The N Is For Nigger

OK , either I am just getting too lazy to write, or some of these Inky columnist have been playing "Jedi Mind Games" with me. Because seriously, I have really been feeling some of their articles lately. Like the one below from a sister that really struck a nerve with me. Partly because I am still trying to find myself with this issue, and partly because she just flat out made some damn good points. I don't agree with everything she said, but I certainly think her piece was well thought out and well written. So here goes:

"N-word: Don't play with fire
By Annette John-Hall
Inquirer Columnist~
This country has become obsessed with the word nigger.
Everywhere I go, I hear it. Out of the mouths of blacks and whites alike. From garden-variety bigots and platinum-selling rappers. Kids on the playground. Loose-lipped politicians. Washed-up comedians. It's been heatedly debated and used as a punch line. Spewed in profanity and tossed around in love.
As the word continues to wreak havoc on our cultural consciousness, more and more African Americans are calling for its total banishment because of its enduring legacy as a racist epithet. A couple of months ago, the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Congresswoman Maxine Waters urged people to stop using it, along with comedian Paul Mooney, who had once sprinkled the word liberally through his act.
Now Jet and Ebony, the venerable magazines for African Americans, have picked up the mantle. In the February issue of Ebony, editorial director Bryan Monroe, introducing a package of articles titled "Enough! Why Blacks - and Whites - Should Never Use the 'N-word' Again," writes that the word will no longer appear in his publications, except in unavoidable instances that will be subject to his approval.
(The Inquirer's policy prohibits the use of the word unless it has a "compelling journalistic purpose." Even then, it must be signed off by a top editor.)
I called my friend Bryan, who is also president of the National Association of Black Journalists, and asked him, "Why now?" After all, the controversy over the word is not new.
"It has been something we had talked about for the past few months," he said. Though it was rare for the magazine to print the word, he felt it was important that the biggest publications targeting African Americans take the lead on "such a crucial issue."
Plus, Monroe said, "When the Michael Richards incident happened [www.youtube.com], it created all the more urgency."
Truth is, I took the word out of my vocabulary long ago. See, I'm old enough to have felt the sting of it as a racist pejorative, not as a greeting or a term of endearment, as so many younger African Americans use it today.
Even before my kids started school, my husband and I explained the word to them. We instructed them as our parents instructed us: If anybody assaulted you with that word, all bets were off.
That's why my middle-school daughter retaliated recently with a shove to the head of a white kid, who called her the name on the school bus - with malice, of course. The most troubling part of the incident, apart from my daughter's loss of innocence, is that some of the other white kids couldn't understand why she was so offended.
I do know intention means everything. Look no further than comic Michael Richards' vitriolic attack of a black heckler. It took him three seconds to go from lashing out with the n-word to making lynching references. Interestingly, the punditry afterward was focused on the n-word, not Richards' pleasure in reminding us that "50 years ago we'd have you upside down with a [expletive] fork up your [expletive]."
Such is the enduring power - and offense - of the word.
"If a white person calls me the n-word, supposedly out of some hip-hop kinship, I can't dissociate that from being called that by white kids in the suburbs of Boston when I was a child," asks Imani Perry, a 30-something professor of law at Rutgers-Camden and author of Prophets of the Hood: Politics and Poetics in Hip Hop. "It's not about rules, it is about history. We have a history of white people using the word and backing it up with violence and mistreatment."
While some young folks are trying to flip a historically horrific pejorative into an embraceable form of cultural expression, it doesn't erase its history.
Which is what the Web site www.abolishthenword.com shows in its powerful challenge to visitors to make a personal commitment to rid themselves of the word. Its graphic and searing introduction breaks down the history of the n-word, spliced with a horrific series of photographs of black men being lynched with Strange Fruit, Billie Holiday's mournful protest dirge, in the background.
Blacks who are still debating the use of the word and whites who don't understand why they can't use it, should have a look at the site and ask themselves not just Why would you use the n-word today? but How could you ever use the n-word again?"

True confessions? As recently as a few months ago I found myself using the N word as a term of endearment with some friends of mine. No one noticed, and no one checked me. In fact, as I recall, some of my buddies used it too, and no one checked them. Now I consciously do not use the word for all the reasons articulated in this sisters post, but I still struggle with the some issues pertaining to whether it's right for black leaders to call for an out and out ban of the word. After all, I laugh just as hard as every one else when Katt Williams or some other black comedian uses it in a routine that I find funny. And as a fan of hip hop, I can honestly say that some of the tunes would not be as artistically rich without it. (That "N word) So I am feeling folks like my man Max, over at Free Slave, when he says he struggles with using the word as well, and I can only imagine how many more of us are out there.

So help me folks, I need an education on this one. Miss Annette John-Hall certainly dropped some knowledge on me, and I appreciate it. I am still not totally on board, but I am pretty damn close.

Oh, before I go, I would like to leave you with a little poem:

"Ten little nigger boys went out to dine;
One choked his little self and then there were Nine.
Nine little nigger boys sat up very late;
One overslept himself and then there were Eight.
Eight little nigger boys travelling in Devon;
One said he’d stay there and then there were Seven.
Seven little nigger boys chopping up sticks;
One chopped himself in halves and then there were Six.
Six little nigger boys playing with a hive;
A bumble bee stung one and then there were Five.
Five little nigger boys going in for law;
One got into chancery and then there were Four.
Four little nigger boys going out to sea;
A red herring swallowed one and then there were Three.
Three little nigger boys walking in the zoo;
A big bear hugged one and then there were Two.
Two little nigger boys sitting in the sun;
One got frizzled up and then there was One.
One little nigger boy left all alone;
He went and hanged himself and then there were None… "

So if we banned the word, does that mean some folks wouldn't say this little poem anymore?

Mmmmmmm.