I must admit that I don't quite understand it.
How could I? I am living in the cesspool of Europe and there are no black people here, except for the basketball players. My people did not have slaves and did not have colonies like the most European countries did.
I know that I get really uncomfortable when this kind of things gets discussed because I just don't get it.
There are several local variants of the N word and the words even sound awful. These words are used a lot, but they are not always used hatefully. Some people just don't know better. The acceptable word is literally translated to "a black person".
I'm white and European, but just from observation:
- N***er -> Extremelly offensive insult, equivalent of calling a gay person a f****t.
- N***a -> Term of endearment among black people (the recipient may not be black, but the speaker definitely must).
The point is that it's a term that black people are defanging by reclaiming it. This is a pretty effective tactic, and one that, for example, sexually active women are also using against the sexist double-standard about promiscuity, by reclaiming "slut".
It follows that, by dictating what black people can or cannot say, they're being effectively deprived of a way to defend themselves, and policed about how they want to refer to each other, which obviously depowers them. Some people do it out of ignorance ("I think nobody should say the word because it's hate speech"); others (hopefully none or a minority in this forum) are clearly aware of what they're doing.
