WEBVTT - That's Racist pt. 2: The Worst Word 0:00:01.400 --> 0:00:07.720 Uh are you're waiting on reparations? You're listening to Waiting 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:11.559 on reparations a production of I Heart Radio. All I 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:14.560 hear is nigga. This nigga that I'm telling everybody at 0:00:14.600 --> 0:00:17.079 the bowling Alley where my nigga is, that everybody know 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:19.119 they got their triggers grass. If I actually need to 0:00:19.160 --> 0:00:22.000 worry about that, I'm putting us in present for smoking grass. 0:00:22.160 --> 0:00:24.840 Lockdown with a sentence that will last long. And they 0:00:24.840 --> 0:00:27.120 don't want me saying the N word in my rap song. 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:30.040 Niggas want to sense to me. Put me in the penitentiary, 0:00:30.280 --> 0:00:32.600 Lock me in the box and put me there for centurieson. 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:34.199 Then when I get mad to be like yo, that 0:00:34.280 --> 0:00:39.320 nigga's menacing, sick my middle finger up at every racist sentity. Ah, 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:41.519 I got your white teeth, hey, white teeth. If you 0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:43.760 come up against me with your little white sheet on 0:00:43.800 --> 0:00:46.280 your head like you was acting all nightly trying to 0:00:46.280 --> 0:00:48.760 say the A word, I'm probably gonna spike me. How 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:50.720 to spike you in the face, Like my name was 0:00:50.720 --> 0:00:53.000 Spike Lee. And if it's Spike Lee, you better go 0:00:53.040 --> 0:00:55.000 and do the right thing. You say the wrong shit 0:00:55.120 --> 0:00:57.240 around me, know what it might bring and you're the 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:04.920 fighting motherfucker's exciting. It's like a new igniting. Alright, Hey, 0:01:05.200 --> 0:01:07.959 what's up. My name's Dope Knife from Lingua Franca. We 0:01:08.000 --> 0:01:13.960 are waiting on reparations. We are here another week, fresh 0:01:13.959 --> 0:01:17.920 air to breathe now now, well, last week I just 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:21.440 started teaching my hip hop and Public policy class. Shout out, 0:01:21.480 --> 0:01:29.240 Walker Swain if the department is in. Yeah, I sucked 0:01:29.240 --> 0:01:33.360 it up, my co teacher. So tomorrow we have our 0:01:33.360 --> 0:01:36.240 second day of class, and we're talking about Tanisi coats 0:01:36.360 --> 0:01:40.039 is case for reparations and analyzing it for the different 0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:43.560 public policies that come up in it as well, and 0:01:43.640 --> 0:01:46.800 doing that same kind of analysis on most des mathematics, 0:01:47.560 --> 0:01:49.560 sort of like look at something that's more of a 0:01:49.560 --> 0:01:51.760 policy brief and an argument as something that's more just 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:55.640 like hip hop CNN coverage of life in the streets 0:01:55.680 --> 0:01:57.960 and the way that public policy manifests in both of 0:01:57.960 --> 0:02:01.000 those texts. The class line hour long, so that'll be 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.400 probably the whole class, but we're gonna have to we gotta, 0:02:04.680 --> 0:02:06.600 we gotta go into that. Yeah, we should bring Walker 0:02:06.640 --> 0:02:08.720 on the show. We should. Uh. I'm looking forward to 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:10.800 bring in some of my students perspectives in the future 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:13.040 episodes to see the kind of things that they say. 0:02:13.080 --> 0:02:15.639 They're freshman, a little baby, so maybe they won't really 0:02:15.639 --> 0:02:19.640 have anything insideful to say. You never know. Okay, So 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:23.520 we had the two conventions, and we've had the media 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:28.800 coverage that follows, and the different shifts in the poll 0:02:28.919 --> 0:02:31.440 numbers and stuff like that. One of the interesting shifts 0:02:31.440 --> 0:02:33.440 and pulling that kind of caught my eye was I 0:02:33.560 --> 0:02:39.040 noticed that in recent weeks that the soaring high approval 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:43.360 numbers that Black Lives Matter had is kind of leveled 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:47.480 out to being something a bit more realistic. What do 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:49.160 you what are your thoughts on that. The thing about 0:02:49.160 --> 0:02:52.040 these poll numbers with regards to support for b LAM, 0:02:52.120 --> 0:02:55.440 you have to look back historically at how unpopular things 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:59.920 like integration of schools was at the time. Like if 0:03:00.240 --> 0:03:03.120 you know, like it's it doesn't record, Like I think 0:03:03.120 --> 0:03:07.440 people need to let go what I'm talking more about now, 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:11.120 like in the moment, because the people who are already 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:15.240 against it are already like manipulating imagery and stuff to 0:03:15.400 --> 0:03:18.079 paint the protests is something that's not or to paint 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:22.160 the rioting is being more part of the protest than 0:03:22.200 --> 0:03:25.960 it is. Do you think there's like a risk of protests, 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:29.440 fatigue and backfiring. I mean, if it weren't footage of 0:03:29.440 --> 0:03:31.760 the protests, it would be footage, it would be fottage 0:03:32.000 --> 0:03:36.160 from literal world star like of black people being the 0:03:36.160 --> 0:03:39.360 ship out of each other kids that they would use 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.080 to stoke those racial fears that have always been there anyway, 0:03:43.520 --> 0:03:46.200 So I really feel like we'd be at this point regardless. 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:51.200 Now I feel you on that, that's for sure. So um, 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:55.800 today's episode is going to be part two ongoing series 0:03:55.840 --> 0:03:58.400 that we started at the beginning of the show called 0:03:58.680 --> 0:04:02.200 That's Race Is. In today's episode, we're gonna be talking 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:05.880 about one of the most controversial words around and most 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:09.840 used depending on you know where you're at, Yes, party people, 0:04:09.880 --> 0:04:13.320 I am talking about the N word. You mean ni 0:04:13.960 --> 0:04:16.240 or at least it's hard our cousin. We're gonna talk 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.440 about how it's managed to stick around for so long 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:21.640 and as well as explores prevalence in hip hop music. Yeah, 0:04:21.680 --> 0:04:23.560 and then we'll try to see what type of commentary 0:04:23.600 --> 0:04:26.680 rappers have made on it in music as well. What 0:04:26.800 --> 0:04:29.359 do you what's your experience with the word, you know, 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:34.400 besides using it in rap songs. I haven't been called 0:04:35.440 --> 0:04:39.280 like a nigger by like a white person outside the 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:43.520 context of the internet, uh, in a long time, not 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:45.240 since I was like a kid. I feel like, what 0:04:45.279 --> 0:04:48.560 were the contexts in which you were like elementary school, 0:04:49.040 --> 0:04:52.279 Like this white kid like refused to hold the door 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:55.920 open for me or something and then like called me 0:04:55.960 --> 0:04:58.440 a nigger, like as he like slammed the door in 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:01.480 my face. And mean, what was the aftermath? I mean, 0:05:01.480 --> 0:05:03.080 he got in trouble. We had taken to the principal's 0:05:03.080 --> 0:05:05.240 office of ship and like talking to but I still 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:07.680 had to stay. I was like in fifth grade class 0:05:07.720 --> 0:05:09.680 with him for the rest of the year, you know, 0:05:09.760 --> 0:05:12.960 like he was still around. Yeah, I have a similar story. 0:05:13.000 --> 0:05:16.520 I mean when I was we're saying third grade and 0:05:16.560 --> 0:05:18.919 the Malcolm X movie had just come out. You know, 0:05:19.000 --> 0:05:22.120 motherfucker was going to school where in the cap in 0:05:22.160 --> 0:05:25.120 the sweater that had the X on it. That was 0:05:25.160 --> 0:05:27.680 probably the first time that I had a bunch of 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:29.920 heard a bunch of white kids say it to me. There. 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:33.640 As far as the internet ship goes and comments sections, 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:37.400 I'm pretty sure I've have been or get called a 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:41.200 nigger and comments sections. But you know, I I don't 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:44.279 really I don't know. I just don't consider in terms 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:46.760 of what we're talking about. I'm not really considering like 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:50.279 the virtual world of the Internet and social media. But 0:05:50.400 --> 0:05:53.039 like my father didn't really use the word that much 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:56.680 or even with his friends and my mom's Africans, so 0:05:56.800 --> 0:05:59.120 like she didn't even really hear that ship, so she 0:05:59.160 --> 0:06:01.360 came to the States. So it was something that I 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:06.000 got exclusively from listening to rap music and ship and 0:06:06.080 --> 0:06:11.560 being in these international schools for you know, people who 0:06:11.560 --> 0:06:14.040 live overseas and shipped, like nine times of ten. I 0:06:14.080 --> 0:06:15.880 was the only black kid, or one of the only 0:06:15.920 --> 0:06:19.680 black kids in school. So it wasn't until I graduated 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:23.120 high school and went to Howard University that I was 0:06:23.160 --> 0:06:26.160 around other black folks and started hearing it more and 0:06:26.400 --> 0:06:29.360 incorporated into how I spoke and ship out, Like what's 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:31.560 your usage of it is something that you only use 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:33.920 in your because you use it very sparingly in your 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:36.440 rap songs, like I use it very sparely my rap songs. 0:06:37.200 --> 0:06:40.599 I have occasionally actively used it in front of white people, 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:42.839 like when I'm only with white people, and then like 0:06:42.920 --> 0:06:47.680 felt really embarrassed and bad in what sense I was 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:50.280 trying to remember. So I was in Charleston right before 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:52.600 the pandemic hit. I was hanging out my friends Chris 0:06:52.600 --> 0:06:55.960 and Elliott, and something happened. We were at the hotel, 0:06:56.200 --> 0:06:59.960 like drinking and laughing, and at some point I said 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:02.880 stuff like nigga, what And then like I stopped and 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.039 I realized who else with like a bunch of these 0:07:05.080 --> 0:07:07.880 like you know, like gnarly white dudes. And I was 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:14.080 just like, because I don't, like, I don't know, it's 0:07:14.080 --> 0:07:17.880 just weird. Well, I mean, like I didn't mean, I 0:07:17.880 --> 0:07:19.720 didn't mean to, It just slips out sometimes. I mean, 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:23.680 most of my white friends are like hip hop has 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:26.800 and people who raped, So I don't know, there's a 0:07:26.880 --> 0:07:29.559 certain when I say it in front of them, there's 0:07:29.600 --> 0:07:33.560 like a certain level of not even being an issue 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.720 because everybody there knows what's up. So nobody's thinking it's 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:39.000 nigga that you know. It's like no one is getting 0:07:39.000 --> 0:07:41.280 it twisted, and they just understand that. I don't know. 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:43.360 I don't even I'm not even really that conscious of 0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:47.560 it now. I mean, it really literally is some I 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:55.880 say it the same way I would say dude, no, Yeah. 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:58.200 I believe to have come about in the eighteenth century, 0:07:58.240 --> 0:08:01.240 as an adaptation of the Spanish codinia grow, which was 0:08:01.320 --> 0:08:04.320 itself at to send the Latin adjective and I G 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:10.080 e r, which means black um. By the mid twentieth century, 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:13.160 especially the United States, has come to as we know, 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:17.040 be considered a racial insult, and as such it's acceptance 0:08:17.040 --> 0:08:20.400 in popular culture, especially by non black people, has faded. 0:08:21.320 --> 0:08:24.560 Its original English language usage, it was a word for 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:28.000 dark skinned individual. The earliest known published use of the 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:30.680 term dates back to fifteen seventy four, in a work 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:33.640 alluding to the n I G E r s of 0:08:33.679 --> 0:08:38.200 the ethiop Bearing Witness. According to the Oxford's English Dictionary, 0:08:38.840 --> 0:08:41.600 the first derogatory usage of the term wasn't recorded until 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:45.320 two hundred years later in seventeen seventy five. In the 0:08:45.320 --> 0:08:48.200 Colonial America of the fifteen nineteen, one of the earliest 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:52.079 English settlers of North America, John Rolf, used any g 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:55.600 A r s in describing African slave ship to the 0:08:55.640 --> 0:08:59.520 Virginia Colony in the eighteen hundreds of eighteen forties. In 0:08:59.600 --> 0:09:02.200 the West. In US during the fur trade, it was 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:04.840 spelled n I G G you are, and it was 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:07.360 common in literature at the time. It was recorded in 0:09:07.360 --> 0:09:11.040 the mountain Man lexicon by British explorer George Frederick Ruxton, 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:14.439 and apparently it didn't have any pejorative connotation back then. 0:09:15.120 --> 0:09:18.680 Um and I G G you are was evidently similar 0:09:18.720 --> 0:09:21.960 to the modern use of the term dude guy. So 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:24.160 it's kind of similar to how it operates now, only 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:29.240 it was used by white people. Yeah. Um. This passage 0:09:29.240 --> 0:09:31.960 from Ruxton's life in the Far West illustrates how the 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.840 word was used in spoken firm Uh. The speaker is 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:38.480 referring to himself here and he says, I'm gonna try 0:09:38.520 --> 0:09:43.640 to do this traveler marm, This niggers, No traveler, I 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:51.240 are trapper marm a mountain man walk all right? Yeah, 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:55.440 didn't mount then, you know, use it. They didn't use 0:09:55.480 --> 0:09:58.280 it in this period exclusively for black people. Also use 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:02.240 it for Indians, Mexicans, French men. Yeah, anyone could be 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:05.400 in an I A G D U I UM. The 0:10:05.559 --> 0:10:08.920 noun slipped back and forth between derogatory and endearing. Thank 0:10:09.040 --> 0:10:14.440 Colored and negro became more respectful alternatives with time. For example, 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:19.040 in the eighteen fifties, abolitionous organizations posted warnings Colored people 0:10:19.120 --> 0:10:21.920 of Boston, you were respectfully caution to avoid conversion with 0:10:22.000 --> 0:10:26.360 watchman and police officers of Boston. Journalists Clifton Johnson documented 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.520 in nineteen o four how it was used in the South, 0:10:28.559 --> 0:10:32.520 specifically because it was more offensive than colored or negrown. 0:10:33.080 --> 0:10:36.319 The letter Niggers in the White House. It was a 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:39.320 poem published in newspapers all over the country for three 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:42.360 years from nineteen o one to nineteen o three, in 0:10:42.520 --> 0:10:44.640 reaction to the White House dinner that was hosted by 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:47.840 Theodore Roosevelt, who had invited book or T. Washington at 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:50.160 the time. And it reminds me kind of how Fox 0:10:50.240 --> 0:10:53.960 News reacted when Obama invited common to the White House. 0:10:54.559 --> 0:10:56.400 Like they were, I mean, they were going crazy for 0:10:56.440 --> 0:10:58.360 a little bit. They're like, have you heard this song 0:10:59.120 --> 0:11:01.600 song about the Solder? And they're all like using their shipment. 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:05.040 In the book Bury That Soccer, A Scandalous Love Affair 0:11:05.080 --> 0:11:07.319 with the N Word by H. Lewis Smith, he writes 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:10.160 that replacing the e er with A changes nothing other 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:14.920 than the pronunciation. The African American Registry notes that brother, brother, sister, 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:19.640 sister are terms of endearment. Nigger was still a word 0:11:20.280 --> 0:11:23.000 of disrespect, and the double a CP It's well has 0:11:23.040 --> 0:11:25.360 condemned the use of both and I G G A 0:11:25.520 --> 0:11:28.760 and I G G E R. Some early documentation of 0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:32.120 the word not using a pejorative fashion amongst black people 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:35.640 was in nineteen twelve in the book The Autobiography of 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:40.800 an ex Colored Man by James Weldon Johnson, who he 0:11:40.880 --> 0:11:43.240 could have his own episode. He's like some biracial guy 0:11:43.280 --> 0:11:46.800 who had like the sold Yeah, we'll definitely get into him. Yeah. Um. 0:11:46.920 --> 0:11:50.920 But he recounted in a scene from the book, when 0:11:50.960 --> 0:11:52.560 he was in New York City at the time, he goes, 0:11:52.800 --> 0:11:56.040 I noticed among this class of colored men the word 0:11:56.559 --> 0:11:59.720 nigger was freely used in about the same sense as 0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:03.080 the world fellow, and sometimes as a term of endearment. 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:06.839 But I soon learned what its use was, positively and 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:09.560 absolutely prohibited to white men. So that was as early 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:12.720 the nineteen will that this was documented, a documented cultural 0:12:12.800 --> 0:12:16.559 practice of it being used frequently among African Americans but 0:12:16.920 --> 0:12:20.640 prohibited among whites. Says from two thousand six show that 0:12:20.679 --> 0:12:22.679 nearly half of whites and two thirds of blacks knew 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.760 someone personally who are fewed referred to blacks by the term, 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:32.400 and that was two thousand six. So like some cultural 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:35.880 elements of it. So the implied racism of the word 0:12:35.920 --> 0:12:38.719 has rendered its use taboo for the most part, So 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:42.679 like you won't see it in magazoo zines and newspapers generally, 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:45.920 and if you're watching TV, you're more likely to hear 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:50.720 the word asks than you actually hear the word nigger, 0:12:50.840 --> 0:12:54.280 And it's gonna be censored regardless of its usage in 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:57.439 most cases. In most cases, it's been controversial and its 0:12:57.559 --> 0:13:00.839 use in um literature for a long time, the most 0:13:00.880 --> 0:13:04.600 notable and lasting controversies being the words used in Mark 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:07.439 Twain's novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, as well as to 0:13:07.559 --> 0:13:11.240 kill and Mocking Burton. The film Trouble Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.880 there's an interview with this English teacher named Nancy Methellis 0:13:15.320 --> 0:13:17.599 of the Boston Latin School, and she explains why she 0:13:17.640 --> 0:13:21.040 doesn't use the word in class. She says words are 0:13:21.040 --> 0:13:23.920 amongst the most powerful things there are. A grown up, 0:13:24.240 --> 0:13:27.280 middle aged white woman using that word gives another level 0:13:27.360 --> 0:13:30.040 of meaning than a fifteen year old African American student. 0:13:30.400 --> 0:13:32.959 I think I could hurt students by using it, and 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:35.440 I don't feel that my minority students want to hear 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:37.880 their white peers use the word either. And if it 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:41.319 turns out that we're sacrificing a little academic rigor in 0:13:41.440 --> 0:13:45.480 service of not adding to anyone's pain, maybe that's okay. Yeah, 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:48.560 I mean, like having a brank dialogue about the way 0:13:48.640 --> 0:13:51.520 the word makes us all feel. I think as a 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:53.839 component of like an English light which arts class like 0:13:53.880 --> 0:13:57.120 this or something like that is appropriate gauge different people's 0:13:57.160 --> 0:14:00.840 comfort because I try to tell especially like why people well, 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:02.800 I guess exclusively white people all the time. But it's 0:14:02.840 --> 0:14:06.480 like I might feel comfortable with like people saying that 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:11.080 word in certain circumstances, but I can't speak for all 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.719 black people. I can't say that as as you know 0:14:14.040 --> 0:14:17.320 the black person, Like this is how we all feel 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:21.720 about it, And it's really about gauging um, a person's 0:14:21.720 --> 0:14:24.480 individual comfort um because I know some I mean, I 0:14:24.560 --> 0:14:26.800 know some brothers that don't care at all. Who uses 0:14:26.880 --> 0:14:30.600 it at all? Yeah, No, I'm never comfortable with speaking 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:36.040 like my individual feelings on a subject is like what 0:14:36.320 --> 0:14:44.440 everybody else who looks like me thinks. You know, so 0:14:45.120 --> 0:14:47.840 links and heughs once said used rightly or wrongly, ironically 0:14:47.960 --> 0:14:50.880 or seriously of necessity for the sake of realism or 0:14:50.960 --> 0:14:53.600 impishly for the sake of comedy. It doesn't matter. Negroes 0:14:53.680 --> 0:14:56.040 do not like it in any book or any play whatsoever. 0:14:56.440 --> 0:14:58.800 Be the book or play ever sys sympathetic and its 0:14:58.880 --> 0:15:02.080 treatment of the basic problems of the race, even though 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:04.200 the book or play is written by a Negro, they 0:15:04.240 --> 0:15:07.280 still do not like it. The word nigger, you see, 0:15:07.400 --> 0:15:09.680 sums up for us who are colored, all the bit 0:15:09.760 --> 0:15:12.280 of years of insult and struggle in America. So that's 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:14.840 that ship. I don't like talking to be like they 0:15:14.920 --> 0:15:17.680 don't like it, Like who is they? Who are you? 0:15:17.880 --> 0:15:19.400 I mean, like lazy and hughes. I ain't trying to 0:15:19.400 --> 0:15:22.880 start ship with you, alright, pbro like, don't speak for me. 0:15:23.000 --> 0:15:27.880 I wasn't even born yet, nigga, Like damn well, in 0:15:28.040 --> 0:15:32.520 all fairness, he definitely came up in a time where 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:35.600 no white person who was saying it was saying it 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:39.240 because their favorite Drake song has the word in it, 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:41.800 you know what I mean. So just in that context, 0:15:42.400 --> 0:15:46.320 he's probably a bit more uptight about the words usage. 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:49.760 I mean, let's let's not get it twisted. And this 0:15:49.920 --> 0:15:52.600 is totally pulling numbers out of my ask. But I 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:57.040 would wager the like of black people in America don't 0:15:57.760 --> 0:16:01.360 funk with white people using the word in any context. 0:16:02.280 --> 0:16:06.000 That would just be my hunch. When giving a reason 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:09.280 for refusal to go into the Vietnam War, Muhammad Ali 0:16:09.520 --> 0:16:12.640 once said, no viet cong ever called me nigger. And 0:16:12.720 --> 0:16:18.320 that's that goodass internationalist looking at like this oppression of 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:22.160 the working class all around the world, How you'd take 0:16:22.240 --> 0:16:26.160 me to unite and take down the white supremacist that's 0:16:26.240 --> 0:16:27.720 like that. I guess the whole point of what he's 0:16:27.720 --> 0:16:30.440 saying is especially you know, in context of the time, 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:32.040 it's like, you got you want me to go over 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:36.320 there and shoot some some brown yellow men, but y'all 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:40.720 aren't letting me, and we gotta fight for equality here, 0:16:40.880 --> 0:16:43.680 So funk that? Oh shure, this is an interesting thing 0:16:43.760 --> 0:16:46.480 that I found to check this out. In February of 0:16:46.800 --> 0:16:50.000 two thousand and seven, the New York City Council symbolically 0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:52.720 banned the use of the word. However, there is no 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.960 penalty for using it. The formal resolution also requests excluding 0:16:57.080 --> 0:17:01.880 from Grammy consideration every song who's lyrics contain the word. However, 0:17:02.320 --> 0:17:05.959 Ron Roker, the Vice Presidents of Communications for the Recording 0:17:05.960 --> 0:17:09.200 Academy doubted it would have any real effect on actual 0:17:09.280 --> 0:17:12.480 nomination and not. Actually something similar with regards to awards 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:14.520 and stuff happened to me. I think in two thousand 0:17:14.600 --> 0:17:17.240 and eighteen, I was passed over. I was a finalist 0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:21.960 for the Songwriting Award, but the panel was uncomfortable that 0:17:22.040 --> 0:17:24.240 I use the word nigger and my song you know, 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:27.760 soft Day but or whatever um because they thought they 0:17:27.800 --> 0:17:30.800 thought it, I guess detracted from it's like literary merit 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:35.520 because it's like base and it made people uncomfortable. See, okay, 0:17:35.560 --> 0:17:37.399 this is where this is how I would stand in it, 0:17:37.560 --> 0:17:41.440 right if they passed you up or excluded you because 0:17:41.480 --> 0:17:44.080 they're like, yo, we don't funk with that word. It's 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:46.200 just you know what I'm saying. On on some even 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:48.200 if if like someone like me would want to like 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:50.680 judge and be like, oh, that's like some fake moral 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:52.720 stance or whatever. But if it's like, hey, we don't 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:55.960 want to use this word and we don't wanna, it's 0:17:56.000 --> 0:17:58.840 just like you know, we're anti this word, then be 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.879 anti that word. But don't make shift up like the 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:05.480 use of this word affects something's literary or you know, 0:18:05.680 --> 0:18:09.840 artistic merit and ship like that. That's all like, that's 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:14.240 your opinion, man, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, absolutely 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:19.720 So in there was a Kendrick Lamar concert and he 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:23.200 brought a white girl up from stage to come and 0:18:23.320 --> 0:18:26.760 sing some words to the song Matt City with him, 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:30.280 and she did not stop herself from saying then word. 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:34.159 It was this whole thing where like they stopped the 0:18:34.240 --> 0:18:37.560 music and you know, he put her on blast, and 0:18:38.080 --> 0:18:40.199 I mean it wasn't really like a mean putting her 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:42.480 on blast, but it was definitely like, hey, you know, 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:46.439 it just seemed really kind of like staged, but whatever. 0:18:47.160 --> 0:18:49.880 And it's like now you fast forward two years later 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:52.160 and it's like, I feel like, if it really happened, 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:54.760 that that girl probably would have been speaking at the 0:18:55.160 --> 0:18:58.879 RNC like on some anti cancel culture ship at that 0:18:59.000 --> 0:19:02.280 time that I got canceled at the Kendrick Lamar concert 0:19:02.359 --> 0:19:04.240 and I haven't heard anything else from her, but just 0:19:04.400 --> 0:19:08.359 in general, the whole conversation of white people hearing it 0:19:08.480 --> 0:19:11.440 in songs and singing along with it or not, I'm 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:16.040 pretty sure that every white person in that stadium when 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:19.080 they were doing that ship was wrapping that word along 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:23.040 up into that point she got the ire until because 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.080 she was in the spotlight. And I mean Kendrick Lamar's 0:19:26.480 --> 0:19:31.040 own labelmate, Schoolboy Q actually has a complete opposite stance 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:34.720 where he actually encourages about the fucker's at his show 0:19:34.880 --> 0:19:39.280 to like wrap the ship along. He does specify like 0:19:39.840 --> 0:19:42.359 use it here in this space and in this context 0:19:42.480 --> 0:19:44.040 and not so that they don't use it on the 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:48.240 street or something like that's give him the wrong idea. 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:52.200 It's like, well my black friends, Schoolboy can said, I 0:19:52.280 --> 0:19:58.040 can um. BBC extras, DJ Sideman actually quit his job 0:19:58.320 --> 0:20:00.399 over report where they used the word in a quote. 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:03.120 It was reporting on a hate crime that had happened, 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:06.480 and I guess the family of the victim wanted them 0:20:06.600 --> 0:20:10.200 to say what was said to the victim before. You know, 0:20:10.359 --> 0:20:12.119 the same with the ML's mom had to help them 0:20:12.119 --> 0:20:14.600 cask the funeral. It's like, we all gotta do this 0:20:14.600 --> 0:20:16.920 ship to ask. You want to see it, you gotta 0:20:16.960 --> 0:20:21.080 see it, and it's full horrid. Now, it did end 0:20:21.160 --> 0:20:23.920 up being a white reporter that they had say it, 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:28.760 But I mean if I worked at BBC and I'm 0:20:28.840 --> 0:20:31.600 just in my office and my cubicle doing my ship 0:20:31.760 --> 0:20:35.359 and somebody walks and it's like, Yo, we got this 0:20:35.480 --> 0:20:38.520 report where we need somebody to say nigga, and we 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:40.560 thought you'd be the perfect guy for the job that 0:20:40.760 --> 0:20:42.320 might make me feel some kind of way, you know. 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:44.840 I mean, I guess it depends on so many dynamics 0:20:44.880 --> 0:20:48.200 that they encounter in the workplace, Like if they have 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:52.680 some races, motherfucker sayre like hey sambo, like I mean, 0:20:54.320 --> 0:20:57.159 like if they're already like if they're like, you know, 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:00.560 some smells funny when you walk in the coffee room 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:05.160 and like your whole like microaggressions, you know, like abound 0:21:05.240 --> 0:21:07.560 in your everyday experience. That might be the tipping point 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:11.040 for me. Per an article in The Undefeated by Brando 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:15.800 Semeo Starkey, he says that white folk indoctrinated them into 0:21:15.840 --> 0:21:19.560 accepting their supposed inferiority. These narratives illustrate the success of 0:21:19.640 --> 0:21:22.480 the campaign of mental terrorism. In no word conveyed the 0:21:22.600 --> 0:21:26.680 depth of this internalized oppression more than nigger. Black folte 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:30.400 rescued the word from this moldering debris a virulently racist land, 0:21:30.560 --> 0:21:33.600 reclaimed it and renovated the slur into a celebration of 0:21:33.680 --> 0:21:37.080 black camaraderie. Defenders of contemporary usage of nigger. Repeat this. 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:41.280 When this tale collides with reality, however, it shatters as 0:21:41.280 --> 0:21:44.080 a misreading of history. The current use of the word 0:21:44.240 --> 0:21:46.480 is owed less to white folk calling black folk nigger 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:49.080 and more to black folk who thought they were niggers 0:21:49.119 --> 0:21:53.359 and said so. Black people have hurled the infamous word 0:21:53.640 --> 0:21:56.080 for nearly as long as white folks have exists within 0:21:56.160 --> 0:21:58.960 black sweet Now, because it existed within black sweech, then 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:03.080 I think to about a little bit earlier, the uncomfortable 0:22:03.080 --> 0:22:06.239 truth must be confronted. Absolutely internalized oppression of those who 0:22:06.280 --> 0:22:09.520 called white men and black white men and women their masters. 0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:13.639 Nigger would probably not be part of black folks's lexicon. 0:22:14.600 --> 0:22:17.040 We black folks are, we claiming it not from bigoted 0:22:17.119 --> 0:22:19.719 white folks, from from our ancestors who sadly deemed their 0:22:19.760 --> 0:22:22.400 blackness as a badge of inferiority, Which I think is interesting. 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:27.840 M as Motherfuck's been he got a quote from him 0:22:27.920 --> 0:22:32.399 later on. Um, but this takes us to uh, you know, 0:22:32.520 --> 0:22:37.200