The "N" Word: What's wrong with the status quo?

Shortly after the Imus incident, my friend immediately called me and yelled, “You nappy-headed ho!” Then quickly added, “We have to claim it like the “N” word!” Never have I laughed so hard. And, coincidentally enough, when we see each other we refer to each other as nappy-headed ho’s even though our hair is cut short. Thank you, Imus. You’ve brought two black, gay friends even closer together.

Yesterday, we were watching Fox News for some news entertainment. The best news entertainment is the O’Reilly Factor and Hannity & Colmes. Indeed, O’Reilly’s fervent conservatism and Hannity’s iamreallyacoolguy attitude is just hilarious. Colmes’ intellect and insight is often attenuated by the fact that he is the most alien-looking, nasal-sounding liberal in the United States. But I digress. Both shows suggested that there is something “wrong” with black music and the “N” word. As usual, Fox News brings on the most uneducated, ebonics-speaking blacks on the show to prove their point. All the while, Hannity and O’Reilly are sitting in the background nodding emphatically as their guests mangle the English language, "You is . . . . " instead of “You are.” Or my favorite "I be . . . " instead of “I am”. When watching this minstrel show on Fox News, I always get this image of a impressionable white girl pulling at her father’s sleeve and asking, “Daddy, why do all the black people talk like that.” The father smiles and replies, “Because they are niggers, honey.”

I am not blind to the fact that recent exposes such as “OMG! Black people don’t snitch!” or “Look at gangsta rap! It’s horrible!” have appeared in the media after the Don Imus incident. Indeed, I am convinced these stories have been rushed to our television screens to assuage the pangs of white guilt over the whole Imus debacle. Because of this press, we even have our black leaders (sigh) talking about burying the “N” word forever. Why? I ask this with seriousness: What is wrong with the status quo?

We can say the “N” word and white people can’t. I don’t care if Eminem or Jennifer Lopez say it in their music as along the meaning isn’t derogatory. After all, music is art, right? I don’t even care if white people refer to themselves as the “N” word or use the word to demonize blacks as long as its not done purposefully and publically to incite hate.

Concerned parents complain that the “N” word is pervasive in black music. Not true. Parents can purchase, just like my mother did for me, albums with the explicit lyrics bleeped out. The “N” word is also bleeped out in radio and on televised music videos on BET & MTV.

The real question, at least in my mind, is why are all of these white kids listening to black music anyway. If the content is so crude, hateful, and mysogenist why are they the primary consumers of rap music? And, more importantly, why aren’t the parents preventing their children from listening to it?

This is a question I always wanted to ask a white person: Is it wrong or hypocritical for me to respond differently to the “N” word depending on whether its a white or black person saying it? If yes, do you think its hypocritical for a gay person to be upset that a non-gay person called them a “fag” if that individual affectionally uses the same word among his gay friends?

  • Honesty

Why? Do you think there is a white answer?

No, not necessarily. I see what you’re getting at. The point I was attempting to drive at is that the “N” word has multiple, distinct meanings. The definition is amorphous; the meaning of the “N” word isn’t hinged on the context which the word is used, rather, it (the definition) is self-evident by who utilizes the word.

Does that make sense?

  • Honesty

You might have as many answers to that question as there are white kids. But the music isn’t “black” anyway. The artist may be African-American or another person of color and the style of music may have originated with black artists, but that doesn’t make the music “black.”

Music is a universal language. Don’t go being a pig about it or I’ll take back my white hymnal and not even let you have the basis for your spirituals. See where such foolishness leads?

I have only your word that “they” are the primary consumers of rap music. But let’s say you’re right. What makes you think that a lot of white rascals shouldn’t like crude, hateful and mysogenist lyrics? If it rebels, it sells. Nothing new there.

Their great-grandparents and grandparents were just a little sssmmmooooother about it. As one person I read put it, “You can’t beat sly smut.” Different parents have different feelings about the kids listening to the music. Some recognize that there is no way to prevent their kids from hearing it. Some try to add a little balance to the stupidity that the lyrics belch out. Some trust their kids not to be total morons.

Again, you’ll get different answers from different white people. I think that it is emotionally healthy just to be in touch with what you feelings are and to own up to them. I can’t tell you what you “should” feel.

But I sure do want to! :cool:

Perhaps “queer” would be a better analogy. Today’s gay people have no problem embracing the term, but to hear it as an abusive epithet gets all my defenses up.

And just like “queer,” “nigger” seems to have different meaning to different generations. I suspect most black people in my generation respond to the word differently than their kids (or grandkids) do.

That’s the key. It depends on the context. However, it’s pretty difficult to be in a situation where black people would put down other black people using that word, while on the other hand, it’s possible that whites would not be if they use the same word.

That said, it irks me when people claim that they are the only ones allowed to use a word, especially that since a good amount of the time they use it around me, they are being either passively or actively aggressive against me (not all the time, depending on context.)

So I would prefer that they not use the word at all in my presense, because it makes me uncomfortable, in a much more active way than one would normally think. It’s associated with using it in a way that is a slur against me. Similal to when whites use it, the few who use it in a “correct” way are more than made up for by those who use it at least partially as an anti-white slur (IME.)

Absolutely not. I’ve argued this before - I started a thread on this topic last year -and it’s not hypocritical, unusual or wrong. As Ludovic said, the identity of the speaker is part of the context in which we judge what a statement means and whether or not we are okay with it.

It seems like a bunch of white people don’t like this when “nigger” is the word in question. I think some of them are irritated at the idea of having their speech restricted, some are afraid of being called racist for using the word in a non-racist way, and some are actual racists.

On the one hand, I totally agree that context is the most important factor in all this.

But there are many things which combine to make up the context, and not all are clear and obvious. Most importantly, it is often difficult or impossible to know the speaker’s true intentions: Is he trying to be honest, funny, rhetorical, sarcastic, or what?

For these reasons, if someone talks to me about the group I’m in, it makes a big difference whether he is a member of that group or not. For example: I wear eyeglasses. If someone calls me “four-eyes”, and he also wears glasses, then my presumption is that he’s being self-deprecating and/or some other kind of funny. But if he does not wear glasses, then I’ll have to stretch a lot farther to come up with some excuse for him.

I call it the “some of my best friends are whatevers” phenomenon.

We prefer the term Undetermined-Americans.

An aside: Eminem does not use the n-word. An ancient track from when he was seventeen surfaced once in which he did, and he’s apologized for it since. Dr. Dre and others do occasionally refer to him as their nigga.

No, not at all. Most people here will say yes, I’m afraid, and you will encounter a great deal of hostility for even suggesting such a horribly “racist” thing. But I believe the issue of language ownership is only charged when the dynamic underlying it is charged, in this case black/white relations, or gay/straight ones. We’re surrounded by countless examples of language it’s only social appropriate for certain people to use at certain times, but it’s invisible, whereas anything that divides white and black people in the US is visible to everyone.

Really interesting answers (great spokesmodels for white folks - I’m smiling as I type this).

My grandmother considered herself “colored” and was highly insulted by people calling her “black” “Turn that crap off”, was her refrain if anyone played the song, “Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud” by James Brown. She used the “N” word affectionately (I think since family and friends were the objects of her bomb throwing) but would have been pissed off to the Nth degree (I think) if a white person used it in her presence. She wouldn’t eat fried chicken or watermelon in front of other races. Ever. (nothing to do with the discussion - just some granny lore) She was hilarious.

I’m very conscious of the terms I use. No one can “gyp me” - I might be “taken”. A rug is “oriental” a person is Asian, “Latino” is better than “Hispanic”. I try to be as sensitive to other cultures as possible, but I’ll bet there’s something I say innocently that’s no longer acceptable to someone.

My answer - the status quo changes.

Are you saying I’m articulate? :mad:

There is the “insider/outsider” rule. You have to look at the context. I don’t mind a female friend saying “Way to go, girl.” If anyone came into the office and said “Can you please help me, girl” I would have a hard time not correcting them.

Yes I am…but in a good, complimentary way.

I once heard the theory that oppressed groups adopt their despective names to somehow reduce the power of that word. That would mean that blacks or gays use “nigger” or “fag” to own the word and strip it from their hate charge. Hate groups will then be forced to choose a new hate term.

Think of it as a reverse euphemism threadmill where what happens is that the oppressors put a negative charge on the PC euphemism and a new one has to be invented.

Doesn’t that seem just a wee bit hypocritical?

If we believe that racism is a bad thing, then accentuating artificial differences between groups is being racist, isn’t it? And if the list of words I must or must not use is determined by my skin color, an artificial difference, wouldn’t that be racism, and not to be encouraged?

Wouldn’t be better in the long run to strive to diminish such artificial differences?

(And to use an absurd example, think of what it would be like if we had a “color button” next to our SDMB user name. Bob23 is allowed to post with word #4, but Jane99 can’t, because she is of a different race? What’s next, whites-only drinking fountains?)

Racism is not “any acknowledgement of differences between the ‘races’”. It is the systemic oppression of one race by another in various culturally entrenched ways. How is your inability to say “nigger” oppressing anyone?

A hypocrite says one thing and does another. Somebody who says “nobody should say nigger!” and calls people niggers, in a friendly or unfriendly manner, is a hypocrite. Having different rules for different people can be wrong, but aren’t automatically bad.

I think this is partially correct. But in my experience, reclaiming a word that has been used to oppress your group has very little to do with how hate groups deal with it.

In the African-American community, for instance, there is a long tradition of the dozens, jonesin’, snaps, yo’ mama jokes, whatever you want to call it. This form of “signifying” has an adaptive purpose: you were going be denigrated and insulted by Whites, so you had to learn how to a) deal with it, and b) find a way to make it less painful. I doubt that slaves or sharecroppers would bust out with “yo mama” to White people directly, but they may have said it under their breath, or in places where the White person couldn’t figure out who said it. Bottom line, you had probably heard a much more insulting term leveled at you by a friend, so it didn’t crush your spirit so much.

A Tribe Called Quest has a song called “Sucka Nigga” that explains how a lot of Black folks use “nigga”:

I’ve even heard people say when they hear it, they think it stands for “Never Ignorant, Getting Goals Accomplished.” Whatever floats your boat, I guess.

There is also an exclusionary nature to the word. If you have to ask, you can’t say it. Part of having an in-group means you also define an out-group.

My suggestion to White folks: leave it alone. Find something else to get riled up about. You don’t sound enlightened trying to justify using the word yourself (why would you want to?) and saying that Black folks should stop using it is somewhat paternalistic. If someone refers to you as a “nigga,” you’re well within your rights to ask them not to call you that. If you interact with Black youth quite a bit I think it’s fine to voice your opposition to the word and it’s fine to ask that kids not use it in your presence, but I would expect that it might be hard for them to stick to it. Especially if the kids are comfortable in that setting.

Now I’ve observed groups of White kids, Asian kids, or Latino kids using “nigga” amongst themselves. I’m not sure how I feel about that. :eek:

I live in a black-majority neighborhood. You can’t go two blocks without hearing someone say something like “You the nigger!” as a compliment.
The result of treating any word as taboo is a religious thing, not racial. Blasphemy is not a concept in the public interest.