When was the last time you heard n-word used by someone who wasn't black or a bounty hunter?

[theboss]

Throughout this campaign, there has been an undercurrent of suspicion that white voters publicly declare their support for Obama while still calling him "nigger" behind his back. I find this curious because it's literally been years since I heard the N-word used in a casual conversation by a white person - at least by white person not quoting a rapper or black comedian.

Granted, I now live in Northern Virginia where everyone is politically correct to a fault. But I grew up in West Virginia and Pittsburgh and still spend a fair amount of time around what can only be described as "white, blue-collar workers." I believe the last time I heard the N-word used casually among that crowd was during the Tyson-Holyfield fight when Tyson bit Holyfield's ear off. The consensus among two drunks seated near me was that Holyfield was a good guy but that Tyson was a "n-----."

So, how often do you hear it?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. I don't think I've heard it in a conversation in at least 20 years.

[theboss]

4. I've heard it a few times...I can pin point the location most of the time

1989 - a fight at a local high school game between my school, which was 97 percent white and a rival school which was probably 20 percent black. However, their basketball team was 50 percent black and the gym was in a black neighborhood. A pretty decent brawl took place after the game, and I heard one man yell, "I'm gonna get that n----r." I do not believe that he succeeded as he was 5'6, skinny, and intoxicated.

1994 - At a bar where I'm having a conversation with a friend. Another acquaintance who is pretty serious alcholic and a wannabe Hell's Angel comes into the bar. When sober, this guy is actually a fairly sweet guy. When drunk - which is most of the day - he has a hair-trigger temper. He also held a bench press record for my high school football team so he's pretty handy in a bar brawl. He's completely blitzed and is inexplicably yelling, "N---r! N----r" at the end of the bar. Granted, there are no black people in this bar and, like, five in this town so this is odd. The guy I'm talking to is dating a girl, however, who has a child who is half black. He actually yells at the drunk, dangerous guy to "Shut the f up." This leads to a minute of extreme worry in the bar because they think a full-scale brawl is about to take place. Luckily, a really good friend of mine who seems to know how to calm down the dunk biker guy steps in and settles him down.

1996 - An old uncle of mine refers to a local high school football player as "one tough n----r." He's, like, 78 at the time.

1997 - The aforementioned Tyson fight.

Some point in the late 90s, an elderly aunt of mine uses it describe the some of the guys at her granddaughter's high school who find said granddauther attractive.

[tekisui]

2. About a month ago.

I live in the South, and work around physical laborers and construction workers. It's STILL used. Those who know me, know how I feel about and censor themselves when I'm around. But, I still hear ignorant strangers spew a lot of bullshit.

[theboss]

5. What state?

I'm curious.

[tekisui]

6. Western NC.

I'm surely not proud of it. Growing up, I heard it constantly. I had friends who's parents would not let them watch the N's on the Cosby Show.

My parents didn't raise me that way. As I got older, I shut it down around me. It really puts a fire in my belly, and I won't take it. I pissed some people off, but they got the message.

NC will not go Dem in the General anyway.

[theboss]

7. I find that Cosby story a little hard to believe...Everyone loved the Cos

But I'm sure there are still pockets of racism throughout the country. I just don't think there is this overt racism everywhere that certain activists want to believe still exists.

I think there is a lot of subtle racism that can still be plenty damaging, however. And having a political "Jackie Robinson" is probably a pretty good way to break that.

[tekisui]

9. I assure you the Cosby story is true.

I, like you, do not think that the racists have a voting majority in this country and I want to prove it to them.

[Dervill Crow]

16. Not everyone loved the Cosby show.

It was about uppity n-----s.

Strangely enough, my mom, who was from NC, purged the N word from her vocabulary in the 1960s, but my dad, a native Oregonian, used it until the end of his life in the 1990s. I loved my dad dearly, but he was an ignorant asshole about a great many things.

[aasleka]

11. It will

I have heard this so much in NC but I know there are more people who are not asshats in this state than are.
The western part of the state won't but I expect turnout to be low and the Democratic turnout will be amazing in November.

[tekisui]

13. I hope you're right!

[havocmom]

3. I live in White Bread Central. Heard it four years ago and was stunned

I also here many life long Republicans here saying they would vote for Obama over anyone the GOP has to offer. The GOP has gone too radical for the extreme RED voters where I live.

Color, race, gender? None of it matters as much as getting the direction of this country corrected. Most of my very GOP neighbors recognize that fact.

[nosmokes]

8. Sad to say but it was the last time I was back in Alabama.

[NoBushSpokenHere]

10. Unfortunately, thanks to W, I have heard negative racial references

far too often these past 7 years. I believe our country has stepped back 100 years in time due to the tactics they have used in the past. I call out everyone I have heard on the use of any negative racial or ethnic reference. They only use the terms once in front of me.

Oh and don't worry, this answer is not related to the election - I hear just as many bashing females.

Tired of prejudiced people, tired of bigotry, tired of negative campaigning, tired of the whole crap load of stuff started by the right wing of the Republican party.

It is time for change... in a major way.

[JustinL]

12. one week ago

I live in the Philadelphia metro area. One week ago, my 56-year-old mother repeated a joke that had been told to her by my sister's 30-year-old husband, in which the last three black mayors of Philadelphia were referred to as "a Goode n-----, a Street n-----, and a Nutter n-----".

Within the past 5-6 years, I have also heard the following (not of all which involve the n-word):

  Another sister's 20-something friend stated that he did not like going to a particular movie theater because there were always a lot of "n-----s" there who "ruin the movie".

  A 50-something coworker referred to a young white woman who he suspected of having a black boyfried as a "n----- lover".

  The same coworker praised "n-----s" for always having a good sense of humor.

  My 83-year-old grandfather has used the word on countless occasions, usually in reference to baseball players or inhabitants of his neighborhood.

  My friend's 20-something roommate who grew up in rural western PA used the word numerous times, sometimes comparing the appearance of "n-----s" to that of apes.

  At dinner tonight, my mother expressed concern about visiting a particular park, and my 22-year-old brother reassured her that it was near a river and "black people don't like the water".

  My brother's 30-something friend recommended a neighborhood and reassured me that the "demographics" would suit me.

  Numerous white people have described formerly all-white neighborhoods as "turning" when blacks or Hispanics begin to move in.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. There's probably more.

[theboss]

15. Is being concerned about neighborhood demographics overtly racist?

I'm in the process of moving to Houston and am still learning the neighborhoods, but I know I ain't moving into the Fifth Ward.

[Dervill Crow]

14. Occasionally.

I would like to say it is someone really old or really young, but it's just someone who is really ignorant. Two people, actually, whom I know use that word, both of them middle class ostensibly Christian males.

[bigbrother05]

17. My Dad, used it all the time till he passed

He was Military career guy, we moved to southern Georgia when I was 6, from Minn. early 60's, I had never even seen an AA
but the signs were still up, As an young adult, I finally got the nerve to confront him, and asked him when he became such a bigot, he didn't respond, but refrained from using the language around me and my family.

[Frustratedlady]

18. I can't remember the last time I heard the word.

It had to have been many years ago....many years ago.

[lastliberalintexas]

19. Come to SE Texas

Unfortunately down here you can even hear a few Dems say it. And forgetabout the repubs in the South- many of them may as well be wearing the white hood. :(

[tammywammy]

22. Where are you at in SE Texas?

I have family in the Beaumont/Pt Arthur area. :hi:

[lastliberalintexas]

23. The Beaumont/Port Arthur area

:)


I recently overheard a man in the grocery store talking with his wife/girlfriend about how dangerous Port Arthur has gotten and that the murder rate this year has been higher than that of DC. His comment was that at least it was just n- killing other n-.

No one of my acquaintance uses that word (at least in my presence), but I work with some individuals who very likely use it when not at work. The worst racism is that which is more subtle, though. I knew a Black guy who once said that he'd maybe vote for David Duke over Edwin Edwards, since he knew exactly where Duke stood. I didn't understand it then, but I think I do now after Obama's campaign and the reactions I have seen here.

Not that most of those same people I know would think any better of a female leader, much less a particular female named Hillary Clinton. So many are just uninformed/misinformed and apathetic, but buy into the media talking points. Thankfully the area is still mostly Dem, but even that could be changing due to the influence of religion. :(

[tammywammy]

26. My family's more liberal

They're in Pt Acres and Bridge City. The only time I heard my grandfather use that word was once when we were watching television. A commercial came on for "Shawshank Redemption" and he turned to me and said "that n-----'s a good actor" referring to Morgan Freeman. :crazy:

[tammywammy]

20. Yesterday, unfortunately

My dad was at my house helping me do yard work. His wife called and left him a voice mail asking "Are you almost done being the yard n-----?" :grr:

Thankfully, my dad's leaving her within the next couple of weeks.

I don't know when the last time I heard it before that though.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

21. I Can't Even Remember How Many Years Its Been.

I guess I'm lucky for that.

But I definitely can say that I haven't heard it used towards him whatsoever during this campaign, though I've heard countless times already sexist slander towards Hillary and why they wouldn't vote for her. That's been quite depressing to me, actually, since I really did think we were ready as a country to not really view her through such eyes, but I'm saddened to say too many aren't quite ready for a woman president yet.

[kimmylavin]

24. Pretty recently.

Live in a rural area about 50 miles north of Los Angeles.
You hear it around here quite a bit.

I'm actually involved in a war of words right now with an "old guard" type of guy who uses the tiny local paper as his very own pulpit.

Two issues ago, he wrote about all those "pious, politically correct" and "hysterical" people who have the nerve to think they can tell HIM how to speak.

He told several stories, mostly centered around friends who use "the N word" (as he says) and then go and have lunch with black friends the next day. (Just like every Nazi knew a Jew who didn't deserve to die... I hate it when people use this excuse...) And then he bemoaned the fact that Imus lost his job because of "three ill conceived words".

I wrote a letter lambasting him for this and other things (how his wife cringes every time he calls a waitress "Hon", for instance). The latest issue has his reply, which basically says that if I even had been sexually harassed, it must have been because of what I was wearing! (And that at 32, I'm too young to tell him how to speak...)

Racism - and sexism - are very much alive up here...



As for Los Angeles itself, go spend some time with a film crew.
It gets tossed around a LOT, as well as many, many epithets about homosexuals.
And this is NOT in jokey way, they mean it.
(A lot of crews (the physical labor kind, not the artsy kind) are staffed with blue collar guys, many of whom are involved in motorcycle gangs, many of which advocate hating others because of skin color/ethnicity.
It can get pretty ugly...

[Recursion]

25. Kramer (nt)

[AZ Criminal JD]

27. Recently I was on a business trip to Chicago and heard it three times.

I was in the city for six days and was in different bars three nights. I heard it several times in each bar. I couldn't tell you how many years it has been since I heard the word in a bar in Birmingham where I live.

[MrSlayer]

28. All the time.

This Philadelphia blue collar, union construction worker hears it constantly. It's written on the walls and verbalized all the time. Lots of racism here in Philly. Of course women are treated as poorly. The consensus is they'd rather vote for Barack over Hillary but many are going to go McCain.