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I've been trying to decide if I wanted to write about actor/comedian Michael Richards public meltdown during his performance at a comedy club. It has been a long time since anything has left me speechless.

Like most people, I was dismayed by the blatant use of the N-word. I can't even bring myself to write that word. I don't use it, not even as some so called term of endearment when used by one black person to another. However, I have family and friends who on occasion use the term. They do not use it as a pejorative, but as a playful term, sort of an insider's code of communication. Nonetheless, it always makes me flinch and I tell them of my dislike for the word.

Many of the posts that I've read on the web chastise black people for the use of the N-word. Some are from black people who say that the use of the word demeans us all. Some are from whites that want to know why it's okay for a black person to use the word but not okay for a white person to use it.

I'm in the camp of black folks that oppose the use of the word. I cringe when I hear it used whether it is intended as an insult, a jest, or a term of endearment. I don't buy into the notion that the N-word loses its negative aura if black folks embrace and claim it. I think that's nonsense at worst, wishful thinking at best. As for white people using the N-word, it is inappropriate under any circumstances. Trust me on this.

In my lifetime, I've had the word used against me as a racial slur more than once. Each time it felt as if someone had slapped me or branded me with a hot iron.

Richards use of the N-word as he chastised audience members for heckling him was shocking. He made a choice. He could have referred to them by other negative terms. Insulted their parentage by calling them bastards, or SOB's. But he chose to use the N-word.

I have trouble accepting his assertion that he is not a racist and that he doesn't know why he used that term. He attributes the use to his extreme anger. What if the hecklers had been white? He would have been angry but he wouldn't have used that term. I can't separate his choice of terms with the race of the hecklers.

I have lost my temper and said things that I later regretted, harsh, angry words to people that I cared about. But I've never used a racial or ethnic slur in my angry tirades and as I've gotten older, I've managed to temper my feelings and my out of control angry outbursts are a thing of the past. "When I was a child, I spoke as a child." Now I've put away childish

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