If the goal is to make the n-word so taboo that any discussion or even *hint* of it is toxic, it is succeeding. So goodbye to discussing all of MLK, James Baldwin, Pres. Johnson. Smart teachers won't risk their jobs. We'll edit out the scary parts, or drop writers altogether. 1/4

Why would I give my students President Johnson's 1965 speech at Howard University, where he deplores the way black Americans have been treated? He says "negro," as was polite then, but that might offend students ears and the Times says intent doesn't matter. 2/4

Why would I use the full text of Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail," where he uses the n-word to powerful effect? Could I get away with it? Probably, but why risk my job when I don't have tenure? I have bills to pay. Fearlessness is a luxury. 3/4

This doesn't cost me much. A slight bit of guilt that I'm not giving my students a complete picture. I'll survive. And my students will do fine too. Honestly, not much is being lost at all. I hope the gains make up for that "not much." 4/4