The N

Everything I've done so far hasn't worked out in my favor. Fraternity rush was a bust. All of the guys there I could have met at home (and not to mention some of the stuff I heard them say definately turned me off). The N-Word in particular. These guys, most of them white, said it like it was second nature. I had never heard it so much in my life! The possiblity of me joining one of these groups dropped drastically as a result. I don;t think there was one house I went to where I didnt hear it. It made me pretty uncomfortable hearing it like that and to know that so many people said it. Not saying anything about it didn't make it any better. Trying to be accepted made me allow something I knew was wrong.

I am taking an Africana Studies class this semester and it has exposed me to alot of things I wasn't aware of. I took it for the Black aspect, thinking I would just be learning history and stuff. Things I never learned about back home. I didn't really know the impact the word had on Black people until I got here. I'm no expert on it. I just see how others talk about it and it makes me guilty for saying it. I start to feel their anger toward it and it makes me want to stop saying it. I guess I was naive enough to think that was something that only the people I knew did. My friends and I used to say it to each other like it was nothing. I'm starting to see the wrong in it now.