is asking a black man to dance a "jig" racist?

[RZM]

60. I'm not saying it's not out there

I'm not an old-timer and I've heard it. I'm just saying that I haven't heard it in a very long time. Generally speaking, I think the proscription of racial insults has seeped in enough that even in private conversation, you don't hear racial slurs nearly as much as you used to. Nowadays it's more implied/insinuated.

About 7 years ago I was at Indiana University for a summer language program. During the summer, the university would host black high school students on campus for some program (I never found out exactly what it was). Anyway, one day I arrived at the dining hall for lunch and I immediately detected something wrong with the mood there. I asked one of the food servers if something had just happened. He said:

'There was a huge fight between a bunch of girls and the cops came. I'm not going to say who was responsible, but you know what I mean.'

That's the way I think private discourse is trending nowadays. 30 years before, he probably would have said 'a bunch of [insert racial slurs] were going at it.' I don't disagree that you still hear this stuff, but probably not nearly as much as you used to.