The “N-word”: What’s in a name, Black America?
Today, as opposed to being ruthlessly, physically and emotionally beaten into submission and acceptance of the n-word by a brutal white social system, black people find themselves courted and conned by other blacks to voluntarily remain in their pre-appointed place of a n**ger/n**ga. In this contemporary era, White supremacy is most effective when it uses a black voice as a ventriloquist, and today, many rappers, comedians and black scholars validate the premise.
It is incredulous and appalling how some black scholars encourage their college students to greet each other as n**gas. An uninterrupted indoctrination process that began almost 400 years ago by a brutal racist social system is now carried on by cloned black representatives. The definition of self is only limited by who that person thinks they are, and far too many black scholars—who are, by definition of their roles, leaders and influencers in the community—have a diminished image of themselves and their race.
The American institutionalized systemic has always identified Black America with the n-word and, therefore, finds Black Americans’ willingness to accept and relate to their pre-appointed place and category of being a n**ger/n**ga both gratifying and an ease on their guilty conscience.
So long as black people restrict themselves to saggin’ pants, referring to one another as n**ger/n**ga, b*tches, mf’s; and limiting their thinking to sex, cars, drugs, guns, sports and life in the hood, all is well in the American institutionalized systemic. However, a far more challenging and graver concern to the systemic are Black Americans retaking control of their minds, demonstrating the ability to think and act rationally, and possessing demeanors of royalty—walking with dignity; that who boldly declare their independence and rightfully return any unfitting or cursed gifts to the systemic—one primarily is being the n-word.
Black historians and scholars such as Dr. Asa Hilliard, Dr. John Henri Clarke, Dr. Chancellor Williams, Dr. Richard Williams, Kimani Nehusi, Dr. Kwaku Person-Lynn, Dr. Ray Higgins, Dr. David Pilgrim and a few others serve as examples of liberated, independent thinkers. As such, the American institutionalized systemic refrains from parading these gentlemen before a sound-asleep Black community in fear that the knowledge of these thinkers may awaken the slumbering masses.
However, they will parade and promote the likes of a Dr. David Bradley, Dr. Randall Kennedy, certain rappers, black comedians and some other hand-picked high profile blacks—all of whom are proponents of the n-word—before an unsuspecting and sleeping Black community. The systemic will and does make every effort to keep the sycophants—n-word supporting blacks—constantly before the public to trick blacks into remaining blinded to the truth even though they believe they are in control of their thoughts and aware of what’s occurring.
The ravages of centuries of brutal mistreatment at the hands of whites through slavery, Jim Crow, segregation and lynch mobs still have a powerful psychological effect on black people to this very day. The intent and purpose of being categorized as the n-word was far more sinister than just a mundane racial insult.
The term was used as an identifier and a method of separating blacks from the remainder of the populous; it was used as a psychological conduit to breed thoughts of inferiority and, thus, no self-dignity, -pride, or –respect. The definition of a n**ger/n**ga painted blacks as sub-human, 3/5 a person, a bestial savage beast who needed to be tamed. The term was white America’s way of not accepting blacks as their equal—but as a burden. And because blacks were considered non-human, and instead, animalistic, Whites believed that in the eyesight of God, classifying black ancestors as n**gers made it okay to dehumanize, brutalize and subject them to anything and everything ungodly.
The Holy Bible was interpreted in many self-justifiable ways to support White America’s idea that blacks were a cursed race and that it was God’s word that instructed them to “cleanse the world of impurities” by enslaving and dehumanizing them. They found it necessary to browbeat, brainwash and indoctrinate the black slaves into believing that they were indeed n**gers, and that whatever harm came to them was an act of God because they were nothing more than n**gers.
N**ger is an inferior category and place, reserved for those black folks who are gullible enough to accept the term. During slavery, our ancestors had no choice but to accept such categorization; today, their descendants have a choice but are timid about leaving their comfort zone, their pre-appointed place of being n**gers. So, what do they do? They dupe themselves into accepting the ghetto vernacular n**ga as some BS term of endearment. That action in itself basically safeguards White America’s plight of destruction against the black community at the black community’s own hand.
The embracing of the n-word serves as a sanctioning of all the evil deeds committed upon Black African Americans’ beloved ancestry. This is not a consensus or opinion but a fact. Deliberate or not, it is sanctioning nonetheless. Such actions are neither magnanimous nor altruistic but indeed the opposite—malevolent, mean-spirited, self-centered and narrow-minded. Black ancestors deserve better—in the perspective of reverence and honor of their sacred and hallow memories. The n-word should be taboo and forbidden to be a part of the Black African-American culture.
There is nothing empowering about embracing the n-word; it has no benefit or value. Continually holding on to the name given blacks by a racist society through using, defending and supporting the use of the word, as well as trying to rationalize that it has been changed into something positive, is sheer insanity.
N**ga/n**ger is an empty sign of self-hatred masquerading itself as a term of endearment. The idiom serves as perpetual imprisonment and is the detonator to the absolute extermination of an entire race of people’s pride, dignity, honor and state of mind. Some may feel that the term carries no weight and plays no role in the current status and eventual outcome of the black community.
However, the name “N**ga/n**ger” was always meant to demean and destruct. And as blacks continue to use the term, the community’s ill-development will continue to occur. Words are a mighty source of power (Proverbs 23:7), and there is power—a negative, evil, conniving power—in the name “N**ga/n**ger”.
H. Lewis Smith is the founder and president of UVCC, the United Voices for a Common Cause, Inc. (www.theunitedvoices.com); author of “Bury that Sucka: A Scandalous Love Affair with the N-Word”. Follow H. Lewis Smith on Twitter: www.twitter.com/thescoop1
