The columnist behind an op-ed that used the N-word in the headline stood by the use of the word in the headline.
In an interview with CNN, James Lincoln Collier, explained that the use of the word in the headline of the column (pictured above) captured what he was trying to say: that many people still consider Obama “the n***er.”
“A great many people continue to think of President Obama as the n***er and I wanted to make that point there’s a substantial amount of racism still existing in the United States and that’s how I expressed it in order to get that point across as strongly as I could,” Collier told CNN Monday night.
Collier noted that the op-ed was actually supportive of Obama. He said “the whole article is very supportive of Obama and it directed at the people who are against Obama because of his race.”
“I thought it was an appropriate title to put on the piece because that was the nature of the story, that a great many people have a lot of trouble with the fact that we have a black president and my point was to try to get that across and I used that term in order to make that understood, that that’s the way a great many people think of President Obama,” Collier said.
The editor of the newspaper where the column was published, the West View News of the West Village in New York, told the New York Post that some of the paper’s staff had reservations about using the word in the headline.
“The editorial staff continues to object,” West View News editor George Capsis told the Post. “In this article, however, Jim reminded me that The New York Times avoids using the word which convinced me that West View should.”
According to Capsis, Collier meant for the headline to “shock us into accepting that there are people who believe and use this outrageous word.”
(H/t: Mediaite)
Dude: We get it. You meant it ironically. But it was still a bad idea. Apologize and cut your losses already.
“I wanted to make that point there’s a substantial amount of racism still existing in the United States”
Oh, gee thanks for the public service. Would have missed it otherwise.
A case where one’s points on race are so reactionary and insidious, they are ignorant of everything else. The end justifies the means, which is why the editorial staff should have acted to impose civility/sanity in the discussion.
You really think this was a point that needed to be made and you are the one that needed to make it? Your circulation is targeted to visitors from other planets?
It was absolutely unnecessary and repulsive but well timed to catapult yourself to national attention…as someone tasteless enough to put it in print. Congratulations
A lot of folks are missing the fact that a substantial amount of racism still exists and that’s part of the point he was making. Sure, you don’t, and you’re not the audience he was speaking to because you’re one of the ones who gets it. Sadly, there are many, many more who don’t.
I very much appreciate Mr. Collier using “nigger” instead of some other more PC term. Too many people in this country are operating under the assumption that if someone isn’t holding a rope with a Black person swinging from it then they’re not really racist. The standard for which is now considered real racism in America is so high now that someone has to be screaming “nigger” before many are even willing to acknowledge that it’s racism. As an African American, it’s extraordinarily crazy-making and frustrating. So, I absolutely applaud Mr. Collier’s decision to be as abrasive and jarring as possible. It’s the only way some will ever get the message.