CNN's Don Lemon holds up sign showing N-word on air, asks, 'Does this offend you?'

[Jazzy]

CNN's Don Lemon sparked controversy on Monday, holding up a sign with the N-word printed in bold, capital letters at the top of his prime time show after President Barack Obama used the racial epithet in a discussion about race with podcast host Marc Maron.

"Does this offend you?" Lemon asked viewers as he held up the sign. "President Obama said it out loud in an interview. And a lot of people are shocked."

"Racism, we are not cured of it," Obama said in the podcast interview, which was recorded Friday and posted online Monday. "And it's not just a matter of it not being polite to say n----- in public. That's not the measure of whether racism still exists or not. It's not just a matter of overt discrimination. Societies don't, overnight, completely erase everything that happened 200 to 300 years prior."

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the president has no regrets about using the controversial term.

Later in the CNN broadcast, Lemon led a discussion on President Obama's use of the word — and defended his own.

Source

If the president can utter that word, do you think journalists should be able to utter it, too?

 

[DrLeftover]

Have you seen CNN's ratings lately?

 

[Jazzy]

^No. Are they worse than Obama's?

 

[DrLeftover]

They're right down in the same neighborhood.

Live + Same Day Cable News Daily Ratings for Monday, June 22, 2015

Total Day P2+ (000s) 25-54 (000s) 35-64 (000s)
FOXN 1,115 217 399
CNN 452 146 230
MSNBC 394 81 156
CNBC 153 56 87
FBN 72 17 29
HLN 261 118 144




Primetime P2+ (000s) 25-54 (000s) 35-64 (000s)
FOXN 1,771 345 640
CNN 598 186 298
MSNBC 767 156 320
CNBC 276 112 148
FBN 50 12 20
HLN 231 103 133

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2015/06/23/cable-news-ratings-for-monday-june-22-2015/420819/

 

[Jazzy]

It's okay for the rappers to use it in songs, but it's not okay for the white person to say it ever? It's okay for the black community to use "n***a" as a greeting (ever heard "What's up my n***a?).

If the damned word is so "offensive", why do blacks continue to use it? If it's offensive, the blacks need to STOP using it themselves to set the example for everyone else. To say it's okay for blacks to use it, but white's can't is exclusionary and that is the basis of racism. It's either acceptable or not. If black people can call each other the N-word and it's not offensive, please explain to me why it is such a horrible word.

 

[DrLeftover]

It is such a horrible word because they say it is.

I try not to give others that much power over me using words. If they choose to do so, that's up to them.