its been two years since the NAACP officially “buried” the word nigger. deemed “the greatest child racism ever birthed“, nigger had a full funeral replete with a procession, a eulogy, and a rare sighting of a standing christine beatty to symbolically put an end to the power behind that word.
even before this strange act, post-racial bigots already put that word on waivers, realizing that you just can’t go around calling everybody niggers anymore (unless, of course, you’re ghostface killa or frank sobotka). in its place are dozens of terms, phrases, code words, epithets, and idioms; synonyms for “black” lingering around the american lexicon and causing more uneasiness and deferred discomfort than an ugly baby.
today, with your help, verysmartbrothas.com will begin to put an end to this phenomenon with our first ever installment of post-racial slur survivor
the champ will list 11 of his favorite post-racial racist code words and slurs, and we’ll decide in the comments which term will officially be voted out and buried in the plot next to nigger
1. communist/socialist
—although this coding seemingly surfaced overnight, america has a long and storied history of branding educated blacks as anti-american anarchists perpetually plotting towards the country’s demise (which we are...but thats besides the point.)
2. urban
—a term that’s become so synonymous with black that six months ago, a group of arkansas businessmen petitioned to boycott the entire city of little rock when hearing of plans to open an urban outfitters there, saying that the retail chain’s title “promoted crime and miscegenation”¹.
3. church groups (from trenton)
—just read and weep. or laugh.
4. inner-city
—am i the only one who’s felt that the connotation of inner-city doesn’t just suggest “they live in the city” but that cats live inside the city? like we actually live inside of stairwells, sewers, and streetlights and sh*t?
yea? ok, moving on
5. at risk
—although usually used by educators to describe certain school districts and neighborhood populations, “at-risk” itself is so ambiguous that it can be applied to basically anyone. i mean, why can’t you describe a college freshman class as being at-risk even though the risk they’re facing is chlamydia?
6. thug
—although it originally derives from the thuggee’s of india, the term has become so racially charged that espn.com and other websites have actually begun to censor it out of the comments on it’s articles. we tried doing that here as well, but liz our moderation is racist
7. illegal/foreigner/muslim
—code words that serve as reminders for a bigots prevailing feeling that minorities are america’s mother-in-laws: needy, unwelcome visitors with bad food, strange hair, and gout
8. affirmative action/quota
—terms used by those conveniently forgetting that white women exist
9. regular/hard-working
—while these terms aren’t used to describe blacks per se, they are used to imply what blacks are not. a politician or pundit making a reference to “regular, hard-working americans” is basically saying “not niggers”.
the same could be said for “trustworthy”. but, since i don’t trust most of ya’ll niggas either, i can’t fault them for that one
10. n-word
—this isn’t really any type of racial code. i just really, really, really hate this f*cking word.
11. ghetto
—used when inner-city isn’t quite black enough to accurately describe “black”. its almost like it implies “no, not just black. really, really black. superblack. ultrablack. uberblack. so black that if you turn off all the lights, all you’ll see is a d*ck and some teeth”
people of vsb.com, vote for which term you’d most like to see buried next. remember, you can only choose one. also, since i know i haven’t covered them all, please feel free to mention any write-in candidates you’d like to nominate.
the carpet is yours and sh*t
¹i’m lying. admit it, though. you can totally see that happening
—the champ