It’s still a neutral-to-positive term. You can pack a lot of sadness, bitterness and anger in any term, my friend.
Actually, thinking about it: only my older relatives consistently say “white folks” when they start going on about how wrong white folks did 'em. My generation seems to use “white folks” and “white people” interchangeably or just start cursing. I.e., “those white motherfuckers down on my job…” “that crazy bastard” “that sorry son of a bitch…” etc.
pizzabrat’s claim that “the slur game doesn’t go both ways” is absolutely true. Here’s some NOT used in the sketch or the song “Colored Spade”:
nigras
mud people
black devils
Porch monkeys
Gorillas
Apes
Cotton-picker
Watermelon-eater
Sambo
Rastus
Rufus
Shine
Uncle Remus
Uncle Tom
Mammy
Stud-nigger
Coal
Blackie
Big-nosed
Liver-lipped
Velcro-headed
Swollen-dicked
Monkey-tailed
Fat-assed
For generations, at the very real threat of whippings, lynchings, withheld food or being sold off somewhere, black people in this country weren’t allowed to talk just any ol’ way to white people. Also this society has been trying to actively integrate since the sixties. Whereas racist whites have had 400 years of (mostly) impunity to come up with some really hateful terms. Of course there are more negative names for blacks.
I think you’re interpreting pizzabrat differently from how I was. I was taking him to mean that there are no slurs used by bigoted black people to describe white people, whereas you seem to be saying that it’s rarer in general for black people to use epithets to describe white people (am I understanding you correctly?)
The latter seems plausible to me, but the former does not.
“None”, “hardly any”, what’s the difference? Of course I can’t say for a fact that no black people anywhere use anti-white slurs these days, it’s just that I can’t remember hearing any examples of such.
You also have to remember the history here. Blacks in the US have a long history of oppression and abuse at the hands of whites, even long after their enslavement was ended. Clearly, when a white person uses a racial epithet like “nigger”, it is more hurtful and provocative because of that history, and the negative feelings behind it. When a back person uses a racial epithet like “cracker”, there just isn’t the same sting. It’s meaningless, because there is no point of reference in which any such term can truly be demeaning to most whites. It’s a self-reinforcing imbalance. There will never be as many white slurs as black ones, because they have inherently little impact on their targets.
I’d say “ghetto” is, since it’s almost never used to describe modern folk (in my experience) except to describe black people disparagingly; but I hear “thug” used to describe white people fairly often. Might be because I play Dungeons and Dragons.
Certainly if someone said, “I don’t listen to that ghetto music,” I’d consider that to be a flashing sign of racism; wouldn’t you? More so, in fact, than if someone said, “I don’t listen to that redneck music.” This despite the fact that Johnny Cash makes my playlist a lot more than Public Enemy.
Hmm. That’s kind of interesting.
QED, I definitely agree that the slurs carry different weights. If someone called me a cracker, I’d crack up. My beef was with the idea that there are no anti-white slurs used. On reflection, that’s a pretty trivial beef with a pretty trivial point, so if there’s something more significant to discuss, I’ll happily let it go.
I’ve rarely heard one use the word perjoratively, in anger, or in hatred. I mean, Jeff Foxworthy grew up in Hapeville, GA, on the other side of Atlanta. It’s definitely not widely used in the African-American vernacular, although we’ve heard the word.
Offhand, I can’t think of any contemporary white racial derogatory terms used by blacks. Seriously. Not even “redneck.” There are black men in their late fifties and sixties who use “whitey” “crackers” and “peckerwoods” – esecially if they’ve been to prison – but younger African-Americans have a tendency mostly to just cuss you out and throw “white” in there somewhere. “Motherfucker” is not just for black men anymore.
Here’s “proof”: A nice barometer for young black culture is hip-hop music, right? Check out: I’ve just Googled “hip-hop lyrics” and “redneck” and I get 232,000 hits, mostly white people who rap using “redneck” in a song or song title somewhere. I see Kid Rock… Jeff Foxworthy – Craig Morgan – Gretchen Wilson…
There’s an Ice Cube song called “US” where he uses “redneck” but only after using a litany of black racial descriptors stereotyping blacks.
It’s not used much at all.
(On Preview) I’ve re-evaluated my own use of the word “racism.” Saying, “I don’t listen to that ghetto music” is most likely a classist assessment, and a prejudiced one, rather than racist or bigoted. I say that because there are PLENTY of bourgie black people don’t listen to that ghetto music either.
Interesting–and it really does get into a nasty area where race and class intersect. The last three times I’ve heard a white person use the word “nigger,” they were really using it in a classist sense–and the two of them that I gave a chance to explain themselves defended themselves on classist grounds.
Nevertheless, I’m sure you’ve heard bourgie blackfolk talk about ghetto music, but were they ever referring to klezmer music? Montgomery Gentry? Or were they always referring to the music of poor black people?
When a comment disparages a particular subgroup that’s defined by both race and class, it seems to me that it’s hard to figure out whether it’s racist or classist or both or neither.
(I’m not ignoring the rest of your post; instead, I’m thinking about it.)
Whatchoo think, man? Laaaaast time my cousin took out Dr. Dre’s “The Chronic” and flipped the radio dial to Skee-Lo’s “I Wish I Was A Baller” I almost kicked out the car windshield.
Laaaaast time my cousin took out Dr. Dre’s “The Chronic” and flipped the radio dial to Skee-Lo’s “I Wish I Was A Baller” I almost kicked out the car windshield.
