Comedy writer Paul Mooney swears off the N word. Will the hip hoppers do the same? [View All]

[Philosoraptor]

I have a great deal of respect for comedy writer/comedian Paul Mooney, he's edgy, concise, hard core, and sharp as a knife, and he's decided to take the pledge and not use the word nigger in anymore of his writing and routines, based on the controversy stirred up by comedian Michael Richard's racist rant at black hecklers.

Can we come to some sort of consensus on the awful N word? We should either all agree not to use it, or come up with rules regarding it's proper use and abuse. I tend to agree with Paul Mooney, it's an ugly word, a volatile word, an insult word, like beeyatch or ho or nigga. Is the word nigga less offensive than the word nigger? If one black man calls another black man a nigger or a nigga, is it cool? Let's get to some sort of social agreement on our insults.

I stopped using the word many years ago, although some of my friends still use it, some black, some white, but I personally stopped uttering the word in public and only use it in discussions like this one.

A lot of the so called poetic lyrics of certain hip hoppers has always been controversial, and peppered with profanities of all types. Richard Pryor himself stopped using the word decades ago, and it was his number one comedy word. He was just as funny after he stopped using it, and he never looked back.

I hope Paul Mooney's example is picked up by everyone, of all races, ugly words hurt, let's try nicer ones.