Why are slurs making a comeback? 🤬🫢😳

Hey friends, Manny here.

As I write this, I'm on a flight from my hometown of Columbus, Ohio, back to New York City. Thought it'd be a good time to write the newsletter for today's episode about the return of slurs. Don't worry, after last week's plane episode, I'm on alert up here…

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Recently, I was at a sports bar in the Lower East Side of Manhattan watching the Los Angeles Lakers play the Boston Celtics. Our proximity to Boston means that the vast majority of people at the bar were rooting for the Celtics, and the town's sports fans don't have the best reputation for civility (even if that's a bit of an unfair rap). In accordance, I heard some words being thrown around that I hadn't heard in years. R-word. F-word. You name it. A few weeks later, the words reappeared at a dinner with friends, all of whom are either liberal or even further left than that. This anecdotal resurgence is in tandem with pop culture uses in things like Deadpool & Wolverine and the FX show English Teacher. So what's going on here?

I'm not trying to shame anyone: I was absolutely letting these words rip growing up. The Xbox Live lobbies in middle school were an actual warzone. But the slurs have made a comeback in a major way. Today's episode of NO SUCH THING dives into why, and it also features a very special guest: Business Insider deputy executive editor Mia de Graaf edited a story by Julia Pugachevsky about this topic, and she also happens to be my girlfriend.

Enjoy the episode, and as always: If you like what you hear, please share with friends and leave a nice review wherever you’re listening.

Let us know how you feel about the slur-assaince in the comments below, and if you have any questions you’d like us to tackle, please reach out at mannynoahdevan@gmail.com.