Another Whole America Out There

Here's what someone said to me during a brief discussion about the election while I was in Missouri:

"They say that n*****'s a Muslim."

Tamping down my initial inclination to respond in a, er, non-verbal manner, I instead had a civil discussion with the person about both of the issues raised by the utterance in question--that is, both the political issue and the moral/terminological one. You'll be as surprised as I am that significant progress was made on both fronts. I was, in particular, surprised by how relatively easy it was to elicit agreement that it is wrong to use the 'N' word.

Man. It's an astonishing country out there in many ways.