This week’s Partyline was great. As I have often done, I called a girlfriend and we read it over the phone laughing and discussing the issues you brought up.
I did have one comment about the n***a word or the n***er word. The context in which Michael Richards used the word (and let’s remember he used n***er) was hateful. No amount of apology or explanation can wipe that away.
When the rap community uses the word, we hear n***a. Before the passing of Tupac Shakur, n***a meant “Never Ignorant Getting Goals Accomplished.” If you look at most of the new rappers on the scene, they are just that. Since we have taken n***er and turned it into n***a and a term of affectionate greeting, they now have us fighting among one another about a word.
Kimberly R. Wiley
St. Louis