The n-word is pernicious and it hangs about like gnats in a humid room. Whether it's the Duane "Dog" Chapman saying the word, or Nas releasing a new album bearing the title, the n-word is part of the strange fruit ripening in our culture.
We should shudder at the use of the word. Men and women have died because they were dehumanized -- and killed -- by society's use of it.
When I viewed the Without Santuary photography exhibit a number of years ago in Atlanta, I felt horror. The presentation hit home because a young man in my mother's family was lynched in the 1930s. When she and I found his name in U.S. Census records, it was an eerie, breathless moment. We knew the outcome of this man's life: He would never grow old.
His death -- and the deaths of so many others -- should make the n-word taste like poison when we utter it.
Other words have the same sickening effect -- like turning the adjective, "illegal," into a noun and recklessly using it. Many journalists and media outlets are guilty of not only bad grammar when they use the term, but of social irresponsibility. With our usage of it, we sanction its illegal existence. We help it thrive.
Debate illegal immigration. Get passionate. Search for solutions. But don't fall into the old, ugly traps of dehumanizing people and robbing them of the basic dignity of the right words.
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