Quote:
Originally Posted by donquixote99
The meme that blacks are niggers has been passed down, from generation to generation. You learned it in your childhood, perhaps first in 'nigger jokes.' It passes from older kids to younger kids, even if parents would not explicitly teach such a thing, or even teach against it.
Now you grew up to be a decent person, and you'd never use the word, probably not even as I just have, to talk about how things work. Still, the identity is back there, in your mind. If you explicitly think 'What are blacks?' that word is one of the answers.
And sometimes when events or circumstances put blacks and whites in conflict, perhaps in the workplace, perhaps in the school, perhaps at a demonstration, certainly when policing the streets, and in the courts, and in the jails--that word, and all it implies, are ready and waiting. Maybe you keep it closed up. Others let it sneak about in their minds, and some glory in it.
That's the legacy we're dealing with.
|
Hey Don,
I think I can honestly say that the n word is not in my mind when I deal with, hear about, or read about the black folks. Seriously, it is not. I would bet my kids never think it, might not even know the word. Yes I heard the jokes, some, when I was a kid.
I do get myself into trouble with the word boy. My northern midwest farm boy culture sneaks in. "How are you boys doing? I never learned it as a derogatory term, in fact as a term of endearment. Thus the slip.
Even so, you do make it clear, that the "legacy" is still likely alive. Hopefully it will be dead by the end of my children's generation.