Let's start off by stating "I am white"! I'm sure I can only begin to imagine how a black person might feel when called the "N" word, but even my imagination would not begin to cover the depth of their pain. I grew up in the rural south and if I had a nickel for eavery time I'd heard the "N" word used I honestly think I might be a millionaire now. I remember when the notice came down that my local school would finally begin integration in 60's. Mostly what I remember are the arguments/discussions my parents had about what their options were. With five children (3 in school) there was no way they could afford to put us all in private school. They eventually decided they had no choice and sent us all off to school with warnings about leaving them alone, making sure we always traveled in two's, not to speak to them even if they said something to us, LOL...there was quite a litany of advice. I was in the fourth grade. Turns out I had 4 blacks in my class, 2 girls and 2 boys. 40+ years later I still remember each of their names. The other thing I remember about the four is how smart they each were. This was actually quite funny because one of the arguments against integration had been that having blacks in our school would lower our level of education. Karen and Laurel became good friends of mine, so good in fact that I had to argue with my parents to let them come to our home after school. Slowly attitudes in our home changed, not completely, but in visible ways. Two years later our school got a black principal...I heard a few of the same old arguments, but once there, he was one of the best principals I was ever blessed to have. By the time I graduated from high school my school was 55% black and I had numerous black friends. A few of their parents became close friends with my mom and it was not uncommon to find them in our kitchen baking mass batches of cookies at Christmas or working on PTA projects for our school. The "N" word was eventually banned in our home, but I still saw it's power to embarass and humiliate my friends. I of course received my own version of the offensive word by being called a "N" lover, by those still backwards enough to think that skin color might make whites more superior.
I find it quite sad that so many of the younger generation seem to use the "N' word so frequently, particularly but not exclusively amongst blacks themselves. This generation has been blessed to grow up in a more racially tolerant time and have never had to experience the pain and humiliation that their parents have had to overcome. Unfortunately, while the youth might glibly utter the "N" word, there are still far too many others that use it to announce to others their belief in white superiority. For those that still use the "N" word in the derogatory context, I find that they usually also have an equally offensive vocabulary to define other races/nationalities whether it be Mexicans, Chinese, Spanish, etc. (All of which I find offensive.)
As for me, I've found that it is much easier to divide the world into just two categories, those that are morons and those that are not. I guess the biggest difficulty in my method of division is, you actually have to wait for a person to open their mouth and say something before they can be classified.:wink:
