WASHINGTON — (Scroll Down For Video) — President Obama said the United States has not overcome its history of racism — and he is using the “N-word” to make his case.
In an interview, Mr. Obama weighed in on the debate over race and guns that has erupted after the arrest of a white man for the racially motivated shooting deaths of nine black church members in Charleston, South Carolina.
“Racism, we are not cured of it,” Mr. Obama said. “And it’s not just a matter of it not being polite to say nigger 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.”
Mr. Obama’s remarks came during an interview out Monday with comedian Marc Maron for his popular podcast, where crude language is often part of the discussion.
The president said while attitudes about race have improved significantly since he was born to a white mother and black father, the legacy of slavery “casts a long shadow and that’s still part of our DNA that’s passed on.”
White House Spokesman Josh Earnest reiterated that the president was talking about the whole history of race relations in this country and pointed out that the president used the N-word repeatedly in his first book “Dreams from my Father.” One incident Obama related in his memoir is one from his mother’s childhood – his grandmother told him that she had once come upon a group of children taunting and yelling the epithet at his mother and her black friend as the two shared a book.
