This was my thought as well. I notice that basically ALL of British media refers to very obviously Arab people as "Asian" to deflect from how all their grooming gangs are essentially a singular ethnicity. When I hear "Asian food" I do not think of Shawarma.
As far as I know, that's not actually a deflection - in britain, asian does mean middle east, etc. Instead using oriental (or something, not sure) for people from china, japan, and so on.
This was my thought as well. I notice that basically ALL of British media refers to very obviously Arab people as "Asian" to deflect from how all their grooming gangs are essentially a singular ethnicity. When I hear "Asian food" I do not think of Shawarma.
As far as I know, that's not actually a deflection - in britain, asian does mean middle east, etc. Instead using oriental (or something, not sure) for people from china, japan, and so on.
And yet those terms are backward. the Orient in the UK was the Ottomans until the Blair-ification of British Society into Bongistan.
Now "The Orient" in the UK is the entire Orient ... in the UK.