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Granddad: Y'all need to start appreciating your granddaddy. I went and spent your inheritance on this beautiful house in this neighborhood and all I ask you to do is act like you got some class! Riley: (to Huey) Hey...what's "class"? Huey: It means, "don't act like niggas." Granddad: S-s-s-see? That's what I'm talkin' about right there! We don't use the "n-word" in this house! Huey: Granddad, you said the word "nigga" 46 times yesterday. I counted! Granddad: Nigga, hush!
Ethnic slurs are wrong. They are used as a way to imply that a whole group of people is inferior to another group in some way(s). Yet somehow, it got to be that ethnic slurs are just wrong if they are spoken by people other than the group the slur is about. (Another aspect of the Double Standard: the "W-word" and "G-word", whitey and gringo, though clearly slurs, were until recently freely usable by anyone without getting called on it. Allegations (albeit unfounded ones) that American President Barack Obama's wife may have used the former is one of the first times it's ever been indicated that a black person might not have "W-word privileges".)
The most notable form is the word "nigger", which then became a term of fellowship in American hip-hop culture. Yet that fellowship only extends to those who have been accorded N Word Privileges. So who has N Word Privileges?
Current rules appear to be as follows in the country of its most predominant usage, the United States of America:
- Those a part of the ethnic group to whom the term originally applies usually get a free pass.
- Those a part of an ethnic group who have also historically experienced racial discrimination sometimes get an honorary pass, but pains must be taken to not appear as part of the out-group when using it.
- Those a part of an ethnic group who have not historically experienced racial discrimination or have been folded into the group who have not historically experienced racial discrimination can exercise N Word Privileges only if their honorary in-group status is unquestionable to every single person within earshot. (And sometimes not even then.)
Another aspect of this trope is that if a person outside the group says an ethnic slur, that person is aware that it is wrong, or will soon accept that it is wrong, then later apologize for it. (This applies to clinical discussions of offensive terms.) Otherwise, it's just plain old prejudice. Thus when Draco Malfoy and Voldemort say " Mudblood" it doesn't count as this, because they never accept that it's wrong. (This applies bigots in Real Life, as well.)
Because whites as an ethnic group have not experienced racial discrimination (at least in history recent enough to be considered relevant) as almost every other ethnicity in the U.S., it is worth noting that most white people don't have N Word Privileges at all, even so far as calling other whites "whitey" or "gringo", etc. However, N Word Privileges do not just encompass ethnic slurs but religious ones as well, and these religious slurs are perhaps the only time whites are counted as part of an "in-group" with N Word Privileges.
Many people (of all ethnicities) find this trope problematic. Those belonging to the in-group wonder if they can really "reclaim" a word with such a loaded history, or the point in doing it at all. Those belonging in the out-group feel bereft at not having every single possible word in the English language at their disposal (not that they'd ever use it, mind, but Its The Principle Of The Thing).
The title of this trope comes from Chris Rock's expanation of why white people can't say the N word. "Well, the thing is, you used to use it all the time. Got a little uppity with it, you might say. So your N-word privileges have been revoked."
The same phenomenon can be applied to non-ethnic terms as well, usually terms for various disabilities (crip, gimp, spaz, etc.) or for sexual orientation/identity minorities (fag, queer, tranny, etc.). The general idea is to resist the euphemism treadmill —thus implying that no euphemisms are needed because the concepts that would usually be referred to by "polite" words are not inherently shameful and do not need to be hidden.
Also see T-Word Euphemism, which this page demonstrates.
Examples
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Comic Books
- In an old issue of Uncanny X-Men, where Kitty Pryde is confronting a group of her fellow students who are plotting to kill Professor Xavier during a visit to Columbia University (this was at a time that Kitty was taking college classes). One of the students, who was black, accuses Kitty of being "a mutie," to which Kitty replies: "I dunno, Ray, are you a nigger?" (The word was not censored in the original dialogue.) Ray responds predictably, prompting Kitty to call him on his hypocrisy.
- And in the Uncanny X-Men graphic novel God Loves, Man Kills, Kitty's dance teacher Stevie Hunter attempts to keep Kitty from beating up a boy who'd called her a "mutie lover"(not knowing that Kitty herself was a mutant), by telling Kitty that "they're just words". Kitty immediately throws Stevie's seeming hypocrisy in her face, asking her if she'd be so calm had the boy called Kitty a "nigger lover".
- In an issue of Punisher MAX, a member of the IRA visiting the United States goes on a rant to his friend about how he'll be "nobody's nigger ever again", forgetting that he isn't in Belfast and the word means something very different in the States. He soon finds himself surrounded by some very...unhappy people.
- In Y The Last Man, white Yorick's black bodyguard uses the N word in reference to him, and eventually lets him use it in reference to her.
- The Quantum And Woody issue "Noogie" explicitly refers to this in an intro saying that they've been forbidden to use the "N-word", and will use the word "Noogie" instead. It then subverts it by having a poor black character refer to Woody (who is white) as his "noogie". Quantum, who is black but wears a costume that covers him completely, takes offense, only to be told, "You're black? S-word!"
- Referenced, Fantastic Racism style, in Ultimate X Men:
Northstar: Somophore year I realise I'm gay, and now you're telling me I'm a mutie?
Angel: Um, you may want to live the life for a bit before you start slinging derogatory terms like that, even if you're trying to reappropriate them, or whatever.
Film
- Blazing Saddles. The blacks in the movie use the N word toward each other in a friendly manner. All white characters who use it are racists, including the little old lady. Mel Brooks stated that he intentionally wanted to overuse the word in the movie to the point that it became such nonsense that nobody could possibly be offended by it anymore. Most people assume that this was a strong influence from co-writer Richard Pryor, but Brooks has stated that most of the parts you'd assume were written by Pryor probably weren't.
- In Rush Hour, Chris Tucker says, "Wassup, mah nigga!" to some of his friends at a bar—after having told Jackie Chan's character to follow his lead. Chan's character is new to the United States, so just thinks that's something to say. It doesn't go down so well. Especially since he uses it on a white bartender. And when asked to repeat himself, says it again, slowly and clearly.
- In White Chicks, two black men under cover as white Rich Bitches (in this case, it is as bad as it sounds) make the mistake of singing along with a rap song on the radio. When the genuine Rich Bitches in the car with them get shocked, they respond, "No-one's listening, right?". Cut to the whole car singing along with a Cluster N Bomb, grinning and giggling girlishly.
- Quentin Tarantino is noted for his liberal and unapologetic use of the word, especially in his earlier work. In an interview, Tarantino claimed that he wanted to shout the word from the rooftops until it lost all meaning. Some black filmmakers such as Denzel Washington and Spike Lee have criticized him for it, while others such as Samuel L. Jackson have defended him.
- In True Romance, Dennis Hopper's character tells a story about how "Italians were spawned from niggers" to a mafioso who is about to torture him. Hopper's language is part of his ploy to enfuriate the mobster into killing him quickly so that he cannot give up his son's location. In the DVD commentary, Tarantino revealed that he had learned the story of Moors interbreeding with Italians from a black friend of his, who had since passed on.
- Pulp Fiction features black and white characters dropping N-bombs as well as other racial slurs throughout the film. Perhaps most notable was Tarantino's own tirade about his garage being used for "dead nigger storage." While defending Tarantino's dialogue, Samuel L. Jackson claimed that he had ad-libbed two or three N-bombs for every one that appeared in the script.
- Spoofed to hell and back by Clerks 2. Randall uses the term "porch monkey", to the horror of his coworkers and the (black) customers. Later, when it is explained to him what the term means (his grandmother used it all the time, and on reflection he realized she was probably pretty racist), he decides to "take it back" - i.e., by using it, make it less offensive. He even goes so far as to make a jacket that says "Porch Monkey 4 Life" on the back using tape. Yeah, he gets the shit beat out of him for it. By a black cop. Who busts him while he's watching a live bestiality show.
- "I always used Porch Monkey to describe lazy people in general, not lazy black people."
- "My grandma is not a racist! [reflecting] Though, she did refer to a broken bottle as a "Nigger Knife"."
- It's called inter-species erotica, fucko.
- An in-character discussion of who is actually entitled to N-word privileges occurs in the Damon Wayans movie Bamboozled, and may have been something of a Take That by writer/director Spike Lee at the Tarantino character. Wayans has a conversation with his white boss. The boss contrasts himself with the starch-suited, very carefully spoken, single and uptown-living Wayans, saying "I have a black wife, black children, hell, I even used to live in the ghetto, so I feel I'm entitled to use that word." Wayans says he'd prefer his boss didn't, at which the boss scowls and proceeds to drop a cluster N-bomb, never at any point directing it at Wayans, just saying the word a lot. The scene (without apparent transition) then becomes a fantasy Wayans has of violently assaulting his boss and beating his face in. ... All while screaming "Whitey! Whitey! Whitey!"
- In fact, N Word Privileges are a central theme of Bamboozled: Wayans' character, Pierre Delacroix, creates for his TV exec boss, Thomas Dunwitty, a program called Mantan: The New Millennium Minstrel Show, which pretty much recreates joke-for-joke, blackface-for-blackface the minstrel shows of yore. The show is, of course, a runaway hit, leading to (among other things) audience participation: all members of the studio-taping audience - who are of every race and creed under the sun - proudly wear blackface and declare "I'ma nigger!" One of the catch-phrases of Honeycutt, the show's MC, is "Niggers is a beautiful thang," which the audience shouts back with great enthusiasm. Whether this can be construed as a sign that saying a word out of context long enough can make it lose its original harmful meaning, or that taking on the hallmarks of oppression and using it to entertain (or shill, as Lee illustrates with mock-commercials for an "urban" clothing line by Timmi Hillnigger and for "Da Bomb" malt liquor brand) is no better than minstrelsy, is up for debate.
- In How High, an Asian side character is a huge rap fan, and listens to NWA, and suggests the white dorm-mate should also say he does, to make friends. When the protagonists come to the dorm and give the Asian props for his music choice, the white guy blurts "I like Niggaz With Attitude too", and gets smacked.
"Ain't no-one usin' that word here; that goes for you too."
- In Monty Python's Life of Brian, Brian vehemently denies that he's half-Roman (his father was the Centurion Naughtius Maximus) and tells his mother, "I'm a kike! A yid! A hebe! A hooknose! I'm kosher, mum! I'm a Red Sea pedestrian, and proud of it!"
- Leprechaun: In the Hood and Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood have pretty much all the black characters regularly using the word to refer to each other, almost exclusively good naturedly. In the latter, when a minor white character cheerfully uses it during a drug deal everyone (including people in the background) just stare at him in disgust, with a record scratch noise even being heard when the guy utters the word. Of note, at one point in the movie one of the main characters tells another that nigger is actually out and that the new word is "ninja".
The Leprechaun: "Whassup, ninjas!?"
- Gran Torino is an interesting example for this. If you walked into the movie not knowing any Asian slurs, you'll be fully stocked upon exiting, as Clint Eastwood's character, Walt, fires everything in the book at his Hmong neighbours. Walt is equal opportunity, however, and enjoys himself when Hmong teenage Sue starts slinging insults back at him. In fact, Walt goes around throwing (to people under the age of forty, rather outdated) white-related slurs (Irish, Italians) at all his friends, and absorbs many jokes about his Polish heritage. At the same time, when instructing Hmong teenager Thao about masculinity, Thao attempts to copy Walt's slur-ridden speech to his Italian friend, which earns him a (comic) gun in the face, suggesting, as elsewhere, that a certain level of familiarity is required for this to be permissible.
- Also notably, the actual N-word is the only major ethnic stone left unturned here. Walt addresses some troublesome black teens with the (only comparatively, mind you) mild "spooks". Said teens never seem to have heard it before.
- In The Jerk, Steve Martin's character "Navin" is raised by a black family, and believes he's actually a born member of it; as a result, the N-word becomes his Berserk Button when used by whites.
"You are talking to a nigger!"
- In the Hebrew Hammer Mordecai meets up with the head of the Kwanzaa Liberation Front Mordecai calls the leader a Nigga and the KLF Leader calls Mordecai a Kyke as they greet each other, and the white accountent for the KLF lampshades this.
- When making Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen (who is an observant Jew) made full use of his N Word Privileges.
- In the 1990 movie Heart Condition, Bob Hoskins is a racist cop who, on arresting a black man (Denzel Washington), uses the N-word. His (black) boss explains to him that that while he (the boss) can say "Nigger, nigger, nigger, nigger, nigger", Hoskins' character, being white, cannot. Hoskins later gets to justifiably refer to Washington's character as a "spook".
Literature
- Deconstructed in Christopher Paul Curtis' children's book Elijah of Buxton, where the title character (a freeborn black living in a Canadian settlement for former slaves) uses the slur in question and gets severely chewed out by an adult with a speech that is anvilicious, but with good cause.
- The white hooligans in Football Factory refer to black people as niggers, including the ones that are on their own Firm. They're "our niggers".
- Played with a lot by Terry Pratchett in the Discworld novels. The equivalent 'n-word' for Dwarfs is "lawn ornament" which is considered a killing insult for non-dwarfs but is used by one Dwarf boss to his crew in Moving Pictures. In Wyrd Sisters Hwel allows Vitoller to call him that, because they're old friends, but not anyone else.
- In a footnote in Guards, Guards, Captain Quirke is referred to as not being particularly evil, just the sort of person who pronounces "negro" with two Gs.
- Nonverbal: In The Chemo Kid, the titular kid shows up to the school Halloween party wearing a grotesque mask that parodies someone undergoing chemotherapy. The coach is incensed, until the kid takes the mask off.
- A Fantastic Racism example can be found in Warhammer 40000 universe, specifically in the Eisenhorn novels. In the Imperium, the word "twist" is used as a derogatory term for mutants; the mutants themselves have reclaimed this word, wearing it as a badge of pride, and Inquisitor Eisenhorn notes that "a slur stops being a slur when you use it to describe yourself."
- In the Harry Potter series, "mudblood" is a derogatory term used by pure-blood families for Muggle-born witches and wizards. When it's first used in Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, neither Harry nor Hermione know what it means, but Ron goes ballistic and tries to hex Malfoy for using it on Hermione. In later books, Harry and Ron get upset hearing it from Malfoy, while Hermione is shown to just be mildy angered. Then in Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Hermione refers to herself as a "mudblood" when trying to convince Griphook to help them, since Muggle-borns are being treated as second-class citizens(like the goblins are) under Voldemort's regime.
Live Action TV
- Donald Trump once fired a guy in the reality show The Apprentice for using the term "White Trash" to describe himself. During a Boardroom session. Yeah, we weren't surprised, either.
- The introduction to Turk in the first episode of Scrubs featured him and JD having a conversation about whether JD could say the "N word" if it comes up in a rap song to which they're singing along. (For the record, Turk said no.)
- The UK series of "Big Brother 2007" ejected a housemate named Emily Parr because she had used the N-Bomb in conversation with fellow housemate Charley...who had also used it. And yet Emily Parr was ejected, Charley remained. Charley was black, which is probably why she was allowed to get away with it. Of course similar controveries arose because she had also used the word and had used it several times throughout the series. (The incident in question happened early on.)
- Charley was also a notorious hate figure in the house, and was responsible for generating a certain amount of interest in the show - Endemol, the production company, were constantly being accused in the media of fiddling the nomination process to keep Charley safe, knowing she would be evicted promptly as soon as she was nominated but that the ratings - and votes to the premium numbers - would plummet without her. In addition, she actually didn't use the word again, or if she did, it was in a discussion context, rather than directed towards anyone.
- The main reason Emily was removed was due to the huge uproar that took place in the UK a few months earlier on the celebrity edition of the show (which is run over Christmas, as opposed to the main show which takes place over the summer months), where the white former 2002 housemate-turned-inexplicable-celeb Jade Goody, along with a few acolytes, led a concentrated campaign of racist bullying against Indian Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty. Shetty ended up winning the show after showing poise and dignity in the face of Jade's antagonism and boosted her Western career no end; Jade's antics made the national news daily and resulted in the Prime Minister being questioned about the story in the House of Commons, and Jade being burned in effigy back in India. Her career was effectively ended, with her reality tv and perfume deals being instantly cancelled before she had even emerged from the house, and crowds being banned from her eviction due to fears for her safety. Channel 4 were therefore very cautious at that time to appear completely anti-racist, as they had been heavily fined by the broadcasting watchdogs for ignoring the hundreds of thousands of complaints and not coming down on Jade's behaviour earlier in the year. Incidentally, Jade's story ends on a sombre note; in an effort to win back some of her former fans (or earn some much needed cash), she entered the Indian Celebrity BB house a couple of years later. Whilst in the house she was informed by Big Brother that the tests she had undertaken prior to entering the house had come back positive for cervical cancer, which was rapidly spreading. She died within the year.
- An episode of Boston Public featured a white teacher using the standard slur when teaching a history class of mostly black students in order to start talking about Afrophobia and language, with the subsequent uproar. He was actually teaching them about the cultural impact about it because of two students. One black, one white. The black one referred to the white one as "His nigga." and in turn, let the white one refer to him as such. Both were completely comfortable with this situation. Enter third party, skin colour black, plot ensues.
- Present in Generation Kill, except it's pretty much everyone who has privileges. I believe a southern Marine actually refers to fellow Marine who's black using the N-word. Nobody takes offense.
- Spoofed in News Radio: Bill is complaining about rap lyrics that include the N-word. When Matthew asks Token Minority Catherine what the N-word is, she whispers in his ear:
Matthew: Nincompoop?
Catherine: Hey! I'll let it pass this time, but don't let me catch you saying that word again.
- Played with in 30 Rock when Tracy calls Toofer by the "n" word. The square Toofer didn't know about how the term had been reappropriated.
- This is made even funnier when Toofer later attempts to use the N-Word in the same way and everyone reacts with offence that he has just "dropped the N-bomb"... the joke being that although black, Toofer is so "whitefied" that it sounds like a slur coming from him.
- Interestingly, both of the N-words have to be obscured with sound effects. N Word Privileges don't cut it with the censors.
- In an episode of the black sitcom Girlfriends, Joan and Toni are irritated by Lynn's sister (via adoption), a caucasian so deeply immersed in black culture that she acts "blacker" than the main cast, but Lynn and Maya defend her... until a Jay-Z song comes on the radio and she makes the mistake of singing along. Particularly obnoxious in that it was used to deliver An Aesop about how white people can never use that word, because they'll never understand the pain of a history of slavery and oppression. Gag me.
- Angel The Series provides a Fantastic Racism example in electric-powered mutant Gwen: "What I don't appreciate, Elliot, is being called a freak. That's my word, and I get cranky when people like you use it."
- The Daily Show
contributor Black Correspondent Senior Black Corresspondent Larry Wilmore, discussing Barack Obama's potential choice of running mates, explained that he needed to choose someone who wouldn't turn him into a sidekick or the Magical Negro.
Jon Stewart: The magical...?
Larry Wilmore: You can say it.
Jon Stewart: The magical... I'd rather not.
Larry Wilmore: Good, that was a test.
- Also spoofed on a segment specifically on the N word, where one of the (white) correspondents dragged Larry around with him on interviews for the sole purpose of saying it. (Members of other minorities made very brief cameo appearances to provide their own examples of slurs.)
- Despite this, Stewart himself actually used the word nigger recently. The segment came out very strongly against those who do so casually.
- There were issues with this word in regard to Executive Meddling over Chappelles Show, and apparently this is one of the reasons Dave abandoned it. On the show itself, parodied with the "Niggar Family" sketch.
- A running gag of a Mind of Mencia sketch involves Carlos Mencia attempting to get a license plate with some permutation of letters similar to the N-word. (Claiming his family is Indian and their family name is Neega, etc.) Finally, he asks for a plate with the word "wetback" (an equivalent word, but used to attack Mexicans) and is immediately approved.
- Spoofed on an episode of Seinfeld where Jerry suspects a dentist converted to Judaism just so he could say Jewish jokes.
Priest: And this offends you as a Jewish person?
Jerry: No, it offends me as a comedian!
- In another episode, after Jerry accidentally offended an Asian mailman by asking him directions to a Chinese restaurant (figuring that as a mailman, he would know the neighborhood), he laments, "Since when am I not allowed to ask a Chinese man where a Chinese restaurant is? When someone asks me "Hey Jerry, which way to Israel" I don't fly off the handle about it!"
- On The Muppet Show, pigs are particularly sensitive to non-pigs who make reference to the meat of pigs, even the mention of Sir Francis Bacon as part of a panel discussion on whether he was the true author of works attributed to William Shakespeare. Pigs, on the other hand, can make such jokes freely.
- Cold Case is an interesting, uh, case. Even in episodes dealing with Philadelphia's history of racial tension, the N word is never used. Instead, the show has co-opted the word "critter" — which is not actually an ethnic slur in the real world — and treats it in-universe as an equivalent to the N word. Presumably this is a form of Getting Crap Past The Radar.
- A variation on this appeared on Studio60ontheSunsetStrip when Matt writes a sketch in which Jesus Christ rises from the dead to become the president of network Standards and Practices. The result is that everyone in the scene ends up saying "Jesus Christ" a bunch of times—something standards would not ordinarily allow—and the ACTUAL standards & practices people would have had a hard time stopping him.
Web Comics
Western Animation
Music
- In 1969, in the U.K., in the course of being interviewed by a Nova magazine reporter, artist Yoko Ono said, “. . . woman is the nigger of the world”; three years later, her husband, John Lennon, published the song “Woman is the Nigger of the World” (1972) — about the virtually universal exploitation of woman — proved socially and politically controversial to U.S. sensibilities.
- Almost subverted by Eminem, who refuses to follow his rap peers and use the N-word in his hits, even though he used the derogatory term on a tape he recorded as a teenager. The rapper has repeatedly apologized for the slip-up, which was recorded when he was 16, and he insists he's far from comfortable about using the N-word in songs these days. He says, "It's just a word I don't feel comfortable with. It wouldn't sound right coming out of my mouth. If a white kid came up to me and said it, I probably would look at him funny. And if given the time to sit down with him I'd say, 'Look, just don't say the word. It's not meant to be used by us.'"
- Marilyn Manson is infamous for pushing arbitrary boundaries, and that includes dropping the N-Bomb in his songs. With Manson being very white and wearing makeup to make him seem whiter, one would think this would cause controversy...except the most famous example was probably his cover of Patti Smith's "Rock 'n' Roll Nigger" on the Smells Like Children album. Smells Like Children was right about when he blew up and became known in the mainstream consciousness, and people were already incensed over his "satanic" imagery and lyrics. (This was the mid-90s, recall.) That being said, it still didn't stop people, even his fans, from occasionally getting pissed at him when he'd sing it on tour. The video Dead to the World covers his Antichrist Superstar tour, where he was threatened with incarceration if he said the dreaded N-word, or did anything else the cops didn't like, so he had a black man cover his cover. During another performance of it, someone managed to bean him on the head with a glass bottle.
- Subverted by Weird Al. A number of his songs, not least Pretty Fly For A Rabbi, have led people to believe he himself is Jewish. (For the record, he's Serbian-American.)
- Demonstrated by the NOFX album White Trash, Two Heebs and a Bean, referring of course to the members of the band.
- Speaking of the term heeb, that's an in-group reclamation of the anti-Jewish slur "hebe" (from "Hebrew"). Its original and most notable use is in the title of the countercultural magazine Heeb: The New Jew Review. The founding editor, Jennifer Bleyer, claimed that the staff chose the new spelling for "design purposes," but it seems more likely that they wanted to avoid misplaced protests from Jewish advocacy groups (which they've gotten anyway).
- The album was originally entitled White Trash, Two Kikes and a Spic, before one of the band member's grandmothers complained.
- NOFX exhibited this trope during a live show recently. Fat Mike, the Jewish lead singer, told this joke: "Why do German showerheads have eleven holes? Because Jews have ten fingers." Ouch.
- Similarly, dc Talk had an interlude on their "Free at Last" CD that said they were "just two Honks and a Negro, serving the Lord."
Other
- The video where the white kid in the Scripps National Spelling Bee has to spell "negus"... only problem is, "negus" sounds a bit too much like "niggaz"...
- Parodied in this Derrick Comedy video wherein the word the white students need to spell to the black judge is "niggerfaggot."
- Flex, the Panamanian reggaetoner, is known in Mexico as Nigga. "Justified", because the N Word in Mexico has none of the racist implications it has in the USA... somehow. (This is among a long list of black stereotypes that are somehow rendered magically "not racist" by travel south of the American border.)
- I'm gonna take an wild guess and say it might be because they speak Spanish in Mexico! Kind of like that segment on The Daily Show where they showed world leaders congratulating President-elect Obama, and a South American leader used the word "negro" and Jon Stewart started freaking out, saying things like "Not cool!"...until he got word in his ear that the way it was ("neggro") was the Spanish word meaning the color black.
- What the name of the rap group NWA (Dr. Dre's old group) stands for.
- It doesn't stand for "Northwest Airlines"?
- The National Wrestling Alliance was branching out into new territory. So what?
- No Witches Allowed! She turned me into a newt!
- A Doonesbury storyline revolved around a white kid trying to insult a black kid, and ending up calling him "honky" since he didn't remember the right slur. Hilarity Ensues.
Real Life
- Unfortunate real life inversion. A black teacher in New York read a book to her students (of multiple races) about a black girl who learns that it's OK to have a different hair cut from her other friends (metaphor for racial tolerance). The teacher was fired because the parents got upset over the title of the book: Nappy Hair.
- Michael Richards is a notable Real Life example. Perhaps he should've looked to the cookie...
- Black was a racial slur when the term Negro was in use—which was the neutral term you're looking for, and the trope-naming term was simply a degraded form of it; "black" got co-opted hard during the 1960s.
- A more successful example of this is American use of the phrase 'Otaku', or 'Nerd', where even the INSULT version doesn't offend.
- A certain Italian restaurant in the Denver area had a "WOP-burger" on the menu. A fellow Italian (who grew up in New York with the Italian and Irish conflicts of the 50's and 60's and actually experienced how racist the word really was) took offense to the term and eventually it got pulled off the menu.
- It's only partly real life since it's Pro Wrestling, but does this speech from Booker T count? I would tend to think so, look at the way he buries his face in his hands when he realises what he just said...
- Sean Hannity has noted that he can get away with telling an Irish joke because he is Irish.
- Dennis Rodman, probably from his years in NBA locker rooms, wrote that in his opinion, "If a white guy is around a black guy enough, he can call the black guy a nigger and everyone understands its playful. But once you put it out in society, it becomes a whole other situation."
- Indian Sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh was famously put in charge of a Chicago drug gang for a day. In his book, Gang Leader For A Day, he describes how his attempt to talk the part became awkward when he asked a man to "talk to me, nigger" who had just been perfectly okay with the real gang leader saying the exact same thing seconds previously. Needless to say everyone else involved was black. In fact the real leader drew a class distinction between Black, African American and Nigger and had earlier refused to identify as black.
- An incident of this effectively ended the Monday Night Football career of Howard Cosell. During the season opening game in 1983, there was a shot of Alvin Garrett, a black receiver for the Washington Redskins, running up and down the field. Cosell infamously quipped, "Look at that little monkey run". The outrage that stemmed resulted in his being run out of the booth after that season ended. What was forgotten/ignored was that Cosell was far from a racist (he was a close friend of Muhammad Ali) and that he had used a similar comment with some white players with no complaints.
- Parodied in one of the first season South Park episodes, where one of the announcers states (one of several offensive phrases) "I haven't seen a Jew run like that since Poland, 1938!" when Kyle is running with the football.
- Lest we forget Wayne "Dog" Chapman. A bounty hunter and minor celebrity out of Hawaii. He was recorded as calling his eldest son's girlfriend that word. It was spontaneously sold for mass profit and nearly destroyed his career. He defended himself saying in essence that he thought he was in the black community enough to get away with it. He then went out of his way to try and make amends for what he said.
- Though it should be noted that Chapman was almost certainly trying to cover his ass after the fact. The way he used the word and the context in which it was used made it exceptionally clear that he was using it as a slur towards his son's girlfriend... specifically because he thought she might hear him using said slur regularly and get him in trouble. Worked out real well, huh?
- Notice how, around the wiki, whenever people quote Boondocks or some similar show or person who does have N-Word Privileges, they tend to be very careful to write it as "nigga" instead of "nigger"? This almost seems to be a technical adherence to the belief they don't even have quoting privileges (though as George Carlin once said of dirty words, they still mean the same thing).
- Because, as Tupac Shakur said, "'Niggers' are blacks with iron chains hanging from a pole; 'niggaz' are blacks with gold chains hanging at the club".
- Also because it's pronounced that way on the show. One particular episode uses several pronunciations of the word, very few of which involved an R. Most interesting pronunciation? "Nyuhgga!"
- In Chris Rock's most recent HBO special, he outlined the only instance in which a white person could have temporary N-word Privileges (for exactly one month). It's a very long drawn out scenario, involving a popular Christmas toy on Christmas Eve, being beaten up and peed on by a black man with a brick, within a certain time frame in the wee hours of the morning. Riverdance is also involved... let's just say it's never going to happen to you. But if it does, you get privileges for a month. But you must carry the police report with you, to prove it happened.
- Not to mention Chris Rock's famous "Black people vs Niggaz" routine... Linky
- David Howard, a white aide to Anthony Williams, then Mayor of Washington D.C. used the word "niggardly", a word of Scandinavian etymology meaning "stingy" or "miserly" in reference to the budget. One of his black colleagues present at the meeting took offense, and Howard resigned 10 days later.
- Ivan Stang of the Church Of The Sub Genius coined the term "po'bucker" to describe ignorant, usually southern, white trash. He's used it at times to describe himself, in spite of being a university-educated Jew, someone legitimizing his "P-word" privileges.
- If he's Southern, he counts — parts of the US have not realized that not all Southerners are white trash and/or rednecks.
- George Carlin actually got away with using the word nigger during one of his HBO specials, while mocking the founding fathers. "This country was founded by white slave owners who wanted to be free. 'All men are created equal' - yeah, except Indians and women and niggers, right?" Note that despite being white, the context of this quote resulted in a lot of black audience members clapping and/or nodding along with what he was saying.
- Also used in another routine, where he stated that "nigger" or any other derogatory word, wasn't an inherently bad word, and that it all depends on the context the word is used in.
- Comedian Mike Birbiglia inverts this with a small skit on Two Drink Mike. "This black guy came up to me after a show and he says, 'My cracker.' 'Actually, you can't call me a cracker. You can say 'cracka ', but not 'cracker '.
- The word was used by Terry Jones in the song "Never Be Rude To An Arab", which was sung on some live shows and can be heard on some Monty Python albums. He also says racial epithets for Hispanics, Italians, and Germans in the same line before being blown up and dragged off stage by a man in a frog suit.
- There is a Jewish life magazine called Heeb.
Web Original
- When Tatsudoshi hosts his Spam Plays, he and his guests usually leave their humour completely uncensored...except for "nigger", which only The Khold One is allowed to use because he's Southern. Hilariously inverted during the Spam Play of Mirrors Edge, where Khold becomes a bit too trigger-happy with his Cluster N Bombs and Tatsudoshi takes away his "nigger privileges" for a few episodes, and later imposes a limit on the number of N-bombs per episode.
- But apparently, the constant flow of Asian jokes were just fine, except when Khold said 'Rice N***er', that counted as two. (Ding)
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