My thoughts: this was not an accident. This was testing the waters.

I wonder what the person who absolutely insisted to me yesterday that this wasn’t about black people in general would have to say about this…

  • UmeU@lemmy.world
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    Really sounds like it starts with an N and not an M so I don’t buy the mispronunciation story.

    Also there is the fact that neither immigrants nor migrants ends in ‘gger’

    He prolly had a bet with a friend that he would slip in an N word.

    • Avatar_of_Self@lemmy.world
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      I saw the dumb defender say he was conflating immigrant and migrant but I replayed that part a dozen times. It really, really sounds like an ‘N’ as the first letter. It definitely was not him beginning to pronounce ‘immgr’. You can plainly hear it.

      But even if we gave him the benefit of the doubt, the fact that Megyn Kelly completely ignored it and the fact that he didn’t apologize immediately and explain it says volumes about both of them. Why didn’t Kelly even say anything? Maybe she’s so used to hearing it in her circles, maybe even saying it, that it didn’t even register as something unusual to her and she didn’t notice it.

    • WoahWoah@lemmy.world
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      It seems seems dubious to me too. But the ‘gr’ in migrants would sound roughly the same as ‘gger.’ The problem is… well. He seems to start it with an ‘n’ and then also mis-inflects the ‘i’?

      It would be like trying to say ‘clickable’ and instead saying ‘slacker.’

      Mad sus.

    • Omega_Jimes@lemmy.ca
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      Yeah, sometimes there’s something else outside could have been saying but not here.

      Here it’s clear as day. And the host says nothing at all, which says a ton about her.

  • MeaanBeaan@lemmy.world
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    Even if this was just an “innocent” slip up it’s not like what he said wouldn’t have been racist otherwise. The dude is defending the false claims about Haitian immigrants. It’s still racist.

  • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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    Gonna invoke the hivemind rage and say that, upon listening w headphones, it does kinda sound like he’s saying “migr -” with a short “i” sound.

    Now queue the downvotes, calling me racist, dumb, etc.

      • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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        I think you’re hearing what you want to hear and getting a hit of the righteous outrage. Misspeaking is a thing, dude. You say “plausible” sarcastically, as if it weren’t actually 100% plausible lol

    • ripcord@lemmy.world
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      No. I assumed it was actually something like thag. Then listened to it a bunch of times. I don’t find that plausible at all.

      • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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        Lol ok buddy. Everyone closes their lips when they pronounce an “m”, right? CLEAR AS DAY. keep fighting the good fight, hive mind

          • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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            Did you …watch the video? His lips move together at the consonant in question. Lol but sure, you’re not just hearing what you want to hear.

              • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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                Honestly I think it’s incredibly pathetic that you’re so dug in on this stranger saying a naughty word that you won’t even look at it objectively. In response to my detailed, objective breakdown, your only rebuttal was “gaslighter”. K. The embedded video player in the link above has a playback speed option, feel free to use it to slow the video down and see the truth of his mouth shape. Compare it to the “n” shape he uses when he says “in” several times. Or keep sticking your head in the sand and yelling “NUH UH GASLIGHTER”, idc. I think we’re clearly done here.

                Edit:.honestly the slowed playback pretty much proves it’s an “m” in both sound and mouth shape.

                • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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                  I have looked at it. Multiple times. His mouth does do the m thing. After he says the N word. That’s how you can tell it’s different.

                  Your detailed breakdown is just a bunch of bullshit designed to make people doubt themselves. Which is gaslighting. It’s the exact definition of gaslighting.

          • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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            Wow you really got me there. Lol the comment is at a positive ratio. The people downvoting me are the willfully ignorant, such as yourself, who would ignore any and all evidence contrary to your notion that a practiced media presence said the n-word live in front of cameras, lol, super smart deduction there buddy. Also ignore the sentence structure and how much more sense “migrant” makes following the word “Haitian”, ignore that he was actually defending the Haitian migrants in his comments, ignore how the consonant sounds slightly more like an “m” than an “n”, and ignore that his lips move together when making the “m” sound, which wouldn’t happen with an “n”. Did I miss anything?

                • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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                  Cognitive dissonance is the feeling when your actions don’t line up with what you’re thinking. Is that how you meant to use that? or were you just looking for impressive words to make me doubt myself or feel confusion?

    • SkyezOpen@lemmy.world
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      Sometimes I hear an m, sometimes an n. Not gonna shit on you. BUT he doesn’t say migr- as if he’s going to say migrants with the short I like he claims he did, he says -IGGER. You have to simultaneously fuck up two different ways to say it that way. It would be mig-rants, not migger-ants.

      • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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        Sure. I’d still say that he just fumbled his words, as people do everyday. Importantly, it’s incredibly stupid to hyper focus on someone possibly saying a naughty word when the whole Haitian migrants story is full of real, undeniable, tangible racism. Missing the forest for the trees.

    • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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      Your headphones suck because he definitely lead with the “n” and not the “m”. I know the difference in sound between n and m and it was an n. In fact around the 0:35 mark he said, “complaining about Haitian nigge-mngr-migrants”. I don’t know how to spell him correcting himself.

      • Organichedgehog@lemmy.world
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        Nah man, you’re hearing what you want to hear. Just look at his lips - they come together as they would with an “m” sound. The exact same way they come together shortly thereafter to say “migrants” properly.

        Compare his mouth movement to when he says “in”, his lips do not move together.

        Or keep hearing what you want to hear, I don’t care. Nothing I say will change your mind.

    • catloaf@lemm.ee
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      Yeah, I’m not 100% convinced either. It doesn’t sound like he used the n-word, nor that he caught himself halfway through saying it. People screw up speaking all the time, and on rare occasions it can sound like something offensive.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    My thoughts: this was not an accident. This was testing the waters.

    The staff at the National Review have always been neo-confederate trash and I have no trouble believing Lowry simply uses this word on such a routine basis that it slipped out during an interview with another arch-conservative media figure.

    These folks are racists and it shouldn’t be seen as surprising when they show all the symptoms of a bigoted mind.

      • MudMan@fedia.io
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        I don’t know. I mean, he does sound like he catches himself, and he isn’t that good of an actor. But then, who the hell has that just… ready to go to the point where it just blurts out by itself? Like, how often do you have to say that out loud for it to just hijack your train of thought? It’s almost less damning if he did it on purpose, honestly.

  • abigscaryhobo@lemmy.world
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    I don’t sympathize with this dudes rhetoric at all, just adding that from his mouth movements he does seem to be making an “m” sound not an “n” sound with his mouth.

    He’s probably still really racist, but I’ve got racist family and if they ever decide to drop a “hard r” you can see it in their face. I do think it was a case of trying to say “immigrants”, flubbing it, then just saying “migrants” because he realizes what it sounds like. Even the forced laughter afterwards has a sort of “oh shit that didn’t sound good” vibe to it.

    Again, not defending this guy. But we have to remember, all sides of politics can spin stuff to fit their agenda, so we have to be discreet in our decisions and judgements, that’s how we stand apart from all the people just sucking down the news as gospel truth.

  • peopleproblems@lemmy.world
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    If it’s in your regular enough vocabulary to “come out accidentally” you are a racist.

    You also can’t ‘unsay’ a racial slur as much as my ex can’t ‘unfuck’ someone.

    What’s also neat is that it also shows one’s intelligence. If you give him a pass “oh he said he was sorry” you’re a racist AND dumb.

    • tabarnaski@sh.itjust.works
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      (…) you’re a racist AND dumb.

      To a large extent you’re racist because you’re dumb.

      For the last few months they’ve traded their dog whistles for blow horns. More and more hatred is being normalized.

    • FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      Important caveat. It’s become a common word in some varieties of black-american english and black people aren’t racist for using it.

      • peopleproblems@lemmy.world
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        Not really, because he wasn’t a Black guy talking to Black people. He knew what he did.

        It’s a racial slur. That’s it. Don’t use it, don’t think it, don’t think you can say it with your Black friends.

        • FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          Obviously it’s fucked up how it was used in the above article.

          And obviously if you’re not black you should never use it. But you’re assuming I’m not black with your comment.

              • Monument@lemmy.sdf.org
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                Who was it intended toward?

                Someone that hasn’t watched TV since the 1980’s? ChatGPT, for when someone invariably turns it loose on the fediverse?

                It’s not niche as a concept. Your explanation is known worldwide.
                Its inclusion in the discourse is unwarranted.

                Next time you feel the need to add a disclaimer that justifies/explains/adds caveats to racist language: fucking don’t.

      • USSMojave@startrek.website
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        There’s a reason a distinction is made between how black people use it and when the “hard r” is in the pronunciation

      • Kalothar@lemmy.ca
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        I changed my mind after putting in earphones and listening to it more clearly

        • PlantJam@lemmy.world
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          The video also looks like he’s making an M sound (closed lips) than an N sound (open lips). Grammatically, I also don’t think including “Haitian” makes sense if the next word is a slur.

          I’m all for calling out the actual content on the conversation as the absolute nonsense that it is, but this specific headline seems like a bit of a reach.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      Even during the Reconstruction Era, Indiana was both staunchly Republican and full of the KKK. And there was no shortage of racism irrespective of party in Congress during the height of the Civil War. The myth is that the Radical Republicans of the 1860s and 70s represented the party population as a whole, rather than a vocal minority within an ascendant movement that managed to squeeze in a few good reforms before Hayes sold it all down the river.

      Republicans barely abolished slavery even with half the country in Time-Out. And they were crucified for it in elections to come.