The "N Word"

[halfbreed]

What are your thoughts on the word 'Nigger'? (does it offend you that I used it just then?)

How do you feel about black people using this word in their raps and whatnot? Do you think it's okay for them to do it, but no one else? .. Or should this word be put out of use for good by all?

[LaFace]

Personally I feel as though there are two valid points to be made.

1. I think it is absolutely fantastic that African-Americans popularised the term 'nigga' as a synonym for calling each other 'mate', 'friend' etc. This is because it portrays a character of pride in one's ethnicity, as well as overcoming the oppression their people had to endure in the past, as well as some of the racism that goes on today. Thus, in this light, I believe it is fine.

2. Having made the above point, it is no secret that through hiphop's emergence over say the last decade, the use of the word in this fashion has become very well known throughout the world. A negative consequence of this is that people who are not of this ethnicity are now using the word without care (which may have started when people sing along to their favourite rap songs), and to me I disagree with this behaviour, because of the word's history.

There has been much debate in the hiphop community regarding the appropriateness of this word. Some have tried to start a movement whereby the word 'ninja' is used as a replacement, as it is similar in sound, can have a similar meaning to the intention of the original word's use (ie a strong person or friend), and above all is a more friendly word to use by people of all ethnicities (particularly when singing along to songs or speaking around people of the concerned ethnicity).

[Mr Brad Pitt]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbeLGqvpQDw

[cm]

I don't see why it is an issue. When they use it with one another, they don't (always) use it in a malicious matter. When white people refer to them as that, it's meaning is degrading.

There is nothing wrong with the word itself. It's just a word. But it's intent that makes it's usage wrong or right. If you say "what's up my nigguh" and hte black guy is your friend, most don't care. If you don't know somebody and you refer to them as nigger, it's obviously degrading.

But it doesn't matter, because they have less intelligence according to that other thread, so we should decide if the word is bad, and not the people whom gets associated with it.

[Mr Brad Pitt]

seejayeff said:

But it doesn't matter, because they have less intelligence according to that other thread, so we should decide if the word is bad, and not the people whom gets associated with it.

Otherwise, I second that.
I mean, the buddy-nigger thing.

[ConceptDesign]

Nigga puh-leez! Can't we go beyond lame threads like this that have been flogged to death before? How about and C word? I mean Ching Chong Chinaman, not Cnut.