When I was young, 'Negro' had replaced 'colored', which came to be associated with segregation in the South. However, 'colored' was much preferred to the word it replaced, 'n****r', which today can only be referred to obliquely, and not printed out directly.

Not complying with their wishes may indicate that the speaker is too old to change, as in Reagan's Q&A with school children, in which he used the already outmoded 'Negro' in one of his answers. I refer all these questions of terminology to what George Carlin said on the subject, basically that words are not the danger, but the thought and meaning behind them that they are intended to convey. It seems any designation of a less favored class of people takes on a derogatory air after a couple decades of use, as children grow up hearing themselves referred to as that class and discriminated against because of it. They naively think that by changing from n****r to colored to Negro to black to Afro-American to African-American, it will turn the page on discrimination and the situation will improve.

But getting people to change their speech patterns, such as from 'oriental' to 'Asian-American', is only a cosmetic fix on the underlying problem of xenophobia. If people are taught to celebrate diversity instead of fear it, then it really doesn't matter what you call some ethnic group because that difference is not a detriment, but an asset. The height of xenophobia is when you can take the word that people use in their own language when talking about themselves, like 'gook' or 'polack' and make it an ethnic slur in your own language.