White Writers Join N-Word Debate - The Root

White Writers Join N-Word Debate - The Root
JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
White writers are coming forward to say they cannot sit on the sidelines in the debate over who can use the "N-Word," if anyone. The latest is Mike Wise, Washington Post sports columnist, who responded in Friday's printed Post, "I deserve a seat at this table. This is about the world my 3-year-old is going to live in."Wise isn't the only one. Garret Mathews, a retired metro columnist for the Evansville (Ind.) Courier & Press, wrote Thursday in the Indianapolis Star about a visit to an Indianapolis high school where the word was bandied about by black students. He taught them about the civil rights movement. "I tell the students the N-word was used by white racists as far back as the 19th century to reinforce the stereotype that persons of color are lazy and stupid," Mathews wrote.
Even Rush Limbaugh, patron saint of conservative talk radio, entered the fray. After Michael Wilbon, co-host of ESPN's "Pardon the Interruption," said last week that he uses the N-word "all day, every day of my life" and that white people have no right to tell black people how to use it, Limbaugh said Wilbon should have used the occasion to scold white liberals wedded to "political correctness" — not all whites.
The latest controversies over the N-word have come from the sports world. The NBA fined Los Angeles Clippers forward Matt Barnes $25,000 last week after his ejection after L.A.'s' 111-103 victory over Oklahoma City the previous night. Officially, Barnes was dinged for "failing to leave the court in a timely manner … and using inappropriate language on his Twitter account."
"I love my teammates like family, but I'm DONE standing up for these n—–!" Barnes wrote, referring to his fellow Clippers, Ben Golliver reported for Sports Illustrated. "All this s— does is cost me money."
Before that, black players in the Miami Dolphins locker room said they had no problem with white players calling them the word. The Dolphins' Richie Incognito, according to news reports, left a voice mail calling teammate Jonathan Martin the N-word. Incognito later apologized after the incident became public.
Most recently, John Wooten, chairman of the Fritz Pollard Alliance, a group formed to promote diversity in hiring in the NFL, said Thursday that Trent Williams, offensive tackle for the Washington Redskins, directed the N-word at umpire Roy Ellison after Ellison had attempted to stop players from the Washington and Philadelphia teams from directing abusive language at one another, Mark Maske and Mike Jones reported Friday in the Post. Williams and Ellison are black.
On Friday, the NFL suspended Ellison for one game without pay for “making a profane and derogatory statement" to Williams, Maske and Jones reported Saturday.
Wise wrote, "All this time I had it in my leftist-engineer head that this word was the most vile, disgusting, loaded word in the history of the English language, and now it's an accepted synonym for 'man' or 'dude' or 'partner?' More jarring, Wilbon said he used it 'all day, every day, all my life,' specifying on 'Pardon the Interruption,' 'I have a problem with white people framing the discussion for the use of the N-word.'
"Okay.
"And I have a problem with anyone of any ethnicity telling me that my values and beliefs about eradicating slurs from public and private conversation are less important than having agency over them for personal use — no matter who it hurts, including millions of African Americans who want the word abolished and should have just as much say.
"Actually, it's deeper than that. When you think you're fighting for a less hostile, less confusing and more mutually respectful country for our children to live in and then you find out your idea of a shared purpose wasn't shared by people you like and respect, a real hopelessness sets in.
"The N-word is filth; it's disrespectful, confusing and uplifts no one. I know of no other minority in the world co-opting a dehumanizing, racial slur used by its oppressor.
"Yet I’m told, 'You don’t get it; you’re white.'
"No. That doesn't work for me. I deserve a seat at this table. This is about the world my 3-year-old is going to live in.
"Spending my formative years in a rural part of Hawaii, where welfare and food stamps were how many families in Ewa Beach got by, I grew up as one of a few 'haole' kids among an ethnic stew of poor- to middle-class Filipino, Samoan, Tongan, Hawaiian and Japanese kids. I would not wish some of the early prejudice and violence I experienced on any prepubescent teen. But in hindsight, I now feel being a minority, even for a few years, should be a prerequisite for every person of a dominant culture; it makes you see and feel what people on the other side see and feel.
"It's where I gained a real affinity and appreciation for diversity, for experiencing the world outside my own ethnic prism. I want to continue that for my son, to impart the one-world values my father imparted on me. I don't want him to experience the word in any form.
"When I am told, 'This isn't about you,' I feel like I’m being judged by the color of my skin and not the content of my character.' . . ."
Wise joins Tom Joyce of the Mount Airy (N.C.) News, Skip Bayless of ESPN and Jack Dickey of Time magazine among whites who have said they cannot keep silent.
Dickey zeroed in on NBA analyst Charles Barkley, a Hall of Famer who said, "White America don't get to dictate how me and Shaq [O'Neill] talk to each other." Dickey picked apart Barkley's logic in a blog post headlined, "Charles Barkley Is Still Not a Role Model."
Jenice Armstrong, Philadelphia Daily News: Rest of Dolphins owe as much blame in Incognito flap (Nov. 13)


Bryan Burwell, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: N-word isn't acceptable in the workplace


Connie Cass, Associated Press: Young people say online slurs common, not OK


Chris Chase, USA Today: Adrian Peterson hears 'crazier things than just the N-word' in NFL locker rooms


Michael DiRocco, ESPN.com: Jaguars react to potential ban of N-word


J.R. Gamble, the Shadow League: Stephen A. Smith Says White Opinion Must Kick Rocks, Leave Fate Of N-Word to Blacks


Justice B. Hill, BET: The N-Word Defines Blackness in All the Wrong Ways


Ernest Hooper, Tampa Bay (Fla.) Times: Learning n-word's origin might help curtail its use


Mark Maske, Washington Post: Fritz Pollard Alliance urges NFL players to stop using N-word


Piers Morgan, CNN: Debating the "N" Word and the "F" Word with Charles Blow, Don Lemon, and Noah Michelson


Lateef Mungin, CNN: Massachusetts high school cancels football games after racial slur spraypainted on player's home


Bob Raissman, Daily News, New York: Bryant Gumbel on 'Real Sports' says no one should ever use N-word


Gyasi Ross, Huffington Post: Richie Incognito, Redskins and Racism in the NFL


George Willis, New York Post: LaTroy Hawkins: Keep N-word out of locker rooms (Nov. 13