate the diversity of various cultures and the origins of their unique figures of speech. It can also help to recognize which things that you may hear said are being used for bigoted purposes by some people. Then you can avoid offending your friends in that particular group by accidental use of offensive language.

But, should you ever choose to call spaghetti "skillet", my family will take no offense, and appreciate that you have joined us in the family joke. ---- More: In the illegal drug culture and/or rap music culture, grape drink, grape drank, purple drink, purple, drank, lean and various other combinations of these and similar words such as the word juice are used, especially in the US South, to refer to drinks that contain some or all of the following with often variations of other ingredients added...prescription cough medicines, Kool Aid, Sprite, Vodka, purple Jolly Ranchers, grape juice, marijuana, a special specific potent strain of marijuana, sugar, water and the kitchen sink. The marijuana usually is used "on the side", not added to the drink. It is a dangerous combination of ingredients.

Answer 2

It's not. Not to any sensible human being anyway.