A Black person is allowed to call a white person a "thug," but not the other way around, according to sports journalist Jemele Hill.
"White people calling Black people thugs has a completely different connotation — depending on context," Hill wrote on X. "There are words and phrases that women can use with each other that men cannot use on us. Hope your brain doesn't explode."
Hill made her comment after ESPN analyst Ryan Clark, who is Black, used the word "thug" to describe the decision by Sean Payton, who is white, to bench quarterback Russell Wilson.
"Sean Payton has behaved as a thug since he became the coach of the Denver Broncos," Clark said on ESPN.
OutKick writer Bobby Burack disagrees with Hill, stating over the weekend that, first of all, her analogy doesn't support her case, as she compares Clark's comment to a woman calling another woman a derogatory term.
But the comparison does not stand up, according to Burack, because Hill isn't dismissing the use of Black-on-Black or white-on-white insults. She instead contends that Black people are allowed to call white people "thugs," but white people are not allowed to do the same to Black people.
Burack insisted that "anytime you argue that one group can use a specific insult toward another ... but the other group cannot use the specific insult back, your argument is a loser."
He also maintained that the word "thug" is no more offensive to Black people than it is to white people.
Burack stressed that if indeed the word "thug" is so hurtful to Black people, as Hill claims, why would she openly excuse Black people using the same hurtful word toward others?
He concluded that "ultimately, campaigning for the segregation of insults is not racial progress. It's a form of racial regression."
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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