Since video showing members of a University of Oklahoma fraternity chanting the N-word went viral Sunday night, CNN has aired several segments about whether it’s acceptable for anyone, regardless of race, to use the slur.
Amid that debate, the network decided Tuesday night to air the uncensored video in addition to an uncensored Vine clip that allegedly shows the Sigma Alpha Epsilon frat house “mom” singing along to a rap song that repeatedly used the word in its lyrics.
“We believe it is important that you actually hear exactly what is being said so that the word is not sanitized to make it more palatable,” CNN host Don Lemon said.
Viewers first noticed Lemon using the N-word during Monday’s “CNN Tonight,” where he interviewed OU football linebacker Eric Striker about his reaction to the video. During that segment, CNN aired a bleeped-out version of the viral video.
“They didn’t say N-word. The word they were saying was nigger,” Lemon said. “They said ‘We’ll never have a nigger in SAE.’ That’s what they were saying.”
Wait, what did I hear @DonLemon say about the n-word on @CNNTonight just now?#oklahoma #SAE #OU
— Muneerah (@muneerahb) March 10, 2015
CNN @donlemon all the way live tonight w the gratuitous use of the n word #SEA #OklahomaSAE
— Dondi West (@dondiwest) March 10, 2015
.@donlemon just said the n-word live on @CNN re the racist #OUSAE video — he’s speaking w/ student athlete Eric Striker
— Emily Martinez (@martinez_emily) March 10, 2015
Lemon used the word again Tuesday while discussing Beauton Gilbow, the fraternity’s house “mom.”
Guest Ben Ferguson, who is white, argued that the word “should be dead” and that people must refrain from using it in both everyday speech and rap music. Another panelist, Marc Lamont Hill, took issue with that line of thinking.
“This train is never late,” Hill, who is black, said. “Whenever a white person calls a black person ‘nigger,’ we find some moment to blame it on rap music or on black people.”
“Marc, in all fairness she’s not calling black people niggers,” Lemon cut in. “She’s repeating the lyrics of a song.”
Watch Tuesday’s segment below:
CNN, leading the way in airing the obvious. Will Don’s unashamed use of ‘the F word’ be next?
People need to see and hear the actual chant. Saying or writing about frat boys chanting an “African-American slur” just doesn’t convey the obscenity.
There are nasty words and phrases we should usually avoid. But there are times when they need to be said.
Nontroversy. I have no problem with them airing it so the viewing audience can appropriately recoil in disgust having been fully informed of what was in the video.
“Marc, in all fairness she’s not calling black people niggers…She’s repeating the lyrics of a song.”
That’s true and I thought about that yesterday and came to the conclusion that all it does is require us to dig a little deeper to understand why what was in her video was just as disgusting: They video’d her doing that because they thought it was fucking hilarious to get the old lady to spew the n-bomb repeatedly. That’s just as insulting and disgusting as their bus chant. It leaves her intent somewhat in doubt (she may have just been a clueless dupe or she could’ve been in on the joke), but not the intent of the fart guys, who were clearly displaying their racist leanings by thinking it’s all a joke. It’s a bit of a reminder that yo may be holding the camera, but you’re still “in” the video. What you choose to record can say a lot about you.
Myself: “Oh, Don Lemon said smart things without adding one or more dumb things to the mix.”
“‘Marc, in all fairness she’s not calling black people niggers,’ Lemon cut in. ‘She’s repeating the lyrics of a song.’”
Nnnnevermind.