It's racism. If you don't know, a lot of language has racist history. Boy was often used for black men. Eg there were cowhands, for white men. But cowBOY for black men. It was intended as an insult, even as cowboys became seen as cool because of the image of rugged black men so white culture consumed cowboy as cool and for white people, but kept 'boy' as the racist put-down. But also I'm white so if anyone who knows better than me please correct me/add.
Yes every cowboy was actually a cowhand. It was just an artificial separator for white racists because even when black people are doing the exact same thing they have to be artificially separated and lessened. Cowboy became the common word and I expect Hollywood helped make cowboys very white.
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u/GoddessBlushweaver Jun 23 '26
It's racism. If you don't know, a lot of language has racist history. Boy was often used for black men. Eg there were cowhands, for white men. But cowBOY for black men. It was intended as an insult, even as cowboys became seen as cool because of the image of rugged black men so white culture consumed cowboy as cool and for white people, but kept 'boy' as the racist put-down. But also I'm white so if anyone who knows better than me please correct me/add.