I just finished watching the Jeffersons episode on TV. No way could that kind of show be on TV today.
George is running around calling black people Uncle Toms and white people Honkeys. There was probably at least 5 “niggers” thrown in there as well.
Then an old black man starts telling him how it is. He tellls him the history of the man called Uncle Tom and what a great man he was, and then tells George that he would never call him an uncle Tom.
Then Lionel gets mouthy with the old man insisting on being called “black” instead of Negro. The old man said that for 300 years they tried to quit being called “nigger” to be called “colored”. Then for 25 years he waited to be called a “negro”, so Lionel would have to wait on him for the “black” label.
I thought that particularly novel because today the term “African American” is preferred instead of black.
My point is, that they actually bleep the word “nigger” on regular TV today. You can say bitch, ass, piss, fart, and others but the “n word” is bad.
I was a baby in the 70s, but after watching this episode, I can’t help but feel that we have regressed as a society. It seems that we were at a point where we were starting to have a frank discussion about our racial interactions, but since then these topics have become taboo.
Was there an intermediate period I missed where it was decided that such things should no longer be talked about? I think it is sad that things have gone back to not being a topic of conversation.