A viral video of Philadelphia Eagles receiver Riley Cooper spewing the n-word at a country concert brought me back to the first time someone called me n—-r.
I was 7 or 8 years old, in rural West Virginia, where my big brother and I spent summers growing up in the early ’70s. We were running an errand in town for my grandmother, when some little white boys — and girls — started hurling the insult at us, along with some rocks that were heavy enough to break glass and leave bruises.
We did the only thing that made sense to a couple of boys from Brooklyn: We threw rocks back at them.
As for the insults, we couldn’t come up with anything as painful or poisonous. No one ever has.
We didn’t know what the word meant, and they probably didn’t either. But we knew it had something to do with hate and shame.
Anawalt, W.Va., near the Appalachian coal mines, was about as small as small towns get, so by the time we got home our grandmother had heard all about the little rock fight.
After we told her our side of the story, our biracial grandmother (who could pass for white, but never did) gave us a lesson about good and evil.
She also told us about right and wrong. Name-calling and rock-throwing were always wrong, no matter who did it, which was why the second lesson ended with a sore backside.
Still, as I recall, being called n—-r hurt more than the rocks or the switch Grandma made us get from the tree in front of the house.
The second time someone called me n—-r was five or six years later. I was back in Brooklyn, bike-riding with some black friends along Remsen Avenue, through what was then all-white Canarsie.
A gang of white thugs armed with baseball bats and bottles chased us through the streets. Luckily, we could pedal faster than they could run.
“Go home, n—-rs,” they yelled. “Stay out of our neighborhood.”
It’s been a while since a white person has called me n—-r to my face. (I still get it in letters and e-mails from some people who don’t like what I write.)
I heard the word again the other day when Riley Cooper, 25, challenged the authority of a black security guard at a Kenny Chesney concert in Philadelphia.
“I will jump that fence and fight every n—-r here, bro,” a drunk Cooper said in a rant caught on someone’s cellphone camera.
I’d never even heard of Cooper until then, but I was hurt by what he said, because I knew he was talking about people like me.
But I wasn’t hurt nearly as much as his teammates or other NFL players.
Cooper was fined but not suspended for what he said. I’m OK with that. The real punishment will come on the field, if he ever has the guts to put the pads on again.
Unfortunately, the backlash has renewed the senseless debate over who has the right to call someone n—-r, as if the English language wouldn’t survive the retirement of a single hateful word.
The last time someone called me n—-r to my face was about two years ago. It was a black man — a relative, in fact. I’m sure he meant it affectionately, the way a black comedian or a black rapper might say it. I was neither endeared nor amused, and politely told him so.
So, here’s the rule, and I’ll try to make it simple.
Is it ever acceptable for a black person to use the word n—-r? Answer: No.
A white person? Hell, no.
Any questions?
Leonard Greene is a Post reporter.