Cyprus-Forum.com

[Paphitis]

[erolz66]

That article showed nothing of the sort. It in fact had examples of the word still being in use and it certainly said nothing about future uses into the 90s - it's just your extrapolation and nothing more.

Furthermore, people have been aware of racism for centuries but that didn't stop such uses. So, knowing the word is racist by the 1970s and not using the word are two entirely different things. Otherwise, it definitely won't be used by nowadays - but only someone completely isolated from the world would think such a thing. Are you completely isolated?

Again, your continued failure to grasp both these points is indicative of your total lack of comprehension, your usual yarn-spinning because you cannot find evidence ... or merely mischief-making.

With each post you make you just continue to show my point that you will, when it suits your needs, continue to argue that red is in fact green, regardless of actual reality.

From your original absurd assertion that the word nigger was routinely (usual, normal, customary) used in the UK in 1994 and later through to your continued insistence that the Wikipedia article does not refute such a claim, you just show how you routinely behave in these forums and what your true commitment to actual truth is vs your commitment to your own fabricated versions of reality.

[Get Real!]

Nigger is not even English slang… I think the word used for blacks in the UK's 60s and 70s was a “coon”.

[GreekIslandGirl]

That article showed nothing of the sort. It in fact had examples of the word still being in use and it certainly said nothing about future uses into the 90s - it's just your extrapolation and nothing more.

Furthermore, people have been aware of racism for centuries but that didn't stop such uses. So, knowing the word is racist by the 1970s and not using the word are two entirely different things. Otherwise, it definitely won't be used by nowadays - but only someone completely isolated from the world would think such a thing. Are you completely isolated?

Again, your continued failure to grasp both these points is indicative of your total lack of comprehension, your usual yarn-spinning because you cannot find evidence ... or merely mischief-making.

With each post you make you just continue to show my point that you will, when it suits your needs, continue to argue that red is in fact green, regardless of actual reality.

From your original absurd assertion that the word nigger was routinely (usual, normal, customary) used in the UK in 1994 and later through to your continued insistence that the Wikipedia article does not refute such a claim, you just show how you routinely behave in these forums and what your true commitment to actual truth is vs your commitment to your own fabricated versions of reality.

And the conclusion I can draw from yet another long-drawn out interaction with you, this pattern of behaviour which you exhibit, to battle by repeating simply that your opinion is better than that of others - at the heart of all this, is the simple matter that you do not actually understand (a) what evidence is and (b) how to critically evaluate the evidence others present.

Somewhere in your arrogant brain, a numbskull operator is telling you that your opinion is so right that nothing should make you give it up ... and there I am afraid, I have to go back to the reminiscences I have of another group of people who hold half my country illegally simply because they think they are right and the Gavurs/Giaors (or however you spell your disgusting word) are wrong!

[erolz66]

Somewhere in your arrogant brain, a numbskull operator is telling you that your opinion is so right that nothing should make you give it up ...

The irony here is GiG that there is simply NO evidence that I could give that would ever convince you that YOU were simply wrong. If I were to post a poll on forums where British people participated asking do you consider the statement "the "N" word was still routinely used less than 20 years ago in the UK" and the result of that poll was to overwhelming show that people considered it 'not true' you would just dismiss the result as irrelevant, because you have NO INTEREST in the objective factual reality, your ONLY interest is in insisting your opinion is right DESPITE any and all evidence. Even if I found a text that stated "by the 1980's in the UK the word nigger was not routinely used" you would just say that says nothing about the state in 1994 onwards. If I found one that said ""by 1994 and later in the UK the word nigger was not routinely used" , you would just dismiss the source in one way or another. That is my point.

There is an objective reality as to when use of the word nigger in the UK to refer to a black person went from normal , regular , common , acceptable (routine) every day usage to its current state today where such usage is NOT normal, regular, common, acceptable (routine). You have NO interest in the actual reality of when this transition occurred. Your ONLY interest is in trying to maintain that 1994 and later is the period when this transition occurred REGARDLESS of any evidence presented.

And to prove this point I will now provide you with more evidence, that you will simply ignore, dismiss and poo poo one way or another. Before we look at this evidence let us not forget that the only evidence YOU have provided to date to support your claim is two distortions of what is said in the Wikipedia article , one of which is a distortion so large it beggars belief and the assertion that you know people who still routinely used the word in reference to black people today.



This is a graph produced using google's ngram project. It basically shows the frequency of the occurrences of the word nigger and niggers in books scanned by Google in the data set "British English 2009" - which is defined as "Books predominantly in the English language that were published in Great Britain." between 1900 and 2008. The 'transition period' from when the word went from normal , regular , common , acceptable (routine) usage to not normal , regular , common , acceptable (routine) can clearly be seen. It is essentially from the beginning of the 1970's to the mid 1970's. From around 1975 to 2008 there is little change in the frequency of word. I assert that this strongly indicates that the real objective time period from when the word transitioned from normal, regular, common, acceptable, routine usage to its current usage today is between 1970 and 1975 and not as you claimed from 1994 onwards.

So go ahead, make my day, as Dirty Harry famously said, and just show (again) that you have NO interest in the actual reality of when this transition occurred and your ONLY interest is in trying to show that "your opinion is so right that nothing should make you give it up". Dismiss this evidence and tell me that I "do not actually understand (a) what evidence is and (b) how to critically evaluate the evidence others present." and then start talking about how I am a Turk and thus display the characteristics of one , as defined by you - for this is surely what you will do and in doing so you will in fact just yet again demonstrate my point.

[GreekIslandGirl]

Sounds like you already know that you are grasping at straws presenting something that clearly does not nullify my points, but supports them.

And so there is no need to labour the point; put simply, you are deliberately skirting the issues and inventing questions that were not in debate.

I have never denied that the N word became taboo some time ago, that it is deemed racist; so what's the point of pasting evidence to support what I agree with and then ask me to rubbish it? Do you think my trashing that data will lead me into trashing an idea that I do not dispute, Mr Mastertwister?

The data simply proves what I said - that the "N" word was still very much in use some two decades ago. And lo and behold, it's still in use and at a much higher frequency in print than I expected. Wow!

[Sotos]

It basically shows the frequency of the occurrences of the word nigger and niggers in books scanned by Google

The data shows that while this word was used most frequently between 1930 and 1970, it was still used in the 90s and even later quite a lot. It is used about 30%-40% less, but one would expect much greater difference between the era of KKK and the era of "political correctness".

[Jimski999]

I was born and brought up in Liverpool with one of the largest Black communities in the UK. I can't ever recall the "N" word ever being used; the usual derogative discription as Get Real said was "Coon" or in the case of mixed race was "Half Caste". Sad that we have such derogative terms for anyone of any race.

[GreekIslandGirl]

I think it's a generational thing as the "N" word is probably more American. That might be why the "N" word usage in the 80s and early 90s that I was aware of proliferated within street culture/slang and the rise of hip-hop and rap music and their predecessors. It might also have been more a London thing which has always been heavily influenced by Americanisms than further up north such as Liverpool (and I lived in the east-end briefly during the NF days). It now seems to have filtered into the upper echelons - or middle classes that gained their 'trends' from Uni days a few decades ago.

Personally, I don't recall any use of 'Coon' although I was well aware of its use, so perhaps exposed briefly; or maybe more in print as I used to read a lot of 50s and 60s British kitchen-sink dramas. I do recall 'golliwog' very quickly losing favour (and the jam manufacturers doing some swift PR) especially with the rise of the Afro hair-styles in the 70s and 80s. Mixed-race seems to have replaced 'half-caste' quite successfully.

I tried to do a quick search on Selvon's Lonely Londoners (a novel on colonial subjects arriving in Britain, especially West Indians) but it doesn't look like 'Coon' appeared in that - might re-read it as I loved it anyway.

[Paphitis]

"coon" is more an Australian term but not in widespread use (thankfully) these days like it probably was among idiots some 30 odd years ago.