ESPN's Jason Whitlock: N-Word 'Anti-Black,' 'Anti-Education'

As the controversy over the efforts of the National Football League to ban the use of the N-word continues, ESPN broadcast an episode of Outside the Lines focused on use of the hateful word. During that conversation, sports writer Jason Whitlock said that use of the word should stop–even among black people–because it is anti-black, anti-education, and the most powerful symbol of hate racists use.

It is expected by many that the NFL will soon institute a 15-yard penalty for any team heard using the N-word on the field during a game. This possible rule has sparked a lot of debate about the use of the N-word.

On the February 23 special episode, but Whitlock disagreed with those who said that black people can use the word and that for them it is just a term of endearment. Whitlock said that the word is nothing but hate and shouldn’t be used by anyone.

Whitlock insisted that the word is one that discourages education among blacks and that use of the word keeps blacks in ignorance. It is a word that is inherently “anti-education,” he said.

The sports man also said that the N-word was more powerful than any other racist symbol and is the most long-lived way to attack black people in America.

Full transcript of Whitlock’s statement:

I think the Leagues is taking the proper steps because I don’t think this issue is all that complex. I think we’ve made it complex, I think we’ve tried to desensitize or sanitize this word and it just won’t be desanitized or de, it will always be a reprehensible word.

The N-word is a symbol of a culture, as our opening show, fifty years ago the culture and the people that used the N-word were very hostile towards black people, very violent towards black people, very against black people educating themselves and evolving.

Not everybody that used the N-word fifty years ago was a steaming racist or took action against black people. It’s no different than today. The people that love the N-word and love to sue it are part of a culture that is still hostile towards black people, still anti-education and still very violent towards black people and I’m talking about the black people that are in love with this word. If you examine the culture that the N-word represents, it represents a culture that is anti-black.

This symbol is more powerful than the Confederate flag or any other symbol we have from racism, it’s the most powerful, it’s the longest standing and it still stands today and its embraced by the very people who it was intended to destroy and that’s what’s sad and I’m glad the NFL is taking this stance.