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J_Taylor comments on 2011 Survey Results - Less Wrong
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I have no idea if this is universal. (Probably not.) However, in my area, using the term "blacks" in certain social circles is not considered proper vocabulary.
I don't have any huge problem with using the term. However, using it may be bad signalling and leaves Lesswrong vulnerable to pattern-matching.
What would you prefer? "Blacks" is the way I've seen it used in medical and psychological journal articles.
Journals use "blacks"? I had no idea it was used in technical writing. In some of my social circles, it just happens to be considered, at best, grandma-talk.
Generally, within these circles, "black people" is used.
However, I have no real preference regarding this matter.
as opposed to black fish.
Seriously? That seems a little cavalier of them.The medical and psychological influence of race isn't all that much to do with the skin color and a lot more to do with genetic population. That makes the term ambiguous to the point of uselessness. Unless "blacks" is assumed to mean, say, just those of African ancestry. In which case they could be writing "African".
What is your area?
Southern United States.
The plural can look weird but as long as it doesn't come after a definite article, it's the standard term and I've never met anyone who was offended by it. The usual politically correct substitute, African-American, is offensive in an international context.
I have never met any black person who was offended by it. I have met some white people who will take you less seriously if you use the term.
However, if it is the standard term then it is the standard term. I certainly would not replace it with African-American.
Moreover, there are plenty of black people in the world who are not African-American.
There's an infamous video from a few years back in which an American interviewer makes this mistake when talking to an Olympic athlete of British nationality and African ancestry. It becomes increasingly clear that the interviewer is merely doing a mental substitution of "African-American" for "black" without actually thinking about what the former term means ...
Come to think of it we could put the emphasis of either of the terms.
I do not use "African-American" to refer to non-Americans.
I even feel weird calling Obama an African-American (though I still do it, because he self-identifies as one). In my mental lexicon it usually specifically refers to descendants of the African slaves taken to the Americas a long time ago, whereas Obama's parents are a White American of English ancestry and a Kenyan who hadn't been to the US until college.
Ironically, Obama is exactly the kind of person to whom that term should refer, if it means anything at all. Descendants of African slaves taken to the Americas a long time ago should have another term, such as "American blacks".
Despite his lack of membership in it, Obama self-identifies with the latter group for obvious political reasons; after all, "children of foreign exchange students" is not an important constituency.
For what it's worth, I'm also from the southern US, and I also have the impression that "blacks" is slightly cringey and "black people" is preferred.
I am glad that my case is not too aberrant.