Comical Tragedy, Isn’t It Funny? (Not Really); The Problems Presented On The Boondocks That Is Blocking Progress In the Black Community

As Black History Month was approaching, we think about the strong and brave leaders that have moved the black community to a better position in society. The black community has moved forward resiliently, but let’s not regress. Watching The Boondocks has made me think about the regression happening and the hurdles that still need to be worked with to mobilize again. The Boondocks places critiques while grabbing an audience that would normally opt out of the conversation of race. The use of comedy is inviting. People prefer to laugh over difficult topics than to listen to intellectuals sit around a table talk about the issues.

Both The Boondocks and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are known for the excessive use of the word “nigger.” The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a historical text and its meaning was erased when the word “nigger” was removed from a version of the book. In this new version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn the word “nigger” was replaced with the word “slave.” It was changed because Alan Gribben, a professor of English at Auburn University did not like that The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was “falling off reading lists” because the word “nigger” was in it. He thinks that the n-word “never seems to lose its vitriol”, so he thinks avoiding the conversation altogether would be more beneficial in a classroom. I think the reason why the book falls off reading lists because some parents and teachers are too lazy or uncomfortable to go into the difficult conversation of how the United States was extremely racist and what the word meant.

Getting rid of the word “nigger” in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn causes several problems. It destroys the historical context of the novel.  The word ‘slave’ doesn’t make sense with the story since a “slave” during the mid 19^th century was actually a freedman. Getting rid of the n-word just softens the United States’ extreme prejudice at the time. Replacing the word “nigger” with “slave” does not convey the impact and the baggage that the n-word carries. The word “slave” can refer to anyone around the world who was enslaved, but “nigger” denotes the slavery that took place right here, in the United States. The word “nigger” represents the time period of the degradation and dehumanization of a people.

The definition of the n-word is a major block in continuing to move forward. The fact that a classic book like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn had to be edited to make people feel more comfortable shows that the battle over the word is not over.

The word “nigger” wasn’t always used toward black people. Wikipedia has provided me with some eye-opening insight about the history of the word “nigger”. One of the biggest shocks for me was that it was actually the politically correct term for black people for a long time. The word at certain points was not always used for black people; the word was used for anyone who is oppressed. Pierre Vallières in his book White Niggers of America: The Precious Autobiography of a Quebec “Terrorist”, describes the oppression of the Québécois by the French. He refers to the Québécois as “white niggers”. He wanted to redefine the word to refer to social class and power instead of skin color. If the word “nigger” did not refer to someone’s fixed character trait like skin color and if the location didn’t have a heavy and nasty history surrounding skin color, then it would probably be used less.  If it referred to economic status it would mostly likely be less acceptable to use. Calling a person a ‘charity case’ is a word used less than any variation of the n-word, and there is a consensus that the word is a “bad word.” Throughout history words have been ‘reclaimed’ by the group oppressed by the word.

The Boondocks shows the different uses of the word “nigger” with its characters, Uncle Ruckus and Riley, which both have different definitions of what the word means for them. Uncle Ruckus uses the word to intentionally degrade. Uncle Ruckus has noticed “darkies are getting used to the word nigger, so we gotta recycle some of the other words, like porch monkey, and jungle bunny”. He is a character on the show that represents racism and internalized racism. Riley is one of the people Uncle Ruckus refers to in the quote when referring to people who have gotten used to the word. On the other hand, Riley uses the variation “nigga” in almost every single sentence. He represents the naïve and misled youth. In society, the lack of consensus gives power to the individuals to decide what intention they want to have with the n-word.

There has been times when using a variation of the n-word was deemed inappropriate and blew up on the news and the Internet. Paul Dawson form Louisville, Kentucky is a teacher from who crossed the line, the distinction between what uses of the word is offensive and what uses of the word is not offensive. He couldn’t see the distinction very clearly. The real life situation is of Paul Dawson, who called one of his students, Keysean, “nigga” and was labeled on television as a racist even though he obviously had no idea what he did wrong. In the episode The S Word, the story was adapted and filled with comedy. The student called “nigga” on the cartoon was Riley. The irony of it all is if you knew who Riley is, it seems really comical that he would call out a teacher for calling him “nigga”. Riley does say it constantly. Riley reminds me of two black teenage boys on the train to school saying the word “nigga” in every sentence. The student in real life explains that he never used the word in the classroom and that he would never use it. You can tell Keysean was definitely lying when he stutters and says, “no one else in the class knows that I said it… because I didn’t.”

Aaron McGruder, the creator of the Boondocks comic strip and producer of the cartoon, makes his opinion very clear when he decides to place Riley in the place of Keysean. Riley in the cartoon tells reporters that he “felt like less than nothing” and that he was deeply offended. It’s even funny to think about it because Riley has a very nonchalant personality and is a typical troublemaker on the show. By placing Riley in the position of the student, McGruder is exposing the hypocrisy some in the black community have. Regarding the word “nigger”, it was not completely reclaimed by the black community. The problem becomes that the word becomes too group exclusive, so no one is able to talk about it without being labeled a racist or offensive.

Because of the group exclusivity, the topic of the word is not held for long nor does it reach a sound conclusion, which probably does more harm and damage than benefit. Many youth find it acceptable to call their fellow male black peers “nigga” in an endearing manner. But when someone outside of the black community uses it, it becomes ‘racist’. If you don’t want to be called a certain name, then don’t call yourself that or allow for people to call you that.

From my experiences, the more educated population seems to understand why the word “nigger” or any variation of it shouldn’t be used. In the show, Tom and Huey, the lawyer and the revolutionary radical, never use the word. I have never heard any of my black teachers call anyone “nigga” nor have I seen someone like Oprah call someone a “nigga”. It seems those who were fortunate enough to explore black history know the weight the word has.

BET is corrosive for the black youth of America. BET, Black Entertainment Television, plays mostly hip-hop and rap songs that are geared towards youth. Ironically, the Boondocks used to be aired on Black Entertainment Television, but was promptly taken off after  very harsh criticism from The Boondocks. A way to sum up what McGruder thinks of BET is that BET is geared towards “niggas [that] have nothing better to watch”. I can see why a black person might turn to BET; BET is one of the only ‘black channel’ for entertainment. The other entertainment channels like MTV are geared towards white America, although BET and MTV are under the same company. It is also very rare to see black people in good light on MTV. BET is cancerous for the black community, but BET is the only ‘black channel’. After reading an article on Parents Television Council, BET: Bad Entertainment for Teens, I was simply appalled at how horrible the channel is. According to the article, BET shows depictions of “sex, strippers, murders, explosions, rioting, and use of weapons, drug sale or use” on average every 38 seconds on BET. “By comparison, prime-time broadcast TV programming in the 8:00 p.m. hour (itself full of sex and violence) averaged one instance of negative content only about every five minutes.” It cannot get more horrible than that. It does seem as if BET wants blacks to go back into a ditch. On BET there is also an aura of stereotypes radiating, which doesn’t help the black community move forward. You would also expect that if you are going to be representing yourself that you would want to represent yourself in the best way possible. One of the many assumptions that BET makes is that all black people are interested in hip-hop, rap, and R&B music. I think because of BET, music that is trash is becoming mainstream because producers think that is what people want.

On The Boondocks, a BET employee points out that the drop-out rates, teen pregnancy rates, and unemployment rates have risen since BET was put on air. Nowadays it does seem, all television geared towards teens is causing the rates to increase. Look at MTV, they have directly caused teen pregnancy rates to increase. Many young girls in America are getting pregnant to appear on the show Teen Mom. BET has most likely infected the young minds of black youth to think that the only way to achieve affluence is to become an athlete or an entertainer. McGruder, in an interview, points out the sad truth that it’s difficult to find a black leader that “won’t embarrass you” and it’s also difficult to find black leaders in general. Another example of how BET doesn’t help educate black youth is that they didn’t air Coretta Scott King’s funeral. She was the wife of a very important leader in the African-American civil rights movement. Did the channel think it it’s not important? This is just another sign of hypocrisy and a sign of great disrespect. Ignoring and not televising the funeral of a pivotal leader in the black civil rights movement is a reason why so many don’t see a problem with using the word “nigga”; the history isn’t being taught on channels with larger audiences. Coretta King lived in an era where that word was so weighted in hate and it was a reminder of where they were in the social hierarchy. Her generation had to endure so much just so that BET can be aired. The bold step of BET calling it’s self the ‘black channel’ is problematic. It is putting forth that it somehow represents a group of people. It would be fine if there was a variety on the show of different aspects of the black community, but it doesn’t.

In one of McGruder’s comic strips it shows what problems BET causes for someone who isn’t black. In the comic strip a young, white girl who has never met a black person in her life assumes that all black people are “gangster rappers or basketball players”. As of 2009, about 65% of the NFL is comprised of black athletes and about 82% of the NBA is black. But in politics, in the 112^th Congress, there are zero senators and 41 out of 435 are black in the House of Representatives.

America was misled themselves about who Barack Obama was. Barack Obama won many votes simply because of his race and the extreme hope people had for someone who was a little bit more liberal leaning and a darker shade. People sincerely believed something big was going to happen. Aaron McGruder seems to agree that the general population mislead themselves to believe there was going to be a dramatic and radical change in the White House after Obama reaches the oval office. In an interview on The Boondocks, many characters were interviewed about the election, including Granddad, Thugnificant, Huey, Sarah DuBois, Riley, and Uncle Ruckus. Most of the characters are completely enamored by the idea of a “black”, young man entering the oval office. Although Martin Luther King Jr. wanted us to look at people for their “content of character”, but it seemed evident that people were “judg[ing] by the color of [his] skin” instead. Actually, within the black community, people who think like Huey Freeman were considered racist for not voting for Obama. Some of the pressure of the election was ‘vote Obama or be known as a racist’. Furthermore, Granddad represents a large population who believed Barack Obama was going to do things differently than what George Bush was doing for 8 years. People were so hopeful that he would turn things around, ridiculous rumors were beginning to spread that people won’t have to, “worry about putting gas in [their] car, or worry about paying [their] mortgage”. Lists of other rumors surrounding his inauguration are: the White House will become the Black House; he is actually an undercover gangster, and the hope that he would end the war in Iraq as soon as he was elected. People most likely felt such a strong connection and obligation to vote for Barack Obama because of his race, although they might not have known much about Obama’s policies and views on issues.

Although the “I’m Black And I’m Proud” movement James Brown was beginning to take momentum in the late 1960’s, the racism imposed on the black community was internalized deeply by blacks. The character Uncle Ruckus in The Boondocks is a personification of this self-hatred. He hates himself for being black, he even creates this entire story in his head that he was actually born from 2 white people, but some disease caused him to be black. He is also very convinced that he is white and doesn’t want any associations with black people. Uncle Ruckus always finds some way to praise white people for some sort of accomplishment, even if it isn’t there. The self-hatred of the black community is evident in its standards of beauty, the color of the eyes, the hue of the skin, and including the texture of the hair.

In a video that exposes the horrible treatments and surgery black people go through to look ‘whiter’, it makes one realize how deeply rooted the hate is. The sad thing is, most of them just do not realize that by making those changes to become ‘more beautiful’ they hate themselves. One woman realizes the horrible mistake she did by wanting to change her eye color. She went to Panama to get the surgery done. She goes on to explain all the medical problems she has for having that surgery. Another account is of women in Jamaica bleaching their skins to become slightly lighter. The bleaching product they are using isn’t actually for bleaching their skin; it was for removing scars or making them less noticeable. People discovered they could use it for bleaching when the skin in the area became lighter. Most African-American women get perms and relaxers for their hair. There are things to think about when thinking about possible reasons to perm and relax. Disney characters and the media in general are to blame for not putting enough emphasis on the beauty of the Afro or frizzy hair. Shampoo ads promise to give ‘your hair a natural look’, that is shiny, and ‘healthy’.  At the end of these shampoo commercials the women walk off with their hair bouncing, blowing in the wind, or have the women giving the camera a long and exaggerated hair flip. In Garnier commercials, the women are mostly white, but when there is one black woman, her hair looks exactly like every else’s in the commercial. The hair products aim for that type of hair that just flows, no wonder so many women with different hair types feel inadequate. The clerk of the store in the video makes a comment that the straight hair “looks more natural”. What disturbs me the most is the fact those surgeries to change eye color even exists and that products to bleach skin even exists.

The Boondocks is rarely seen as a show that takes some effort to understand. Most do not look past the comedy or really listen to what is being said by the characters on the show to reach the message Aaron McGruder wanted to show. When I bring up The Boondocks with people, their immediate reaction is, “It’s funny”, but very rarely does a person say, “I loved the episode about the cycle of oppression/corporate interest/gays in hip-hip/etc”. The show is a bit of a contradiction, it’s comedy but, as Martin Luther King said in a Boondocks episode, “you have nothing to celebrate about”. The topics raised in The Boondocks are no laughing matter and laughter shouldn’t be evoked.

Disney’s Potrayal of “Other” Women

Disney stories and princesses have always been filled of subtle or not so subtle racism, (horrible stories), and not knowing how to not reinforce stereotypes.

After looking at the previous post’s video, I wanted to express what I think of Disney princesses. Most people don’t like to hear what I have to say about Disney because it ‘ruins the magic’.

Let’s take a look at the major princesses of Disney:

From Left to Right: Jasmine, Snow White, Mulan, Tiana, Aurora, Cinderella, Pocahontas, Belle, and Ariel

Most of the skin tones are light. The only ones who are different are Jasmine, Tiana and Pocahontas. If you notice as well Jasmine and Pocahontas (in my opinion) are the least clothed out of all of the princesses. There’s something ‘exotic’ about them because they aren’t common. Looking at it from a USian perspective, Native Americans and Middle Easterners are rare. Just interesting that the other less exotic princesses are almost completely covered up.

Ariel, oh the beloved, Ariel, the only red-head out of the group. One major problem I have with her plot… she’s not even ****ing human! Let’s remember that “Gingers Do Have Souls”. At least all the other princesses are human. This is just a giant ‘face-palm’. I think it would have been a more acceptable story if the prince was a mermaid and she went after it.

Belle, I feel this is typical view from many USians, which is that if you don’t date a white man he must be a beast. Note again, none of the princes are of color, all are white. The only time the prince doesn’t have a race associated, he’s a beast. I totally forgot that, the Beast is white as well. Great way to lie to little girls telling them the only good dates are white men. When I heard Disney was FINALLY going to have a Black princess, I was already gearing myself for disappointment. Whoever wrote the story was walking on egg shells for every stupid, stereotype-reinforcing thing they wrote. A couple of questions for the author are: Why New Orleans? Why 1920’s (definitely not a good time period for Blacks)? Why do you insist on having a white prince?

It’s the 21st century and we still don’t have a Latina princess or a lesbian princess. I’m assuming the second half of my wish won’t happen (soon) since parents are so touchy on things related to sexuality, even though the princesses are already highly sexualized and most of their fortes in the movies is their sex-appeal.

Self-Hatred Within The Black Community

Through the video above you can see how self hatred is very evident within the Black community (as well as in other communities like the Latino community). There are many possible reasons for this to occur.

There’s Disney*, there’s the media that glamorizes certain celebrities over others, there’s society’s imposed self hatred. There are so many ways to get exposed to the disease called self hatred.

Some of the most common signs is the lightening of the hair and eyes. A couple of days ago while sitting in an UN conference room,  a friend noted to me that almost 99% of the people in that room had dark hair. It’s interesting to see that blond hair and light eyes (and goes without saying lighter skin) is a virtue yet most of the world does not possess those traits. I guess this shows how northern European traits used imperialism and exposure to infect most of the world with the idea that they aren’t attractive. Thinking about it now, it might be because it’s ‘exotic’.

A woman in the video gives testimony of going through a surgery to lighten her eyes. The fact that there’s even an available surgery for that shows the racism that this country has. You very rarely hear, “I hate my eyes, they are too light, I wish they were darker”. Very, VERY interesting that the procedure was done in Panama, which as far as I know has a majority Black/ancestral Black/darker skin/etc population.

Straight hair, that seems more related to Afro-self hatred. A good portion of the world’s population (geographically) have straight/wavy hair. The media also glamorizes the hair that you can ‘hair flip’.The clerk in the video mentioned that straight hair “looks more natural”. I’m just wondering what does that even mean? and Who defined natural?

The bleaching is another serious topic. Bleaching is very prominent within the Black community and the Indian community. In some societies like in India, lighter skin means higher position in society.I know that in Dominican Republic this is still a fact. When I watch television, I count how many of the reporters are light skinned and dark skinned, who is doing what. Most of the presenters or public figures are white. It’s unfortunately no surprise. Although most of the women do not have blond hair, they most definitely do have straight hair. It’s very difficult to tell someone they’ve been lied to their whole life about how they aren’t beautiful when a person has fully internalized it and believed it.

There must be a strong force somewhere it to make people to bleach their skin in lieu of the fact that they may get all sorts of horrible skin diseases.

How Exactly Did Obama Win the Election?

No one can deny that the election of 2008/2009 was historical; we had a woman close to winning for both parties and (now) we have an African American president. The election was marked with change, possibly the oldest president, two female candidates, or an African American president.

I feel the election was like playing the “which one is not like the others” game. I feel many people voted for Barack Obama because he’s an African American and not because of his politics. People were so stirred and excited for the new face they saw on television talking about becoming the next president of the United States, that they didn’t realize he wasn’t going to change much. I don’t think the ridiculous rumors created were really helping the situation either:

Various other rumors were being spread, the hopeful and the bad. There was a rumor spreading that the White House would be painted black (right because a federal building would ever be touched in that manner). There was one that he is actually a gangster and that he was ‘hood’. The other silly rumor was that he would end the war in Iraq (although he has said multiple times at debates and speeches that he wasn’t going to).

I also think his platform definitely helped him win the election. All the speak of hope made people hopeful, maybe even too hopeful. Because their hopes are so high, the people of the United States are expecting superhuman feats to come from him.

The yearn for something new and the fact that he’s an African American most likely allowed him to win the election over other candidates.

BET: What Is It Really Doing?

Why am I shocked when I hear about how BET is a horrible channel? I can’t find any good in the channel. I guess the only good thing that it is assigned to a pretty awkward number, 54.

I can’t believe that Black Entertainment Television didn’t air Coretta Scott King’s funeral. It seems extremely disrespectful and ungrateful for a channel, supposedly, dedicated to black people to not show such a historic person’s funeral. I wonder who decided that would be a great idea. I always get the feeling the younger generation doesn’t appreciate anything. I feel they don’t understand how much struggle and pain someone had to go through so that they can live more comfortable lives.

That has always been a problem. It’s extremely difficult to have anything dedicated to one race, since not everyone is the same. Also, what is BET trying to say? That black people only like crap rap/hip hop music, misogyny, low-brow ‘entertainment’, stereotype-re-enforcing? BET probably causes people who has never met a black person in their life to react like this when they finally do:

I can also understand how BET is trying to cater to an audience but the content is just BAD, real bad. The blogger does make a point that Telemundo a very popular Latino channel doesn’t degrade Latinos, it simply caters to the Latino audience.

I really don’t know how to say this any better, than the blogger themselves:

They should take the initiative and change the station’s name to Young Misguided Black Men’s Entertainment Television(YMBMET for short), as that’s who 90% of it’s programming is geared at anyway. Would you believe me if I told you that the religious shows appeared immediately after BET Uncut’s 1 hour block. (BET Uncut’s cancellation had nothing to do with protests of it’s content, claims BET.)

2 things said in that quote, the more educated blacks are not watching BET and BET continues to make stereotypes and make black people look like hypocrites.  I don’t think the more educated population is spending time watching MTV or BET and enjoying it. It don’t understand how you could possibly have such degrading content on so many different levels throughout the week and then on Sunday have ‘religious’ shows. (I guess this also points out religious hypocrisy).

I went through some of the comments and someone mentioned Viacom. I keep hearing Viacom in relation to money and the destruction to all that is good.

BET: Is Aaron McGruder Doing More for the Black Community than BET?

Wanting to know more about BET who better than to watch Aaron McGruder, the creator of The Boondocks, talk about it.

It’s funny they showed a clip about ‘bad things’ skyrocketing after BET started airing. The funny thing is, I don’t think it’s solely BET’s fault. Look at MTV they glorify teenage pregnancy and girls are getting pregnant to get on a show. This actually aggravates me. For me, the entire point of the show is to show how horrible it is to be a teen mom, I guess not. You shouldn’t be praised or given that much money for getting knocked up! What type of message are we sending!? “Do drugs, and you’ll appear on ‘True Life: I’m on Drugs'”. I just don’t get it. BET probably has a role in the drop out rates, but it’s probably more personal reasons than the influence of television.

Aaron Gruder wants to find a black leader that “won’t embarrass you”. Al Sharpton is a  bit of a hypocrite and that just makes everyone look bad. It’s unfortunate that there aren’t many black role models. Many young black people think that becoming a basketball player or being a rap artist is the best way to make it in life. It’s hard to point out all the black writers, doctors, CEOs, politicians, etc.

Although the conversation reared away from BET, he does make a good point. America likes to do things and say they’ve made the most significant change ever. Getting rid of slavery seemed like such an amazing feat to many Americans. Not to brag, but Dominican Republic had slavery for only 200~300 years in comparison to America which had slavery for 200 years, but still treated it’s black population like second-class citizens (I would say 300 years since integration didn’t really happen till the 70’s and 80’s). America had slavery for a long time, even after it was ‘abolished” there was a defacto slavery.

Aaron McGruder also says that “everyone knows what the problem is”, but why isn’t more being done to get the problem solved? Since everything is based off of money, why not cut the supply and channels like BET and MTV won’t be able to produce it’s crappy shows anymore.

BET: Parental Point of View

The Boondocks is always throwing jabs at BET for corrupting the black community. AKA:

Actually, The Boondocks used to be on BET (ironic, right? Especially looking at how the Boondocks ridicules the types of things BET shows; ie naked women on strip poles, while a rapper with no talent raps about wanting sexual relations). BET took the Boondocks off the air after an episode was very critical of BET directly. I highly doubt BET producers ever took the time to watch the show. Makes me wonder if they pay attention to anything else being aired on their channel.

I knew from the get-go that BET was just absolute trash. After reading an article, I am absolutely stunned. The article’s audience is for parents. I think about entertainment from a parental perspective. I’m already very disappointed in the younger generations. I would like to reverse the crap they’ve been fed. We nowadays watch television for hours. Children are pretty likely to watch BET because everyone else is watching it. I thought BET was bad, but not that bad:

So relentless and constant is this kind of content that the PTC found that [BET] averaged one instance of offensive content every 38 seconds. By comparison, prime-time broadcast TV programming in the 8:00 p.m. hour (itself full of sex and violence) averaged one instance of negative content only about every five minutes.

This is ridiculous. How can such horrible $#@! be shown on TV? I’m puzzled as to how this hasn’t gotten more attention. I think the channel does more damage to the black community than a comment made by Don Imus. Don Imus won’t have much an effect, but BET has obvious and direct influence since it’s part of ‘pop culture’ (which I also dislike). I can’t complain too much because organizations are doing things to lessen BET’s influence. It makes me sick all at the same time to believe that BET is just in it for the money and not value/substance. They obviously don’t care. I think almost everything in pop culture is about money. I really wish I knew where I saw this video, but a man interviewed elementary school students in the mid 1900s about what they wanted to be when they grow up and most of the kids have decent dreams, like nurse, firefighter, truck driver, teacher. He did the same experiment in the 2000s and the most popular response was “get rich”. Is this a sign of culture deterioration? Most definitely.

Words: N*gg*r Part 3

In the episode, The S Word, the infamous case of the teacher calling a student a “nigga” and getting in trouble for using the word. The episode says A LOT!

The question of when and how to use the word comes into play. It seems, according to the episode, that no one knows when and how to use either variation. The teacher shows clear confusion of how to use the word. Petto says there’s a difference between the two words, what I noticed after preying on a feed for a while is that the lines between the -er variation and the -a variation has blurred significantly. Of course there were the few specks of people using the -er variant in a directly racist way, but the other used in the same fashion that maybe someone who uses the other variation uses it.

One of the points made in the episode is whether or not it’s hypocritical to use a word that you tell other people not to use. I still cannot grasp the idea of using group-exclusive words.

It also seems that the word became so ingrained in speech that it stopped being a group-exclusive word. Especially with our youth, there seems to be less of a divide between who is allowed to use the word and who isn’t.

Another observation of the show is that Thomas and Huey rarely utter the word. They are supposed to represent the educated black community. I think it shines true in real life. I’ve never heard and educated black person refer to another person as their “nigga”.

This might also show the divide between the educated and the not as fortunate to get educated.

Words: N*gg*r Part 2

When we, as youth need quick information, we refer to our friend, Wikipedia. I wanted some background information about the word “nigger“.

What an eye-opener it was! Some things I learned was the word wasn’t always used to refer to black people and at some point it was the PC term for black people. It’s mind boggling to even think that the word was the PC term! The other thing I discovered that the word went as broad as to refer to anyone who is considered ‘less-than’. The Québécois referred to themselves to explain their situation in relation to French imperialism.

One thing that really bothers me is that this seems be an American-only issue. It seems no other country has this issue, or had this issue till America had it. Many countries adopted a derogatory word for black people after Americans (so proud to be an American -__-).

The phrase ‘the n-word’ was popularized after the OJ Simpson trial. Who knew this word’s history is still changing.There seems to be a giant difference between “nigger” and “nigga”. Something I just noticed is that the racist characters on The Boondocks don’t really use the -er variation.

The annoying thing about the word is that there aren’t clear lines and people get angry because someone else doesn’t see the lines they do.

Words: N*gg*r Part 1

The ‘n-word’ has had controversy over who uses it, how to use it, and what it means. It’s no surprise that this word, which has a log history of racism and hatred, would be such a heavy package. Anytime the word is mentioned every side has a different story to tell about the word. Something/someone can be easily labeled racist for using the word.

Cartoons have been demanded to be terminated like The Boondocks or South Park for their risqué content. The Boondocks is the most notorious for being attacked for the excessive use of word ‘nigga’. I promise you that the word is said 15+ times each episode guaranteed. Like The Boondocks, what better way to make an opinion than humor. Richard Pryor and George Carlin both weigh in about the word. Both have very different, almost polar point of views of the word.

Richard Pryor takes on the view of not calling anyone by that name, which I completely agree with. We wouldn’t have all these ‘fine line’ problems if we just erase it from our vocabulary. I see it as a filthy word no matter what context it’s in. For me the history will just play in my head every time someone says it. George Carlin also brings up a good point of there is actually nothing wrong with the word, its the way you use it you should be concerned with.