Same here, on both counts.
I’ve been watching episode recently of Magnum PI. In the episode “Did you see the Sunrise?” a character refers to TC in that fashion. But he’s a (very) bad guy.
I actually did a laugh at loud at that. You are awesome, Captain Amazing! (This is one of the few time I really wish this forum had a star or plus one feature)
In the last century or so, I think. And probably at different times in different places.
Not as recently as “retarded” which I did not learn as an offensive word originally, while I learned “nigger” as an offensive word to begin with. (I was born in the 1970’s.)
The switch from being associated with offensive persons to being obscene is interesting. As is the fact that it’s colloquially used by some youth today, for their friends–and even by white youth for each other–in a way very different than the nasty, nasty curse word the media would teach you it is.
I grew up in San Francisco in the 1960s and my grandmother (born in 1885 in SF) did an inny meenie miney moe with my brother and I using the “n” word. I knew it was wrong, and my parents overheard and spoke to her out of our earshot about it, and we were also so informed. My mother heard the word in the 1930s growing up, and it wasn’t until she was a teen that she knew it was wrong. Sometime in the 1940s.
Good Times as well.
Willona says it to Bookman.
Born in '74 in a suburb of Chicago, white female, lower middle class.
I heard the word, in real life and in movies, but knew it wasn’t a good word. It was allowable for black people, but not white people, to use the word. (There were no other recognized minorities in my world growing up. I honestly didn’t know until adulthood that Thai, Indian and Hispanic people don’t always identify as White.)
But adults would not stoop to this “n-word” nonsense. They would say, “Do you remember when Fred Sanford said ‘nigger’?”
“The n-word” just pisses me right off. It’s not Lord Voldemort. Only children should refer to obscenities by their initials.
Born 1959 outside of Chicago and trying to remember if I ever heard it … certainly not commonly. Dad was a bit racist and could have, but I don’t think he did … he preferred the Yiddish derogatory term instead. Pretty sure we did “tiger by the toe”… some vague recollection of “nigger pile” but no connection to any meaning of the word, wouldn’t have been able to state what it meant other than a bunch of kids piling up on top of each other for no good reason. If told its meaning none of my group would have continued to use it but we were what 6 or 7 and had no context in our segregated middle class lives.
“Retarded” didn’t become generically offensive in our cohort until later, probably adulthood.
Would have guessed it was in both shows on the bar bet but not have bet very much.
Born Chicago '75, SW side. “Nigger” was not unusual growing up. The version of “eenie meenie miene moe” I remember is that version. I remember “nigger pile,” as well, also “niggerball” for a more physical, less-foul-calling version of basketball. That sort of stuff…
It has been used in network comedies as recently as the early 1990s - somebody wrote it on Dwayne’s car in a later episode of A Different World.
And on Family Matters, where someone wrote it on Laura’s locker.
The unacceptable version of “Einie Meenie Minie Moe” is said on an episode of 1960s era Doctor Who. The Celestial Toymaker, to be exact, an episode which is already a haven for good taste, as the villain is a western white guy playing Chinese.
Slightly off tangent, I was shocked to find out how late blackface (or brown face, I guess) showed up on American Television - I was watching a bootleg of an obscure show, “Bring 'em Back Alive” from 1982, staring Bruce Boxleitner. One character, meant to be from India, was a white English actor straight up painted to have dark brown skin. This was a regular, reoccurring character. He was also a sniveling, thieving coward with an over the top accent, just to make things that much worse. I know shows like Jeeves and Wooster showed blackface into the 90s, but at least that was in historical context. I have no idea what the creators of “Bring em Back Alive” were thinking.
Back when Django Unchained was in theaters, I rented Jackie Brown and it had extra dvd features on it, including a full 1/2 Ebert and Roper episode dedicated to Tarantino (so maybe mid-late '90s). In it they showed a clip of Pulp fiction from the foot massage-Tony Rockyhorror sequence where they bleeped out the work fuck, but not the word nigger. It’s jarring to hear ‘that’s no reason to throw a nigger out of a mother bleeping window, bleeping up the way a nigger talks, that shit ain’t right.’ Just weird.
Totally agree. Of course it’s an offensive word, but so what? Lots of words are offensive. And no one has a constitutional right to go thru life without ever being offended. The number one kind of protected speech is always going to be so-called ‘hate speech’. Because it’s still just speech!
And for me, the whole ‘it’s ok for black people’ is meaningless now. Worse than meaningless, it’s a ridiculous hypocrisy. We understood the difference back in the day, but it was still not ok when black people said it. It was at the very least like saying the word ain’t, it immediately labeled you as ignorant and uneducated (and rightfully so).
I saw that episode of Sanford & Son as a kid when it originally aired. It caused absolutely no controversy, and in its context it was probably the funniest bit in the whole series. “There’s enough niggers in here to make a Tarzan movie!”
H.A. I doubt you do not actually comprehend the difference between these circumstances:
a) In a discussion such as this thread: “‘Nigger’ has been said on network television on several sitcoms that had heavy Black audience demographics.”
b) Young Black man to young Black man in a private friendly social situation: “Hey, nigger!”
c) White middle class woman to her friend: “What’s up with all the niggers moving into our neighborhood lately?”
d) White store owner to young Black man: “Nigger, get out of my store!”
Some words are more offensive than others and some words are offensive in one context and not in another. Some words have become more offensive over time. There is using a word to describe its use and there is using a word as a means of affection and using the same word as means of expressing contempt or hate. The fact that the context matters is just how language works. Seriously, you do understand that, don’t you?
It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia has a story for you.
I really want to know what Conan said at the end of the clip after “No, no, no.” How do you explain away blackface?
Born in 1974, Vancouver, WA.
Around age six we were in an International House of Pancakes that had the flags of the world on the wall. My mom was absolutely mortified when I mispronounced the name of Niger.
That said, I definitely grew up with casual use of the word. My grandfather referred to Brazil nuts as “nigger toes.” And I recall “nigger knocking” when I was a kid (same 5-6 age group). But I don’t recall it actually being ever used in reference to a person and my memory is that I wasn’t really aware of what the word meant in that way but quickly learned I wasn’t supposed to say it.
During the filming of Blazing Saddles, Burton Gilliam (the actor who played Lyle) just could NOT bring himself to call the black actors in the film “Niggers” as scripted. Cleavon Little had to sit down with him and explain to him that Sure, he’d go to town on him if Gilliam called him a nigger out on the street or in casual conversation, but for the scripted scenes in the movie, it was alright and nobody would take offense. It still took Gilliam a while to get it out.
But I’m pretty sure that since the 70s, it’s only used on screen (TV and/or film) by white characters if the character is being portrayed as a racist scum type of person.
I submit that it’s okay if used in the proper historical context; I strongly disagree with the idea of “sanitizing” books like Huckleberry Finn. But then again, I’d be hard pressed to come up with any other examples where it would be okay.
Why do you force people to click the link to find out that William Shatner says the words “retarded child” in old Twilight Zone episode? It’s acceptable (preferred?) to give some context to the link so people can choose if they want to click on it.
I too was born in 1962; and I grew up hearing it all the time; I knew it was a bad word; but not to the extent it is today.
I think the ONLY version I heard as a kid had the “N” word in it. While we’re on the subject of kids rhymes; we also used to sing a song “Danial Boone was a man, yes a big maaaaan! But the bear was bigger, so he ran like a … up a tree.” Anyone else ever heard that?
I too would have bet they never said it on Sanford and Son, I watched the episodes many times as a child/teen and it just didn’t register.