"Chinese" is not an actual language...

[x_xmirror-illusions]

i understand. but it's not really their fault. & i can't call them
ignorant cause they just don't know. what i do is i just nicely
tell them there is no such language as Chinese and off
they go. see? it's all good. =] it's just like how we might think
ohh...you speak Filipino? Filipino just the same is not the
language but describing the race-->and just like us they have a
main dialect [Tagalog]  

[Shikaeii]

'Chinese' is a general term that I use to describe people from China, and 'Chinese languages'.

I only use it when I don't know what language the Chinese person speaks.  

[Eemish]

You COULD just ask which 'Chinese language' they speak...  

[Pixel Chef]

Chinese official language is Mandarin.
In my opinion Chinese is a general term that describes all dialect. It's not a big deal for me if they ask me if I can speak Chinese. I'll just tell them what kind of dialect I speak.

It's like they ask me if I like rock music. I just tell them what type of rock music I like.  

[HotLaMon38]

[pain]TING

I personally don't see a problem with people referring to the language as "Chinese". I refer to it as "Chinese" myself and I know very well that there is a difference between Mandarin and Cantonese. You can't expect everyone you meet to be able distinguish between all the different dialects we have or to know about them nor can you think of everyone who call it "Chinese" as ignorant since its not their culture and they really aren't obliged to know anything about it. Chinese has just become a general term that a good amount of people use when referring to the language. But that's just my opinion.

 

[J ii N G Y u L i]

This is all i gotta say.
Chinese is not a language it is just our Ethnicity/Race. Chinese people either speak mandarin/cantonese/some other dialect but we are still considered Chinese.

Yea i get the same questions too but i just mainly ignore it stare
but i must say its cool that we got different dialets <3