'Dr Laura' uses the 'N-word on air

Here's a snip from Dr Laura's website about a call I heard her take today:

I always tell my listeners when they mess up, they need to follow the four R’s: take responsibility, have true remorse, try to repair it, and don’t repeat it. Yesterday, I messed up. I used the “n” word on-air, and I regretted it as soon as the call was over. While it was in the context of making a point about the unfortunate use of that term by others who deem it acceptable or funny, it is a word that is hateful, hurtful and I should not have used it even to prove a point. After the call, I was terribly upset about it and after that hour of the program concluded, pulled myself off the air for the rest of the show. Today, at the top of my program, I will apologize to my listeners.

I agree with her on about 80% of the issues but I was and still am shocked. She also refered to the fact that Obama got elected with a lot of white votes and 'you're still not happy.'

Her apology is a class act- I wonder if she needs to pull back, she's been awful edgy lately on her show!

Odd how such fear can be struck into the hearts of a white person for uttering a word the ethnic people whom it offends use it non-stop in their daily slang and music, but I digress.

I like Dr. L cause she is an edgy, ballsy broad. Her apology is the act of practicing what you preach and you've got to at least respect that. To err is human. To apologize is showing humility.

Ugh, is she still around...

Good for her for apologizing, though I'm sure it was said in the heat of the moment. I used to listen too her, until she got a bit too rude with her callers and yelled at them more times than I could count.

That she said the "N" word -- I'm really not that shocked.

MOO

Mel

I heard the call. It was from a black woman married to a white husband. She was annoyed that he wasn't more supportive of her when friends and neighbors made racial jokes and comments in her presence. Dr Laura made reference to the fact that African Americans use the 'n' word freely to one another so why was she so offended? The discussion escalated and she then made the comment about Obama.
I had heard her field many such calls from spouses who felt let down by their husband/wife putting up with comments that were hurtful- usually she tells them to make it clear that this is offensive and if the spouse won't stand up for them then they need to stand up for themselves. I got the feeling that because this was a 'black' issue she lost all perspective.
I noted her apology did not cover her dragging the president into the discussion. I also think that the last has not yet been heard on this story.

I hate the word.

Lil story... I was standing in line at a grocery store with my 5-year-old daughter. Three women were behind me saying "n" this and "n" that... several "n" words thrown around. I felt anger building up inside me while my 5-year-old daughter was hearing this, but I didn't say anything to the women. I tried to distract my daughter instead. I do NOT want my daughter to use the word. Ever.

I hate the word.

I have a lot I would like to say, But, I feel quite frankly intimidated for years now to speak about certain issues so I try to ignore threads with them.

But one thing Miss Laura,
Black people have been voting for White men since they have been able TO
vote.

LA Radio.com carried this on their site this afternoon:

http://www.laradio.com/index.php?op...ticle&id=667:the-qnq-word&catid=2:los-angeles

Interesting comments. What I find so maddening is that she never once in her apology mentioned how she dragged Obama into the discussion.
I still say, we haven't heard the end of this by a long shot.

Snick1946 said:

I heard the call. It was from a black woman married to a white husband. She was annoyed that he wasn't more supportive of her when friends and neighbors made racial jokes and comments in her presence. Dr Laura made reference to the fact that African Americans use the 'n' word freely to one another so why was she so offended? The discussion escalated and she then made the comment about Obama.
I had heard her field many such calls from spouses who felt let down by their husband/wife putting up with comments that were hurtful- usually she tells them to make it clear that this is offensive and if the spouse won't stand up for them then they need to stand up for themselves. I got the feeling that because this was a 'black' issue she lost all perspective.
I noted her apology did not cover her dragging the president into the discussion. I also think that the last has not yet been heard on this story.

Click to expand...

Wait. This woman has friends and neighbors that make racial jokes about African Americans in her prescence? Dr. Laura probably should have told her to get some new friends and ditch her neighbros.

As for her husband well that speaks for itself.

Hopefully Dr. Laura has John Mayer's phone number.

Why would she even bring that up? Why would she say "Well African American's use that word all the time"? It's never ending. You have African American's that will never use that word. Some people say it's generational? You have Caucasian people of the younger generation call a Korean friend that word. I hear it all the time. Kids. Often they use the term "nukka". I've heard Caucasian kids say to African American kids "Nukka please" like ODB. I hear African American kids call to their Russian friend "Yo, I'm stretched my n*g*er"

There's arguments made that "blacks" don't have a patent on the word if they use it themselves and forbid a person of another race of using it.

When you have young folks of every race, creed, color listening to Rap music that freely uses a word and they pay money for music what are they going to do? Skip the word? They'll have to skip the words to half the songs.

I've never used it. My child wasn't forbiden to use it because she didn't hear it and when she got old enough to hear it she knew better.

Doctor Laura opened a can of worms. I'd be more concerned for that poor lady who is dealing with a husband who doesn't realize how sensitive this issue is to her.

John Mayer call Dr. Laura. Watch she'll lose sponsors.

Words hurt. Words have power. Words hurt.

We don't use the word. I don't let anyone in my presence use the word. If they do, I call them on it. And I tell them - words hurt. I don't care who they are, unless they look like gang-bangers that might hurt me and then I keep my mouth shut and move away.

I don't spend money on music that uses such words. I don't listen to it on the radio. I don't allow it in my house or my car. I politely request to change the cd/radio station when I'm in some one else's car that has such music playing.

I believe in the power of words, everyday words. I never let my friends call me names when I was a kid. I had lots of friends that thought the b word was what you called all females - friend and foe. Not me, call me the b word and you were no longer my friend and if you weren't my friend, I was ready to fight.

I wish rap music would be outlawed.

And that's my 2 cents about words!

Salem

[video=youtube;bMyp8y8SkUM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMyp8y8SkUM[/video]

I love this young man, and you all should hear what he says. Brilliant.

Montana_16: I'd love to hear what you have to say.

That's just an awful, awful, AWFUL word. I don't think anyone should EVER use it. And I don't understand WHY some people think it's okay - even people throwing it around in slang. Why can some people use it "Hey N - what's up?" and it's okay? Or say "My N---"? when referring to their friends? I don't get it! It's not okay to ever use!!!

And thank goodness I'm a child of the 60's (born in '64) and do not care for Rap music! That word is thrown around so much in lyrics it makes my head spin! It makes me VERY UNCOMFORTABLE!

I don't like it. I DON'T LIKE IT!

Salem said:

Words hurt. Words have power. Words hurt.

We don't use the word. I don't let anyone in my presence use the word. If they do, I call them on it. And I tell them - words hurt. I don't care who they are, unless they look like gang-bangers that might hurt me and then I keep my mouth shut and move away.

I don't spend money on music that uses such words. I don't listen to it on the radio. I don't allow it in my house or my car. I politely request to change the cd/radio station when I'm in some one else's car that has such music playing.

I believe in the power of words, everyday words. I never let my friends call me names when I was a kid. I had lots of friends that thought the b word was what you called all females - friend and foe. Not me, call me the b word and you were no longer my friend and if you weren't my friend, I was ready to fight.

I wish rap music would be outlawed.

And that's my 2 cents about words!

Salem

Click to expand...

Although I love George Carlin and what he's done for swear words... (lol), there are everyday words that are damaging. Yes. Hurtful. Particularly hurtful word for me is haole. It's Hawaiian for "foreigner" but the context of which it was used against me was hurtful and not intended that way. I'm Kickapoo Indian, and I'm purdy tolerant of the "indian slang." Hell, I even used "indian giver," but only because I was taught as a child to not embrace my Indian heritage. "Indians are smelly and dirty," I was told. I was told I wasn't Kickapoo but Apache, because they were "strong" and "fierce," not the peaceful Kickapoo I was actually from. I'm part Irish, in fact "black Irish", which means there's Spaniard blood lines in me. My great-grandfather had to listen to the backlash on that, and that was passed down not to embrace my Irish ancestry.

Let's not even talk about being a woman... lol

Fact is, I'm "white" as far as anyone is concerned, and far be it for me to compare my lineage to those stolen for slavery, but my stance is the same as yours. Words hurt.

So many epithets, so little time...

I'm a lot older than most of you (guaranteed).

With my then-called "Negro" friends, we made lists of all the words ppl used including the ones used among the race itself and unknown to white ppl at the time. We were conscious of the words even though we did not use them in our speech, ANY of us.

Advance to over 40 years later and the most noxious of the words, the N-word, had long-since been adopted by "black" ppl (later "African-Americans") amongst themselves. There were arguments suggested for so doing, including defusing the negative. A white person using the same word in a "friendly" context is/was taboo, IMO.

Friends & family, longtime residents of Hawaii (I'm talking decades here too), often use the term haole or hapa-haole to describe others and even themselves, and not in a disparaging way. It meant "white" or Caucasian (no Asian blood). It was not the negative that "honkie" became on the Mainland.

When my (biracial) stepson attended a Christian college on a scholarship back in the mid-80s, I counseled him *not* to use the *hit word in a paper he was writing entitled "*hit Happens" ... took me a long time to have him get it. He was young and that was a cool expression in his day (NOT to me).

Context and target group are everything. Dr Laura should have known better if she uttered the word on-air in a quote or whatever...Imus learned that lesson, in a related instance, already years ago.

Longlife lesson: Be kind, and use your words carefully...what you say may well be construed not as you intended, depending on the listener or the times.

~jmo~

I'm confused about the "n" word. I hear kids call each other that all the time; white, black, brown - they all say it to each other nowadays. I don't get it?

Unfortunately, the N-word has been somewhat accepted into the parlance. IMO, its 'acceptable' usage is limited & proscribed as my above post indicates.

Those who use it so freely likely have no idea of its origin or potential impact, and might say the word just cuz it's used so readily among young persons in their locality and without regard to its derivation.

I would suggest that those kids don't try using the word in Watts, for example, if they are white... :-o

I personally don't think anyone should use that word It is such a nasty, hurtful, word. As a black American, i grew up in a mostly white neighborhood and I have bad memories of this one kid calling my siblings and I that all the time, and i remember it making me very sad. I also don't understand why some black people feel that it is okay to use the word, but if a white person says it, its not ok. Shouldn't anyone of any race use any racial slurs. It's ignorant. My little girl is biracial, and i hope she never has to hear the ugliness of that word.

Dr Laura is still around? I haven't heard her on the radio since Chicago lost the Westwood One Country oldies on Saturday nights well more than a decade ago.

I'm of Polish decent. and I call myself a blonde pollack all the time. I about fell over when my son (7) came home to tell me he had a new friend in our neighborhood from Poland he called a pollack. Right away I corrected myself and said that is a bad word mommy should have never used.... and mommy was making fun of herself when using that word and it was NOT a good word to call anyone.

And only a year earlier I was dealing with my then 5-6 yr old having an argument with his middle eastern friend. "Mommy he finally told me he believes in Jesus!" -and my son went on for a good 20 minutes on how he debated at 4/5 to get his friend to agree on Jesus. I was waiting for the kids dad to come over and tell me a thing or two.... about that.... Thinking wow, that is new for any of us who grew up in parochial schools. It was the different Christian denominations we dealt with then....and like all kids - WE DID NOT CARE!

At one time I would have thought two words should never be used. C and N..... but both have been so over used they are no longer exclusive to ugly. . I don't like any of those words and I consider a lot of words ugly in my post 40 age.

Ugly is just ugly, and has nothing imo to do with intolerance or words different races use. I try to teach my son that..... and I have found myself trying to explain a race can make fun of themself but it is not ok to make fun of other races.

Raising a kid these days is not easy.

and no I would NOT let my 8 yr old listen to Dr. Laura, or Rap, or Rush L' Nah.

Thanks Dr. Laura for giving little kids a new definition of UGLY!

JMO