The last time "you people" was deployed in a presidential campaign: contempt and class and race

[thesquanderer]

31. I didn't say reporters would keep it secret.

But the press would be the ones to examine them and report to the public. And yes, they'd be made available to the public, but how many citizen voters are interested in personally poring over the Romney returns?

I really think this one is much ado about nothing. "You people" could have referred to the press (since that's who she was talking to at the time, and who would report on them), or more generically, could have referred to everyone asking for the returns (including fellow Republicans). Either way, I don't think it's insulting. In the south, she would have said "you all" (or "y'all&quot but northerners lack that sometimes useful construction.

"You people" is not an artful phrase because it does have a particular history in the context of African Americans, with the offense really being that the people being spoken to are all being stereotypically lumped together and being addressed as a group as if they were all the same and interchangeable; but in this case, the people she are lumping together ARE the same in their desire to see the tax returns. It's an appropriate use of the phrase.

This reminds me of when people get upset when someone uses the word "niggardly." There's nothing really wrong with it, but it raises hackles because of an association.