I want to thank Kentucky basketball star Andrew Harrison.
In one fell swoop, in front of national media, he showed how
stupid and damaging the usage of the N-word – nigga – can be.
Not familiar with the story?
Well, Saturday night after an epic basketball semi-final battle with the
University of Wisconsin in the mens Final Four, Kentucky players sat in a press
conference, answering questions after losing their first game of the season to
Wisconsin and ending their season.
As one Kentucky player was talking about Wisconsin star Frank Kaminsky, a dejected Harrison said off-handedly with microphones still
present, “Fuck that nigga.”
I hate that word. I
hate it when white folks use it, but I also hate it when young black men and
women use it, especially in public.
It’s just a word that was born out of hate, used in the name of hate but
also used by young people now as just a plain ole dumb part of the vernacular.
Harrison apologized (well, someone in the Kentucky athletic
department did for him, I think) and, well, that’s that.
But here’s the deal. Today, there are a bunch of white folks
who are complaining that had it been the other way around, had Frank Kaminsky
said, “Fuck that nigga” about Harrison, there’d be a humungous uproar that
would bring out the Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton in all of us.
They are correct.
That’s exactly what would happen.
So these folks are upset that Harrison isn’t facing the same
kind of music as Kaminsky would.
I can tell you why he isn’t. It’s simple actually.
Harrison spoke in a way he probably always speaks,
especially to his friends. Young black
men, from rappers to ordinary black men on college campuses and street corners,
use the word “nigga” for everything.
But it’s not about malice. It’s
just how these silly jokers lazily use this jacked up word. It can be about anyone, but not with racist
intentions behind it.
That’s it.
Seriously. Most of us hate that
that is how these silly, young people use this terrible word, especially in
public. We absolutely hate it. That lame argument that it's actually taking
the word and changing its meaning to destroy the negative power of it is a
bunch of bullshit that doesn’t work. But
that’s what they think and that’s how they use it. It’s not about racism.
Now when white folks use it, there is history behind the
usage. You cannot call any black person
a nigga. Sorry. White people since the moment some jackass
thought it would be a good idea to kidnap black people from one country and
force them into bondage in another, to this day, have used the word “nigga” with
the full force of racism behind it, or at least the perception of it. If I were white, I wouldn’t even want to use
it, for that reason alone. Its just plain wrong for that reason alone. So why do you care to use
it??? THAT I’ve never understood.
Double standard?
Maybe. But then again, no one of
any reasonable conscious likes the word.
Just young black kids, trying to emulate rappers who are fake as hell to
me when they use it, are trying to sound hip and cool like them. Life imitating art when art supposedly
mirrors life. Most times it doesn’t and
in this issue, it’s a sad mistake and commentary on who we are.
But I digress.
My point is this – white folks who are complaining that
Harrison isn’t feeling the same sting as Kaminsky would need to understand that
its apples to oranges. Sorry, if you
don’t want to believe that, but that’s the truth. It is what it is. When a black person uses it, even when he’s
talking about a non-black person as Harrison did, he wasn’t using it as a
racially derisive term. It’s just
not. Had Kaminsky used it, it’s another
white person reaching back into history to demean a black person. Sorry, but that’s the way it is. If you’re white, simply don’t use it. Life is good.
I know why you guys are complaining though – you are tired
of feeling like the victim. Tired of
feeling like everyone thinks that all white people are racist. So you jump on this to try to say, "see, no
merit in this whole race argument." Well,
you are wrong. Just because you have this
ill-thought out feeling, you have added fuel to the whole fiery issue of racism
in this country.
You are part of a system where black folks have suffered for
centuries because of racism, and continue to do so. Many of you have allowed politicians to
selfishly and wronglfully use race as a way to keep them in power and further
divide us a nation. And most of you have
done nothing but complain when race becomes a factor. I’m sorry, but race is a factor. It has been, and unfortunately probably
always will be, a factor in this country.
Ninety-nine person of black people don’t hate white
people. And those angry at white people
aren’t angry because you are white. They
are angry because of what being white represents. They are angry because they still suffer from
a completely inequitable American system.
Pulling up by the bootstraps?
Nearly all of us do it everyday.
But many of us don’t have the same kind of bootstraps as you do. We have to work twice as hard and get little
in return. That’s why many blacks are
angry. It’s not about racism. It’s the
anger towards racism that you, I’m sorry to say, benefit from each day, even if
you aren’t racist. It’s true.
If you’re young and black like Andrew Harrison, here is
reason No. 1 why your stupid butt shouldn’t be using the word AT ALL. No black person is a nigga. And no other person is a nigga. And the word nigga is a hatefully negative term that you
cannot change the meaning of. Stop using
it.
So thanks, Mr. Harrison.
You’ve shined the light on a great topic for a bunch of folks who need
to talk about it, black and white.
