My Grandma used the N-Word but swore she wasn't a racist.

[trumad]

She's been dead for several years now---- but back in the day she would drop the word quite often. I'd call her on it, but she'd get so indignant and yell up and down that she wasn't a racist. She'd say stuff like ---" while just the other day, I played Parcheesi with a black woman at the Bingo hall". Or---- "I go to church with them people"....

She was from the old school of racism and didn't even know she was a racist.

Which brings me to Bill O'Reilly. His comments the other day about Sylvia's restaurant remind me of my Grandmother. Difference is--- Old Billo aint no old 85 year old woman from Indiana. He's a national talk show host who lives in New York. Did he make these comments for his base of listeners---or is he an ignorant old racist fool... I'll go with the ignorant old racist fool.

Now he's screaming that his comments weren't racist and that this is nothing more than a smear job by Media Matters. Dude just don't get it does he?

[aikoaiko]

1. What did OReilly say?

[Jim__]

3. Here's a link.

Link

[mzteris]

8. omg - I didn't think even HE was that stupid!

". . . people were sitting there, and they were ordering and having fun. And there wasn't any kind of craziness at all."


Wow. Just. Wow.

[Katherine Brengle]

17. Oh my freaking non-existent god.

That was bad, even for O'Lielly.

[madokie]

2. I'll go with the ignorant old racist fool, too. proud to say I don't watch the basturd

people like him think they own the world and the rest of us are trespassers,

[Le Taz Hot]

4. Same here.

I was telling my great uncle the other day about starting to set out my winter crop and mentioned I was planting collard greens and mustard greens. His response: "Jigaboo food." I cringed, of course, but what can you say? He's 85, and VERY feeble and at this point, I'm not going to change him. Although when we were both younger we had some great (female)meathead/Archie screaming matches.

[mmonk]

5. Yes. Cultural racism fools people into thinking they aren't

when they are.

[Iris]

6. Exactly. I know old folks who don't think they are racist because it's a "fact"

that black folks are not on the same level of white folks.

[Canuckistanian]

7. In Britain and Canada, it was a common name for a black dog

My father's dog when he was a boy was named that. It really surprised me when my dad told me that.

Also, watch the British wartime film "The Dambusters". The Wing Commander's dog was also named that.

But I would put that down to sheer ignorance. The Black population almost nil (in Canada and England) in those days and we wouldn't have grasped that it was a racial slur.

[dipsydoodle]

10. Was the name for in Britain

for dark brown shoe polish and suede too - was applied to lots of things which were dark brown in colour. Not intended to be racist in any way to my knowledge - simply descriptive as was the original use of the word when it was spelt Niger back in the 1700's.

It seems to have been abuse in the USA which turned it into a no no word. There is infact an exemption in the UK for continued use of tradition songs containing the word.

I've never quite grasped the use of the word "black" never having seen anyone who was literally so.

[immoderate]

11. It's the opposite of white.

There's really no white people either.

--IMM

[dipsydoodle]

15. I agree

I wonder where the expression white people came from anyway ?

[NOLALady]

13. Have you seen anyone who was literally white?

[Zookeeper]

27. I tend to think of myself as more, "Pink."

But, I have a tendency to be too literal. :D

[populistdriven]

9. Bill O was the victim of an unsuccessful leftist-run reappropriation campaign

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reappropriation

everyone on the right is a victim of the leftist agenda

[NOLALady]

12. I realized a very long time ago that there are no

racists in the USA.
Many white people have felt it necessary to tell me the stories of their racist parent, spouse, children, aunt, uncle, cousin, neighbors. They then pat themselves on the back about how they are not racist. But, when/if I meet same parent, spouse, child, aunt, uncle, cousin or neighbor they will proceed to tell me the same story about how they are not racist, its everyone else that they know.
David Duke is not a racist either. I know that because he says so.
Have you read any comments from the good citizens of Jena, LA.? No racists there either.

Since I have yet to meet someone who says they are racists, I have concluded that none exists.

[Warpy]

14. My mother never used the word until she'd lived in the south

for over 20 years. In fact, I never heard her use it until they moved from NC to Florida in the mid 70s. I have no clue what provoked the change.

I'd gone to integrated schools until I was 11. She thought segregated schools were weird and wasn't too polite to say so. When I brought black kids home as friends, there was never a comment and no change in the way they were treated from white friends. The n-word was forbidden, she called it vulgar.

Yet, some time in the 70s, she started using that word and I noticed a similar change in attitude. I always wondered what had changed in her life, and I winced every time she said the word or came out with some ridiculous racist comment. Was she at last adopting the attitude that had been all around her for years? Did some event cause her to change from civil rights supporter to racist? Was she pissed off by some of the sillier rhetoric from the more fringe leaders?

I always wanted to know but it's one of the things she never talked about. She didn't know she'd become a racist, either.

[Iris]

16. "Was she pissed off by some of the sillier rhetoric from the more fringe leaders?"

or perhaps she bought into the right-wing rhetoric. I'm sure "welfare queens" was a euphemism for black women even though there are more white people on welfare than black.

[Warpy]

18. "Welfare queens" didn't happen until the late 70s

which is long after I'd noticed the change. But yes, it was a code for "lazy inner city black women with gobs of kids and no morals." Never mind raising kids is the hardest work out there, and raising them on welfare nearly impossible.

[Iris]

22. gosh. Who knows, then?

I find myself being less accepting as I grow older,but this kind of thing reminds me to check myself.

[H2O Man]

19. What was

her middle name?

[trumad]

24. Margaret...same as my daughters...

[H2O Man]

28. Okay.

One of my grandmothers was named Margaret, as well. I used to tell my co-worker Gretchen that she reminded me of my granny.

[slackmaster]

20. I have three cousins who grew up in Pennsylvania who used it all the time

Being half Indian they are rather dark-skinned themselves.

[Heidi]

21. A lot of people don't even know what racism is.

I've heard people claim they weren't racist simply because their language wasn't laden with racial epithets. Racism is a belief that race is the primary determinant of human characteristics; lots of people believe that in their heart of hearts. I believe Bill O'Reilly is a racist, whether he wants to be one or admits to being one. Denial is a deep and treacherous stream.

[IndianaJones]

23. sounds tolerant to me. nt.

[EFerrari]

25. I think he needed the flap for ratings. n/t

[KharmaTrain]

26. Through The Looking Glass

My late father was one of the most generous, kind men I knew...he would easily be considered racist, mysognistic, hedonistic and a bunch more istics and phobics...a contradiction, but a product of his times. I see the same thing in my generation as 35 years ago terms like "fag" or "nigger" dripped from a lot of mouths. These are words that I'd never let loose with now, but to deny I've ever used them is to deny there was ever a problem and my own awareness of that. In his lifetime my father faced the same thing...but in a far more racist time. He grew up in a "separate yet equal" world where people were identified by their nationalities and the use of slang or slurs were common.

My children would hear my father spout off and we'd always talk about it afterwards....if anything it's made them more aware of the attitudes and we'd discuss why they were wrong. It appears many others have had the same learning experience.

BillO thinks he's been sandbagged. CNN just did a follow-up that shows BillO trying to get his black friends say good things about him...the "some of my best friends" defense. It's pathetic as it only unmasks this goon's racism further to those who suspect him already. Imus going groveling to Reverend Al didn't help and neither will BillO...but it's very telling that this is how both thought they could make their racism "go away".

[NorthernSpy]

29. this may be why fair-skinned blacks often express much more negative views of whites...

... than do dark-skinned blacks.

The whiter you look, the more likely you are to have had this stuff said right to your face by someone who has no idea that you're one of "them".

Whereas when individuals of unambiguously African appearance are within earshot, all that nigger-this, nigger-that stuff dies downs pretty quickly -- unless someone's actually trying to start a fight.


Just a theory I have.

[QueenOfCalifornia]

30. Grandma and Bill

are both racists. My family was/is the same only worse - My Mother was openly hateful and didn't care if you called her a racist - but they were all cut from the same cloth. I grew up with it and had it ingrained into my head -- It is terrible to bring up children with that ignorant crap. My kids have never heard me or my husband say anything remotely racist. I began changing my attitude when I left home at 17 and started traveling around the world on my own - It opened up my eyes and I realized I had been poisoned. Your poor Grandma was hyper aware of everyones color and wanted you to know that she played cards or whatever with a real, true to life "n......."

Bill O'Shithead has no excuse except he is a never ending bag of hot, hateful air.

[ismnotwasm]

31. My Grandma used it

And she sure in fuck WAS a racist. There are people like her today. She also used jigabooo and pickininny. I brought a black friend's daughter over with my daughter when they both were about three. (This was 25 years ago) I remember her saying the little girl was "repulsive" That was the day I realized Grandma was a "real" racist and NOT a product of her times.(Although the "product of her times" excuse doesn't fly with me. I worked in long term care for over ten years and met enough old folk who were NOT racist) She moved closer to us as she grew old and ill, and I had never realized how bad it was.