I wonder if its racist...or what...but

Okay so there is this fight? argument? discussion? in Tumblr. Watch the video until point 3:59 when Howie made a comment about Tiffany's English, saying 'your English is very good'. So Fany replied 'I was born in America'. Somebody thougt that Howie was being offensive by responding to that with 'your-english-is-very-good' instead of just saying 'oh i see...' or anything acknowledging the fact that Fany's English is good because she was born and raised in America.

I personally thought that the response was milddddly offensive because I don't understand what he was trying to prove.

One person argued that its normal that people don't associate race and language. Language is acquired, right? So it is surprising for people from South Korea or any other countries that do not use English as a second language to be speaking that good English. Heck. Even I sometimes get that comments when I was in Auckland. Some of them seem to be surprised that people from Malaysia to have a good command of English. Some inquired if I have spent my time in other English speaking country because they didn't know how English in Malaysia is like. So you could pass off Howie's reaction to plain ignorance.

It is only natural to be complimented when you are obviously not a native speaker of a certain language but you have a good grasp of the language used in the place. In retrospective, that happened to me all the time when i speak Korean to a Korean. Their eyes always go the size of a saucer when I did, and they seem to be extremely pleased and surprised that I speak their language. They ask me if i have been living in Korea, and get even more surprised when i say i have never been there. It is all normal reaction.

But I don't get why would he respond to her statement by slowing down his speech and repeating the same thing. Maybe he was trying to make a joke? IDK. Maybe he was. I think he shouldn't have. If he was trying to be funny, I think it came out as slightly racist.

So...tell me what you think?