Ni***r Isn't The Same As Honky

TransGriot Note: Guest post by Aletha Fields


Ni***r is the most electric racial slur between blacks and whites in America. No other word between the races carries that charge. That's why ni***r isn't the same as honky. No white person ever got enslaved, humiliated, dehumanized, raped, or sold as a part of one of the ugliest periods in American history.

Sooooooo. . . Everybody quit acting brand new and trying to justify the use of ni***r against the use of words like honky. You know it isn't the same no matter what you say. And for the record, how many black people do you honestly hear calling white people honky? Step out of the 70s please. Honky? Ni***r? Which one makes people turn their heads? Which one makes good white parents intentionally tell their children to NEVER say? Which one is often followed by actions the word ni***r provokes? Black isn't the same as ni***r.

Paula Deen knows the difference about when to not use the word. She isn't brand new. If it was actually a part of her inability to code switch, she would not have made it as far because she would have already used it publicly. No white person in America blatantly uses the word ni***r unless they mean to or want to. She needs to be punished for it. Her being honest about isn't a heroic act. That's a foolish notion in and of itself. She isn't living in a plantation culture and she isn't to be excused because she's a Southerner. She deserves every bit of public backlash for her private blacklash.

Fortunately for me, my social justice family, which includes many, many white do-gooders, taught me how very abnormal this behavior is amongst white people in America. It is THEIR honesty about anti-racist work that let me know white folks like Ms. Deen know exactly what they're doing and their intent around the use of words like ni***r.

The only thing people need to get over concerning racial slurs between whites and blacks is the notion that the use of the word ni***r by white people is not, has not been, and never will be anything than its ugly past intended.

You cannot submit to revisionist history. What happened during enslavement is not natural, is not just, is not a source of pride, is not an unintentional system of oppression, and is not passive. Get over THAT!