The Proper And Improper Use Of The N-Word: Blazing Saddles Versus TV Producer Mark Gordon And Dr. Laura Sclessinger

You Go Cleavon Little!

Now Grey's Anatomy writer and producer Mark Gordon, your use
was a different story.

And radio host Dr. Laura, well... listen for yourself, then decide:

Are Anti-Obama Protestors One Step Away From Calling The President A N-Word?

The Water Line Keeps Rising, And All We’re Doing Is Standing There

by Erin Aubry Kaplan

Worst thing first: the loosely confederated but commonly paranoid, almost proudly malevolent anti-America forces that pass for a conservative movement in this country is about two seconds away from calling our shining President Obama a nigger.

But that’s not the worst thing—actually, it may be best thing.

My husband is an American history teacher who’s been arguing for years that the racism that’s supposed to be such a thing of the national past has always stewed just below our surface, give or take an inch or two. The virulent resistance to Obama’s health-care reform efforts—and increasingly to Obama himself-- exposes this inconvenient truth more effectively than any argument that my husband or anybody else could make.

The big conservative march on Washington this past weekend paraded a grab-bag of grievances that all reduced down to one thing: Obama is an Other who doesn’t think like Us.

I wish this was so much political theater staged solely for the benefit of Fox News, et al, but I’m afraid it’s more than that. How else is it possible that the very centrist senator from Illinois, momentarily demonized as a liberal, was very quickly made into a socialist/fascist dictator with an oily smile and even oilier words who was trying to sneak Big Brother government past the loyal watchdogs of liberty and individual rights?

For many true and overwhelmingly white believers, Obama is Hitler meets the mythical black trickster Br’er Rabbit, a dread colored Communist who must be kept from power at all costs, because of course Negroes were most in need of social and economic redress, and must always be barred from the inner sanctums of capitalism.

Electing Obama was one thing, realizing we all must now follow the path he defines, whether we like it or agree with it or not, is entirely another.

The panic is setting in. Even the white folks who voted for him are rethinking their position, wondering seven months into this experiment if it was such a good idea.

It reminds me of a dynamic that black people know all too well—you get hired for a job in a burst of white generosity, but as soon as the going gets tough, you’re the first to be let go. Except that in the case of the President, he can’t be fired, at least not right away. So a certain segment of the population, including certain members of Congress, are trying to neutralize Obama with panic and character assassination.

I should have known this was coming, and I did. But I’m disheartened nonetheless.

I hardly agree with all that Obama’s doing, starting with ramping up the war in Afghanistan; I’m one of those disaffected progressives that he still calls friends. But to see him not even being treated like a president, when so much unearned respect was accorded George W. Bush for so long, is painful. It’s personal.

And it’s not just Republicans and conservatives colluding on the diss, it’s Obama’s fellow weak-kneed Democrats who either are blue dogs or who have no stomach for racial matters, and therefore say nothing; in not regularly calling out the bullshit of the opposition, they are standing with them.

Alas, President Obama looks as isolated right now as black people in high places have always been—isolation is the price of their success. The irony is that a president is elected to lead, not to be the prominent but innocuous face of affirmative action.

That’s the change Obama assumed came with the mandate of his election.

He was wrong.

ERIN AUBRY KAPLAN is the first African American in history to be a weekly op-ed columnist for the Los Angeles Times. Her musings continue to appear in the Times, Essence magazine, and on the blog 3 Brothers and A Sister. Among her many projects, Kaplan is currently working on her much anticipated book.

Call Someone Nigga Or Nigger, And Watch What Happens

Black Folks Are Not Immune

Michael Scott, 52, a veteran African American television anchor who has worked in Los Angeles, Denver, Dallas, Kansas City and Charlotte, N.C., was ousted Tuesday from his latest job in Huntsville, Ala., after reportedly calling an African American producer the N-word.

Welcome to the new world of zero tolerance.

Keith Lowhorne, interim news director, confirmed on Wednesday that, "Michael Scott is no longer with WAAY-TV." He said the action took place Tuesday, but would not elaborate, saying, "It's a personnel issue."

"According to those who witnessed the incident, Scott, during a commercial break in the 10 p.m. newscast, referred to news producer Jabaree Prewitt as a Negro. When [Prewitt] ask him not to use that word, Scott called him a 'nigger.' Both men are black."

Prewitt told Journal-isms that contrary to that report, he had not quit over the Thursday incident, that he had already given notice that he was taking a new job in Louisiana.

The incident is but the latest censure of the N-word. In September, Chicago news cameraman Ken Bedford of WLS-TV used the term as he and another black photographer were vying for a shot. He received a five-day suspension and told Journal-isms the word would never pass through his lips again.

In 2006, the Chicago Defender asked on its front page, "Take a Stand: Black America, Isn't it time we make up our minds about using the word nigger?" In January 2007, Ebony magazine ran an editorial, "Enough! Why Blacks — and Whites — should never use the 'N-Word' again."

Earl Graves Sr., founder of Black Enterprise magazine, turned off the microphone as 1,200 were gathered in September for the Black Enterprise/Pepsi Golf & Tennis Challenge when comedian Eddie Griffin used the word.

And this month, the rapper Nas finally decided against naming his ninth studio album with that word, after showing up at the Grammy awards with it emblazoned on his shirt. "The pressure on Nas to change the title of his album came from all corners: his label's parent company, political figures, talk show pundits, other rappers and even some hip-hop aficionados," James Braxton Peterson wrote on theRoot.com.

Prior to the "N word" incident, Scott was perhaps best known for "the attack of the gecko," He was interviewing a snake wrangler on the air in 2002 when, or just see for yourself:

NAS GOES THERE IN NEW CUT "BE A NIGGER TOO"

Here is what the entire planet has been waiting for:



What do you think about Nas' new track from what will

clearly be a controversial album. Thoughts???

Rapper Nas & Kellis Take Nigger To The Grammys, While MSNBC's Suspended Reporter Finds It's Hard Out Here For A Pimp!

Bold Marketing or Straight-Up Ignorance?

Can't Wait To Hear Your Thoughts On This One!

And while we're at it, what about MSBNC's Pimp Daddy David Shuster?

ABOUT BURYING NIGGER

This Monday the N.A.A.C.P. will bury the "n" wor... hold up, why don't we just say it? Nigger. That's the word the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People will symbolically bury at its 98th Annual convention in Detroit.

Give me a break. Why are we assigning so much power to the word ? I hear the cries now. "It denigrates us! It diminishes us! You traitor! Blah. Blah. Blah." Even one of the other brothers said we would not be using the word on this site anymore.

Well, I for one refuse to allow a word, six letters, to rob me of any of my glory, power or joy.

Maybe I wouldn't be so blah on this subject if our venerated NAACP and black leaders would bury other things like "the cultural acceptance of tardiness" (affectionately called "colored peoples time") or "our prison influenced value system" or the "denigration of our women in music" or our "young people's focus on wanton materialism" or "declining enrollment in college." Need I go on?

The debate over the word nigger is wasted breath. Our ancestors were called that and they still rose up and kicked butt to move forward. So how is it that we, the beneficiaries of their hard work, become so derailed by the mere mention of nigger today? Are we that weakened? Do we now stand on just the bony legs of victimization?

(Want to see how "other" folks use the word, read the comments after this post)

If the NAACP wants to bury the word, fine. Undoubtedly the word nigger will rise and stay alive within our music, in our homes, amongst our friends, our enemies, wherever.

Maybe they should consider burying "colored" -- since it's not used as often. But if that happened, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People would lose one-fifth of its name, and oh, I shudder!