There’s a running joke that anyone accused of being racist will say “I have black friends!” Even though it’s a total cliché, and sounds SO desperate. But it looks like people are going to keep using that line, because according to a new study, it WORKS.
They got 450 people, and showed them a white guy’s Facebook profile where he made a joke about Asians. On some of the profiles, the joke started with “Some of my best friends are Asian, but,”. But some profiles left that line out.
And both whites and Asians thought the guy was LESS racist when he used the “Some of my best friends are Asian” line.
In other words, if you point out that you have friends who are a different race, right before you make a joke ABOUT that race, people will cut you some slack.
But there’s a catch, everyone still thought the people in the profiles were SOMEWHAT racist. So take it easy at the next happy hour, Cletus.
