I have a problem with Rhaason Mitchell’s Daily article “Standing up for more than just yourself.” You might be asking yourself, how can someone disagree with an article about standing up for yourself?

It is not this concept that I disagree with. I will get to my point, but first I think it is necessary to tell you a little about myself. My make-up is half black and half white. My mother is Caucasian; she was raised a Catholic in Westdale, Iowa. My father is African American; he was raised in the Baptist church in Brooklyn, New York. Both are educated and attended ISU in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Rhaason, I think the fundamental point in your article is commendable.

You state how people shouldn’t be hypocritical; instead, they should consistently defend their views instead of going with the flow or the politically correct viewpoint.

However, I do have a beef with a particular part of your article. Where in the world do you get your definition of the word “nigger?”

In your article, you define “nigger” as an “ignorant or shiftless person.” I think that you are putting an unfounded value on the word, just as ignorant slave owners of the past have done.

If the word “nigger” really meant ignorant and shiftless, wouldn’t it be ok to use this word in everyday conversation? Under your definition, the word “nigger” has rational meaning.

First of all, the Oxford dictionary defines “nigger” as “a Negro except in Black English vernacular where it remains common, now virtually restricted to context of deliberate and contemptuous ethnic abuse.”

This really doesn’t explain where the word comes from. The only other definition providing insight comes from the word “Niger.” “Niger” refers to a country in Africa, a river in Africa or the color black.

Let me suggest that the word “nigger” comes from the word “Niger.” Let me suggest that the early European explorers took the word “nigger” off the map of Africa and used it to label the black people of Africa.

Much like early explorers labeled the native people of America as Native Americans because they thought they were in India.

I believe that slave traders adopted the name “nigger” this way also.

I assume that once the slave ships reached the Americas, they sold the captured black people from Africa referring to them as “niggers.” (i.e. Niggers for Sale)

Over time, the word “nigger” has been taken further and further out of its original context until today, when it is used way out of its rightful meaning, usually at the expense of others!!

I don’t think it was so bad for early explorers, back in the day, to call the black people of Africa “niggers” or blacks. After all, at this point, the word “nigger” didn’t contain reference to slavery and hatred.

The problem really comes in when we take a word like “Niger,” which refers to parts of a beautiful country in Africa and the beautiful black skin of its people, and we use and abuse it to mean things like “ignorant” and “shiftless,” just as the slave traders and owners did last century.

More often than not, the word “nigger” simply reflects the ignorance of the person using it.

This is why the black race, in America, cannot allow themselves to be called “niggers.”

This is why we, as Americans, must re-evaluate our ignorance.

This is why I cannot agree with your so-called “proper definition of ‘nigger!'”

If people really have to refer to us by our skin color, then let’s use the “politically correct” word, African American.

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Jerome Bobo

Sophomore

Art and design