Ninja Drops N-Word On Twitch, A Prequel To His Apology Tour
Expect more and demand more from your favorites.
Update: The apology has arrived.
While I am confident that most of this is a misunderstanding, I recognize that it’s my responsibility to never let there be THIS kind of a misunderstanding. More than anything, I hate that any of my friends, fans, or viewers might feel disrespected. (Tweet 1)
— Ninja (@Ninja) March 29, 2018
Original Story:
Popular Twitch streamer Ninja gained additional notoriety after featuring artists Drake and Travis Scott alongside a cameo from NFL player JuJu Smith-Schuster while playing Fortnite. In what has become a sadly expected series of events for the most visible streamers, he's made it right back into the news cycle but not for a good reason. While playing Fortnite with a friend, Ninja was rapping the lyrics to a song by rapper Logic when he decided to fill in the lyrics with a couple n-bombs.
I'm interested in seeing the reactions to Ninja saying the n word twice. All you man who say "well he was just rapping" (it still would not be okay), the song he was rapping doesn't even say the n word. lmao. pic.twitter.com/zORDfQKOo7
— (@LordBalvin) March 28, 2018
To get one thing absolutely straight, this is not one of those instances where someone was simply saying the lyrics to the song. As seen in the clip above and noted by LordBalvin, he ad-libbed the n-word through a part of the song it seems he forgot the lyrics for. A quick search of Logic's "44 More" will confirm the same.
Much like PewDiePie, Ninja's slip-up seems like a moment where a person who has no business saying a word slipped it in during a livestream because it's a part of their off-stream vocabulary. Unlike PewDiePie, Ninja doesn't have an established track record of poor behavior, so the general response has been pretty tame. We have an idea of what comes next, though.
For the Ninja apologists: These words don't get pulled out of thin air. There's no excuse for it and Ninja needs to be checked on his behavior. The mistake was in him saying it on stream, but he also needs to eliminate that and whatever other potential slurs he may use as filler while rapping from his vocabulary entirely. Feel free to debate whether he's racist or not until you're blue in the face, but we know now he's at least racially insensitive. Consider this a teaching and learning moment. Hopefully, we won't have to backlink this in a future story. Better yet, let's hope we don't have to write "Ninja, Stop."
The ball is now in Twitch's court, considering this doesn't line up with their new guidelines.
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Shacknews
replyCharles Singletary posted a new article, Ninja Drops N-Word On Twitch, A Prequel To His Apology Tour
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Interesting. Glad to see that this stuff is being taken seriously by the games media, though.
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I bet it really make you think.
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The "he was singing a song" excuse falls apart when he ad-lbs the word into it.
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This seems like a point that many people are missing.
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I'm not sure anybody has explained how such a "point" is relevant... Are we really living in a time where a word can be used as liberally as possible in public, film and lyrics by one group yet be also be policed if certain people dares say it? That's VERY disingenuous.
"All these words are okay, but this one word in the song... you can only say it when we say it or you get labelled 'racist'"
I'm sorry, that is the strangest sort of double-speak/thought-policing I've heard in ages. This is the sort of ridiculous PC stuff that keeps the oversensitive left from being taken seriously.
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He still shouldn’t be saying the word as a white dude in front of thousands of fans, many of them little white kids. It’s not a word white people should say, even in a rap context. It’s just not our word. We don’t get to say that word. Period.
Yeah, I like rap and I love how that word fits in to tons of my favorite rap songs for purely superficial reasons. But I am never saying that shit, I’ll tell you that!-
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Me and some friends went into a karaoke bar in St. Louis years back after a work conference. There were probably 200 people there and we were literally the only white people in the entire place. The DJ was a lanky white dude with a ponytail and he was singing karaoke to all sorts of rap songs. His N-bomb replacement technique was masterful. He would change up the word like playa, hitta, etc to whatever fit best with the verse. It was impressive (and funny as hell).
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literally, except not literally?
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It's cool that you wanna be a douche like that. I originally read it on my phone. Didn't see anything below the video. So it's not really and issue of not reading everything. I just didn't know it was there. And ultimately, that detail has no impact on the point I was making. I was speaking to the context in the way he used the word. I agree shouldn't have said it. We all agree on that. I wouldn't have said it myself if I were in his position. I'm just saying that I don't believe he had hate in his heart the way he was using it.
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This is actually good advice you should take away from this thread.
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And ultimately, that detail has no impact on the point I was making. I was speaking to the context in the way he used the word. I agree shouldn't have said it. We all agree on that. I wouldn't have said it myself if I were in his position. I'm just saying that I don't believe he had hate in his heart the way he was using it.
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Dude needs to learn the golden rule of white guy rap recital. You fucking replace the n-bomb with something innocuous or you just don’t sing it at all.
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That said, this article is weirdly judgy/preachy.
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When it comes to that word, yes. We are going to be preachy.
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I hear you.
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He was ad-libbing rap lyrics. He's not a scumbag, he's a normal fucking dude. Everybody needs to chill.
Unless you're up in arms about Kendrick or whoever dropping the word, then we need to turn our outrage meter back a few notches.-
Well “normal fucking dudes” need to stop throwing n-words around.
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This is pretty much the point.
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Also, I regret my judgy post and would like to retract it here. Article is not judgy.
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Including guys like Kendrick Lamar?
It's part of the zeitgeist we live in, rappers say it, some black people use it in conversation. Other skin toned-people hear it all the time if they enjoy rap. So it's just something that's out there, and it's not going anywhere as long as people continue to put out music and stand-up comedy and movies that use it.-
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explain
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It's hilarious.
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legit answer: There's always someone defending the stance to use it, and as a proponent of free speech, I'm with you. I wouldn't do it because of how people would look at me, but I'm not going to forbid anyone else from using it outside my family and friends.
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Same here, I personally think it's in poor taste how Ninja used it, but that's about it. It's in poor taste.
I don't think it's a great misdeed where he has helped propogate 300 years of American racial discrimination or turned some if his young viewers into alt-righters. -
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wait, are you saying we should make a word illegal to use for certain ethnicities?
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Cool, thanks for distilling my argument into a strawman to make me sound like a tool. I have a lot of respect for you too.
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What separates his use from that of black people's is simply this: when they use the word its whole history and context primarily and only affects them and thus their use is truly only their prerogative.
When anyone else uses it, the history and the context of the word, a word which was not literally made to degrade us (but instead made to let us degrade others), it does not affect us; it has no bearing on us; it primarily affects black people and brings with it to the forefront the entirety of its negative and degrading historical context, and so we do not have free reign to use it if we are told and understand that that use is harmful.
We need to stop getting hung up on wringing our hands of "is this guy racist? am I racist?" and instead ask ourselves "Do we want to be racist? Do we want to hurt other people with the things we say and do?" If the answer is no, then the path forward is very simple. Whenever someone says "Hey, this thing you said or did, it hurts me and here is why" and you can understand how your actions or words affected them you simply apologize and stop doing it.
Not saying the n-word or other similar slurs takes nothing away from us. The only thing we lose is the capacity to degrade whole groups of people. And if we don't want to be bigots and we don't want to hurt people that is really no loss at all.
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eh. how hard is it to not include that word in your vocabulary, ad-libbing or not?
for many people it's just something they don't say, it's not a challenge to reign it in.
tossing possibly the most hateful and loaded word in our language into a song (that doesn't even feature that word) makes you wonder why it was so readily available and waiting to bubble up to the surface of his mind-
Because he listens to rap.
He had the highest rated stream ever on Twitch because he streamed with Drake. Safe to say he listens to alot of rap.
That's why it bubbles into his mind.-
I don't know why it's surprising that these guys can't see the difference between peepeeguy screaming it in anger and what this person did. one guy is a racist, the other guy loves hip hop. I'm personally not saying it's "ok" for him to use that word, but it is so very obviously coming from a different place.
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I don't think anyone is conflating the two incidents. But they can both be not cool. You aren't instantly a racist, but it's pretty poor judgement and self-awareness to do this.
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Your last sentence is trying to cutely call him a racist, which totally equates the two incidents.
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Nope, you can't just make that up. I didn't call him a racist.
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You didn't.
Only in America is the possibility of being called a racist more offensive then being a racist itself. -
Ok whatever, but I'm referring to the "really makes you wonder" post higher in the thread, if that wasn't clear.
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Lots of people listen to rap and don't have this problem.
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Kendrick is a black dude from Compton right?
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You should watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO15S3WC9pg
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wow so what happened in this instance is exactly the same to you as what that pewpewpie guy did?
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weird how that word sets people off
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I know. I retracted this stupid post a few times already below. I’m sorry.
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Oh I read “are black”. If you were being a D here my post still stands.
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you caved to the smallest shackpile ever
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It was deserved.
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And if you don't know, now you know, ninja
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Hell yea, my ninja.
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So is there any successful twitch streamer out there who hasn't done something incredibly stupid in a public way by this point? It blows my mind how little common sense some of these guys seem to have.
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Ta-Nehisi Coates on this "dilemma", essential viewing:
https://youtu.be/QO15S3WC9pg-
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I mostly agree with most of what this dude is saying, with a few exceptions.
The main one being that it's OK for his white friend to say "my white trash cabin" in front of him. I think that's in poor taste too, to use a touchy word like that around people who don't really have ownership over it and can't use it along with you in conversation. Like most of my black friends over the years never used it around me, but I had no clue if they around their buds.-
er, black friends haven't used nigga around me
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Nice use of personally there bud.
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God I love that man.
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Meet the author
https://twitter.com/The_CSJR
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I have to admit, I learned the hard myself at 16, working in a pizza hut.
"And this n did blah blah blah, can you believe that shit?" or something.
The room full of utterly disgusted, check yourself, mean mugs I received made me understand right away I was lucky they liked me and I apologized like crazy for the next week. Not proud of that.
Best case scenario, this is his 16 year old dumbass moment that happened later in his life than mine. And I'm really happy mine didn't happen in front of how ever many followers he has.-
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LMAO
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I don't think Charles is trying to clickbaity article or anything, he seems like a pretty standup guy from what I've seen in the streams.
But I do think he's fallen in witht he trend of outrage culture that is a scourge on the internet these days. And this culture isn't just seen with people on the left, but on the right (who'd are even more prone to it depending on the subject), and the middle. -
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because hopefully the mods are recognizing context here a little better than the shack has with Ninja's stream
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Well, lots of rappers use it as filler. He's basically ribbing on that (two-decade old) trend.
So is it in poor taste? I think so. Do we need to write articles about it and spread the video clip around? No -
Its part of everyones vocabulary, and its used alot by black rappers in alot of songs, besides we notice it more because of its racist history, so it feels like its like every other Word in every rap song sometimes, so if some white shmuck like me was for some very bad reason going to pretend to be 50cent or whatever and drop some gangsta rhymes (personally I’d need to be looking down the barrel of a rifle for the motivation to do this in public) ,then i would have to go n this n that for lack of actual skills or knowlegde of actual rap lyrics. But thats kinda also the only scenario i could see me possibly ever using the word, well , except talking about the word like here, but then youre apparantly supposed to use the dreadful «n-word».
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"Thus it is a part of his vocabulary"
Does society judge this young man for WHERE he learned this word was okay to use, over and over, in song after song?
"Context" is; the word is being used non-stop in rap music. That's how it became a part of his vocabulary.
Seems like people are demonizing this young man for simply quoting a person of color. This word either needs to go or the PC Police need to take a step back and understand real context.
Honestly - white kids would be better off not giving their money to rappers that use the word. Let the free market decide. Hopefully that will give more intelligent rappers with a better vocabulary some attention.
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Because apples and oranges are two entirely different things, possibly?
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Being Asian does not give us license or authority to determine what may or may not be offensive to others.
This is a dialogue, not a court of morality. The discourse suggests that we should be careful about words with potential baggage. As fellow human beings, we should be willing to accommodate our language to ensure that others feel safe.
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These entitled people aren't slaves any more than my white immigrant family (or ANY European family I know) has any slave owners in their family trees.
So, just to be clear, we're talking about a culture that is still incapable of turning around their communities, is using this supposedly bad word over and over when referring to themselves, using it in pop music. This isn't a white problem, this is a black problem. It's an absolutely embarrassingly shameful attempt at victimology.
I hope (if you're a black man) you can start looking at the problems in your own culture instead of blaming how that culture affects other, and how you can use that to perpetually be some sort of child that needs to constantly be coddled and protected.
Do you REALLY think policing a word black culture LOVES to call themselves and use over and over in their popular music makes an ounce of sense? Black culture has A LOT to answer for. When they face what's holding them back, maybe we won't have to talk about them as if they're little fragile babies. Maybe they'll also stop referring to EVERYBODY is "n*gga" while trying to demonize anybody who uses the same word.
Sorry, but this crap is pathetic.
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My guess is that Ninja is one of the white people who don't censor themselves when reciting hooks from rap and hip-hop lyrics.
Is it in poor taste? I think so, but I understand if other people don't think so.
So what's the appropriate reaction? Whoever is watching the stream at the time to say something like "come on dude". Writing an article and spreading the clip around on twitter is definitely an overreaction.-
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for doing it once? no. Maybe if it was a habitual thing, his viewers should sit him down and say "dude, we need to explain something to you"
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on stream, if he habitually says it on stream. His viewers wouldn't know if he recites rap lyrics verbatim in his car.
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The issue is that there are still people alive today that were forced to drink out of separate water fountains than white people because they were seen as second-class citizens, and that word, or any derivative of it, is a word that was rightfully reclaimed in some way by black people and white people do not get to use it ever.
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Pretty sure nobody in this thread or in the article said he is a racist asshole. Pretty sure the whole point is that white people should never let that word slip out of their mouth ever, even in private. If it happens in private, there’s a chance it will happen in public, in front of a large audience, making them think it’s OK and it’s definitely not OK.
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Says the white guy.
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You are struggling to have empathy in a situation like this because there’s literally no way you can understand what it’s like to be black. As white people, the more readily we admit that, the more we can empathize and realize that we just need to shut the fuck up about this shit 100% of the time unless we are in support. I made a post above about this article being judgmental, really I misinterpreted the tone of the author and when I went back and reread it, I instantly regretted the post and wished I would’ve just shut the fuck up. Posts like this are like the NRA hosting Second Amendment rallies across the street from the March for our lives thing. They are just pointless.
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I mean, I think that just solidifies that context matters. He even says it multiple times. I'm not saying what Ninja did is fine but I think the article here is a gross overreaction. This is more of a "bro, that's probably not something you should say any more" scenario than a "you owe a public apology and we're going to compare you to this other situation that's significantly different because you used the same word"
I do agree that there are social cues that you should follow just to be a good member of society and there are definitely words people should avoid using but I strongly believe that we need to keep teaching people to be resilient and use appropriate responses instead of freaking out about absolutely everything that is a minor inconvenience or offends you.
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Words are never just "words." You are very right that context matters though. Context in the moment of use can shift a meaning yes, but rarely entirely, and never without losing the weight of its history and definition.
Context exists well beyond whatever personal circumstances surround a singular use of a word. Many words, especially culturally loaded words such as that in question, carry with them a whole history of context with every use. This is a word literally invented for use by white people to degrade and humiliate African Americans. It has literally centuries of history and context of its use in that manner. IT still has that context and literal meaning.
It is a word that was made to affect African Americans and African Americans only. When they use it, it well and truly only their prerogative since it only affects them. And even that can be not so cut and dry; but as you said context matters and when it used among them between them that context is fundamentally different than the context of literally anyone else uttering it.
At the end of the day, we all know the history and context of that word. We all know what it means. We know what it means when someone who isn't African American says it. Is it used in rap and among African Americans in a different manner to mean a different thing than its original meaning? Yeah. But we also know that there is a difference. There is a reason why generally speaking people try to avoid saying it if possible.
Can people hear a word often enough that they easily repeat it without thinking? Of course, that's the nature of people and conveyance of ideas and memetic culture. And it is also part and parcel for the problem at hand. People need to think more. People with an audience like Ninja's especially need to think more.
If someone says, "When you say this word, regardless of your intention, it brings with it this host of pain and discomfort, however unintentional it may be. Can you not say it?" The human response is to try to understand, and if you do understand how a word made to degrade, made specifically for use by non-black people to degrade those it targets; then you take it upon yourself to think and not use it casually, not use it callously, and especially not use it maliciously because hopefully you don't want to hurt people, you don't want to cause discomfort.-
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sorry for not reading the thread better! But I wouldn't qualify this as a freak out about a "minor inconvenience or something that offends" people. I think people are rightly upset and concerned that a person with a very large and very influencable audience doesn't have some basic understandings of history and context, and sense of social responsibility.
Does he fundamentally not know or understand there is a difference in him using that word? Does he not care? Will his audience know or care? I think when you place this in a larger context of the gaming communities, of the language and frankly just toxicity that is seen generally across games, especially competitive ones; this is kind of more than a minor inconvenience or offense. I think its somewhat denigrating to say people need to be taught more resilience. How many times do you think people have to hear the n-word thrown around as an insult casually over a game's voip? Is that going to color and affect their reaction when they then tune in and see or hear how now the top streamer for Fortnite just dropped it casually in a rap freestyle? Knowing that how ever many thousands of people are watching and aspire to be like this guy?
I'm sorry if this is coming across as belligerent or singling you out personally, I don't mean to (I'm a big fan of LatestChatty, and using it right now! And you're a good guy!); just I feel like you're underselling why people are very frustrated by this. Like right now there's the goddamn KFC twitch emote shit happening.-
I shouldn't have mentioned resiliency because that doesn't apply here. No one needs to be accepting of the use of this particular word. I do think we need to measure our outrage accordingly though and I think this article was more of a hit piece than a measured response in the context of what happened.
Like I said in my other comment it's more of a "dude, don't do that" than "you're a racist motherfucker like pewdefart and we're going to rake you over the coals for it" kind of thing.
I agree that people in his position should probably be held to a pretty high standard so calling him out on it is definitely the right thing to do, but this article was over the top for me.-
I guess we read this article differently. It felt rather measured to me considering Ninja's status, what else is going on in Twitch with the KFC stuff, and other debacles recently and with Twitch's new attempts at cleaning up toxicity. The author kept it pretty brief but didn't mince words which in my mind is fair all things considered. The worst the article does is say "there is no excuse for pulling this word" which I think we all agree with. I guess the tone I read into it was more weary of having to read another major streamer/gaming personality dropping a racially insensitive if not racist remark casually.
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Ninja brought no pain and no discomfort on anyone. Just faux outrage because we like to get faux outraged at famous internet people.
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I'm not black. I can't claim to be personally targeted and affected by this particular event. However, I feel like its pretty clear from responses here and elsewhere online that people are at the very least very uncomfortable (one might even say, feeling discomfort) at/with Ninja's use of the word here. This isn't a new conversation. People understand what the word means and how it is different when used by black and non-black people.
I hope that you can understand how if you have to deal with racism in your life, deal with people using the n-word maliciously; how that can really affect what you feel when you hear that word again, especially from a white guy. Especially with everything else going on in culture today.-
Context, man, context. He was ad-libbing rap lyrics. The word is incredibly common in rap lyrics.
Nobody is being targeted or affected, except for people looking to be triggered.-
Also, the more you hear something in a context, the more likely you are to use it in said context, even if you didn't explicitly mean to do so.
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I know the word is common in rap, I listen to a ton of rap myself. At the same time I don't say that word. You seem to understand that he shouldn't say that word but turn around and say "well this was harmless" which is rather contradictory, since the reasons he shouldn't say it still stand.
You are very intent on focusing on context yet for some reason ignore any context outside of "he was adlibbing a rap song." Context of a highly influential, highly watched white man casually saying a word designed by white people so that white people could degrade African Americans. Context of the KFC emote being used across Twitch to callout black streamers in disparaging ways. Context of the just general racism and toxicity that exists in online gaming communities at large. Context of Overwatch League struggling to deal with toxic use of slurs by their professional players. Context of here's a guy who had the largest stream audience by virtue of playing with successful black artists and athletes and who then casually uses a highly loaded slur, that even you agree he shouldn't say, on stream in front of his massive audience. But you just focus on "well he was adlibbing a rap song." How many white rappers worth a damn use the n-word? Has El-P? Has Eminem?
You say "he didn't bring pain or discomfort on anyone," seemingly ignoring much of this thread and other outlets expressing literally that, then say "only people looking to get triggered are bothered." What does even mean exactly?
Is someone who has to deal with racism regularly who comes home to watch a stream and sees this someone "looking to get triggered?" How about someone who just rage quit another stream because of the kfc emote and tunes into see this?
Can you understand how this sort of casual use can be upsetting? How it can cause discomfort to people? Is it less directly racist than someone yelling it at a black person? Sure, but this isn't a mutually exclusive situation. You literally agree that he shouldn't say this word but seem intent on telling everyone to not be bothered by this. Is it really that hard to listen to people say "this bothers me, this upsets me, for all the reasons we've said, please stop using this word."? Is that really that bothersome to you? Is it that difficult to not use a word that we all know has such potential for causing people discomfort? Is it that difficult to hear other people express their valid and long running frustrations?
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Except in their cars, alone, singing rap songs. Just like 99% of every non black person in this thread who likes and listens to rap has done countless times.
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Fortunately, that's NOT how language works.
The day these communities take a page from other cultures that somehow manage to rise up against adversity, take pride in their past and who they are, they'll always use the N-word, always have the rest of civil society look down on such language.
Either people can use it or then can't. Either way, people have a right to judge it's use of ALL people. Heck, it's why I stopped listening to hip hop 20 years ago... Take a page from the Jews. They've been through a lot over history. Yet somehow they don't call each other "k*ke", don't turn their neighborhoods into urban war zones, manage to create positive and sustainable communities.
The amount of white people talking about black people and their language like they're not even adults is just sad. If the word is bad; they NEED to stop using it. Glorifying thugs and thug language is destroying what's left of their culture.
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Fucking streamers need to learn it's still a work environment for them and there are limits.
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I'm not defending pdp in any way what so ever because he was a repeat offender (I think?) and once you know you screwed up you should do your best to not do it again, but expecting everyone in the world to know every social faux pas for every culture in the world is absolutely ridiculous.
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to an extent that is true. think how fucking dumb the general populace is(hello trump), and then factor in a whole different culture where the history of our culture is just a couple of footnotes in alot of their education, if that.
if most americans cant figure out why the fuck sunni and shia muslims are killing each other(do you think many could even point out iraq on a map?) after we've been invading and bombing them for years on end, is it that much of a stretch to think other cultures dont have an understanding of ours? anyway im not supporting it, just saying.-
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Now who's the fucking ignorant racist? He's Swedish.
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totally agree and I think if people stop to think about why people do dumb shit there's always a psychological reason for it. people arent just evil by nature
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"Much like PewDiePie, Ninja's slip-up seems like a moment where a person who has no business saying a word slipped it in during a livestream because it's a part of their off-stream vocabulary. Unlike PewDiePie, Ninja doesn't have an established track record of poor behavior, so the general response has been pretty tame."
Does that seem unfair? Because that's the only comparison the article makes.
Your car analogy is terrible. Car isn't a word literally invented to degrade an entire people. Car isn't a word that was used for centuries and is still used today to degrade an entire people. Cars also aren't people. Cars don't have a history of dealing with institutionalized racism for generations. And also, I'm pretty sure we are all raised to not use racist slurs. This isn't a new phenomenon of someone up and deciding last year that "the n-word is racist." Does the n-word have other meanings now? Yes. But we also are all intelligent adults who I think all can see and understand the boundaries and limits of those other uses given how we all literally agree we shouldn't say that word if we aren't black.
People don't need to have a little more understanding for when someone makes a mistake in the context of the racial turmoil a lot of people have to deal with day and day out. People need to call out these "mistakes" because we all agree they shouldn't be happening.
My bigger question is do you think that people who casually use the word "non-maliciously" are unaware of the original meaning of the word? Of the context of the African American experience with racism (a really common aspect of rap)?
Following up on that, do you think that people should take responsibility for the things they say?
What does it say about our society that even though we all know the history and meaning of this word; even though we all know that racism is still alive today; even though we all know that people have to deal with others using that word to demean and degrade them; that even with all of that a lot of adults think its okay to let that word become casually engrained in their mind? To make a decision to ignore its larger cultural context, often ignoring the very context in which they hear it so frequently (in rap lyrics)?
Does any of that mean he or anyone else who lets that word into their vocabulary is an active racist? I guess my response is it doesn't really matter if he is racist or not. We all agree and we all know that that word shouldn't be used.
We need to all stop getting hung up on the question of "Am I/him/you racist?" and instead ask each of ourselves, "Do I want to be racist? Do I want to hurt other people?" And if the answer is no, then your path is simple and straightforward. Whenever someone says "Hey, this thing you said or did, it hurts me/causes me discomfort and here is why" and you can understand how your actions or words affected them you simply apologize and stop doing it.
Should we not strive to make our society better? Should we not try to, when we are told and we know that this word is harmful when it comes out of our mouths, should we not try to not use that harmful word? Should we not take the time to remind people who didn't previously make these connections that they should think before they speak words that they know are harmful? -
also he says "smoking in the cut myni-" and the lyrics are "in the cut smoking on indica". he was trying to find the indica word and his brain found an unfortunate word that sounds similar
just adding to the psychology at play here
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Ok so I can name 3 popular streamers now.
Two of them because they used the N-word.
One because he something something wife something.
It's almost like it pays to say or do stupid things because the gaming media will then get you all the attention you desire. That is one effective word.
Disclaimer: It is a nasty word and racists are the scum of this earth. That doesn't mean the way we react to these incidents is sensible.-
i think you've got the cause and effect here totally wrong
people talk about them because they're already popular. and because they spend most of their time streaming, inevitably they're gonna do/say something stupid. which isn't to say they deserve sympathy because they are compensated handsomely for this job and they chose it, but it also figures.
imagine if most of your waking hours were visible for everyone to see. you'd inevitably probably do something really dumb that you wouldn't want people to see you doing/saying, like pick your nose or use the n-word or attempt to argue for socialism on a video game forum.-
I know they are/were already popular and well known, but I also believe that all publicity is good publicity for guys like these. People who wouldn't have heard of them otherwise end up doing so, and I don't think the number of people who will stop following them is very high.
Also, I don't think everyone going apeshit over single slipped words is the way to go in the long run to eliminate racism. Whether you are on the right or wrong side of an issue, it's still possible to be a prick about it, and make your stance seem the unreasonable one even if it really is based on "the right thing".
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i cant even hear it https://media.giphy.com/media/qXHhyQpchxRXq/giphy-downsized-large.gif
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I thought it was just me.. Maybe because I'm 45, but I can't hear it.
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it's ridiculous that streamers keep having to rehash the exact same incidents over and over again
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I think the "context doesn't matter it's never okay" line also makes it problematic, because that ends up including education as well.
As a result there's never any formal distinction made between fuck/shit/damn (and in my parents case, fart & booger [no, seriously]) and racial slurs and people don't learn it until they either witness or are subject to one of these explosions.
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Lol at the free speech crowd
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Childish Gambino said it best.
"Chillin' with me n-words, say it like a white kid."-
He doesn't get to say "n-word"... That's our word.
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It's definitely racist but I don't think we need to get outraged over it. The context is forgivable.
There are worst instances of the n word being used by celebrity streamers. Maximilian Dood letting it slip was a big shocker to me but he apologised (and cried) for it and I felt bad even being offended.-
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Almost sounded bad? It was very clear on my speakers.
But yes the word came out because of a dumb joke.
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The article is about getting people to be more sensitive to these words. Him being good at the game has nothing to do with that. Do you think people should not be more sensitive to racially charged words?
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Do you think people should not discuss these kinds of social issues?
Wait, never mind. I know the answer.-
Stop, they want to watch people play video games in peace! You're making them consider other demographics and broader issues, and that's hard! Can't you just understand that they just want to watch people stream video games and don't give a fuck about anyone else? Gosh!
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People throwing around clickbait for any article or concept they disagree with now. Definitely starting to lose its meaning.
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Subjective does not equal clickbait.
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Ok, let's take a look at the primary issue stated in your article:
As seen in the clip above and noted by LordBalvin, he ad-libbed the n-word through a part of the song it seems he forgot the lyrics for. A quick search of Logic's "44 More" will confirm the same.
Ok, so he threw in the word that is used in tons of rap. We all hear it like hundred times if we listen to a rap record. But he's white and as in the American culture we've decided that it's not cool for white people to drop this word in this sort of context because they don't have the same background. Fair enough.
But in the end, it was just an uncool thing for him to do, that's it. How many times have you written articles about other twitch streamers doing uncool things?
You haven't convinced anybody it's more of a serious transgression than that. So it seems like you were just ready to take down another Twitch streamer without really considering the seriousness of the transgression that occured.
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indeed many of us successfully navigate our days without using racist slurs inadvertently on camera
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