Thoughts on showing your tail...
My parents always told me and my brothers not to "show our tail" when we're in public. It's probably an offensive thing to say when you think about it. Like we're supposed to be good little monkeys and not show our tails. But what they were saying in a somewhat crude way, is that when in public, we should hold ourselves and conduct ourselves with a certain grace and dignity. That there was a time and place for everything. That sometimes things that would be appropriate in a private setting would no longer be appropriate in a public setting.
That's where I think we are with the N word. The black community is clearly divided on the issue. I confess that occasionally I use the word in private but would never think to do so publicly. And while I know some blacks want all blacks to purge that word from their vocabularies, I just don't see that happening.
One thing I am concerned about is the mindset. The nigga mindset. Stanley Crouch articulates it well in the excellent documentary, "The N Word." He talks about the fact that somehow the brotha who's been to jail, who's ran with a gang, who's had problems with the police...somehow that's the "real brotha." He's the real black man. And that bitches and hoes and all of that starts with the N word. There really is a mindset out there that to be real, to be authentically black, you've got to be a thug. And I don't know where that comes from but it's detrimental to the community.
Everyone wants to blame rap. I hear white people blaming rap all the time. And a lot of the ones doing the blaming have a thimble full of experience with rap music. Rap started off as battling music. It was like the dozens set to a beat. And instead of gangs fighting in NY, they would battle on the mic. And it turned into party music. During the 80's, rap became socially conscious. So many hip hop groups like Public Enemy were rapping about issues important to the black community. Things like stopping violence, being responsible fathers, anti-drinking, anti-drugs, learning history...With the emergence of West Coast rappers like N.W.A. and Ice-T in the late 80's, early 90's brought gangsta rap and hardcore to the masses. And even those early records brought important messages about drugs int he community and police brutality. Then you had a wave of rappers out to get paid who thought the easiest way to do that were to be thugs. And most of the industry started to go in that direction because that's where the money was.
My point is though that this nigga mentality...getting paid,.bitches...hoes...It didn't start with rap. If you go back to the blaxploitation films of the 70's you'll see pimps portrayed as stars and role models. And blacks have been using the N word amongst themselves from sources I've read since the 1920's. So while one can definitely fault hip hop for popularizing the use of the N word and some negative images, this mindset was out there.
Richard Pryor really did his part by publicly using the N word and making it acceptable for other comedians to use. And from there many blacks took and ran with the word publicly. Years later when Pryor told of the epiphany he had in Africa, where a voice said to him, "Look around what do you see?" And he said he saw people of ever shade. And the voice said, "Do you see any niggers?" And he said no. And the voice said, "That's because they're aren't any." And Pryor vowed to not use that word to refer to another black again. It was a profound statement but the genie was out of the bottle.
If people knew that there were different ways to conduct themselves, I think this world would be a better place. Like when we tell little children not to yell in the house. We tell them to use their "inside voice." We want them to make a distinction between how they behave in the living room and how they behave on the playground. There's a time and place. And maybe the N word belongs inside amongst blacks if they so choose to use it. Just as locker room talk was meant to stay in the locker room, not in church or the grocery store.
What is so difficult about relegating profanity, the N word, ebonics and whatever to the home and speaking proper English in public? What's so hard about having that little internal switch that you click on and off? I've known bilingual people who speak their native tongue at home and English when they're in public. My brothers and I when we speak privately will drop into ebonics, sometimes profanity and we may drop an N bomb from time to time, but different settings allow for different behavior. And I think that's the best you're going to get.
Proclaiming a word off limits just will not work.
That's where I think we are with the N word. The black community is clearly divided on the issue. I confess that occasionally I use the word in private but would never think to do so publicly. And while I know some blacks want all blacks to purge that word from their vocabularies, I just don't see that happening.
One thing I am concerned about is the mindset. The nigga mindset. Stanley Crouch articulates it well in the excellent documentary, "The N Word." He talks about the fact that somehow the brotha who's been to jail, who's ran with a gang, who's had problems with the police...somehow that's the "real brotha." He's the real black man. And that bitches and hoes and all of that starts with the N word. There really is a mindset out there that to be real, to be authentically black, you've got to be a thug. And I don't know where that comes from but it's detrimental to the community.
Everyone wants to blame rap. I hear white people blaming rap all the time. And a lot of the ones doing the blaming have a thimble full of experience with rap music. Rap started off as battling music. It was like the dozens set to a beat. And instead of gangs fighting in NY, they would battle on the mic. And it turned into party music. During the 80's, rap became socially conscious. So many hip hop groups like Public Enemy were rapping about issues important to the black community. Things like stopping violence, being responsible fathers, anti-drinking, anti-drugs, learning history...With the emergence of West Coast rappers like N.W.A. and Ice-T in the late 80's, early 90's brought gangsta rap and hardcore to the masses. And even those early records brought important messages about drugs int he community and police brutality. Then you had a wave of rappers out to get paid who thought the easiest way to do that were to be thugs. And most of the industry started to go in that direction because that's where the money was.
My point is though that this nigga mentality...getting paid,.bitches...hoes...It didn't start with rap. If you go back to the blaxploitation films of the 70's you'll see pimps portrayed as stars and role models. And blacks have been using the N word amongst themselves from sources I've read since the 1920's. So while one can definitely fault hip hop for popularizing the use of the N word and some negative images, this mindset was out there.
Richard Pryor really did his part by publicly using the N word and making it acceptable for other comedians to use. And from there many blacks took and ran with the word publicly. Years later when Pryor told of the epiphany he had in Africa, where a voice said to him, "Look around what do you see?" And he said he saw people of ever shade. And the voice said, "Do you see any niggers?" And he said no. And the voice said, "That's because they're aren't any." And Pryor vowed to not use that word to refer to another black again. It was a profound statement but the genie was out of the bottle.
If people knew that there were different ways to conduct themselves, I think this world would be a better place. Like when we tell little children not to yell in the house. We tell them to use their "inside voice." We want them to make a distinction between how they behave in the living room and how they behave on the playground. There's a time and place. And maybe the N word belongs inside amongst blacks if they so choose to use it. Just as locker room talk was meant to stay in the locker room, not in church or the grocery store.
What is so difficult about relegating profanity, the N word, ebonics and whatever to the home and speaking proper English in public? What's so hard about having that little internal switch that you click on and off? I've known bilingual people who speak their native tongue at home and English when they're in public. My brothers and I when we speak privately will drop into ebonics, sometimes profanity and we may drop an N bomb from time to time, but different settings allow for different behavior. And I think that's the best you're going to get.
Proclaiming a word off limits just will not work.
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