...PC seems to be so out of hand in some instances that people are losing careers because of simple mistakes, like
the weather guy who misspoke and said "Martin Luther Coon King....", so
he misspoke, ...
What's worse, a man making a mistake on live t.v., or the person wanting to take away his career and brand him a racist for it?
But even those that do negative (but still legal) things seemingly unmistakenly, do they always have evil intent in their hearts? Some folks get really angry, frustrated, flustered, and say stupid and horrible things without meaning them...haven't we all?
It's hard to tell unless someone has a pattern. ...
What are your thoughts? 
opcorn2:
What is the point of your including a "popcorn" emoticon?
Red:
The words folks utter are reflections of their thoughts. I don't know what exactly that meteorologist was thinking about when he called MLK "Martin Luther Coon," but I know that epithet is not new or uncommon among Southern racists.
We all misspeak. I do it plenty, and without exception it happens because (1) something was on my mind (subconsciously or consciously) other than what I intended to discuss/say, or (2) I spoke (or wrote) a word that's somewhat apropos to the idea I aimed to express but that is less apt than a different word/phrase I know, could have and should have used instead. Seen in that context, neither provides an exculpatory path for exchanging "King" for "Coon."
For each of us there are thoughts that are so odious that simply don't cross our minds. For that weatherman, that cannot be said of calling MKL "Martin Luther Coon." Sure, he had the sense to know he shouldn't have said that -- it's not as though he's the only racist/bigoted of some stripe who knows it's impolitic to say such things -- but that clearly wasn't enough to prevent him from thinking it.
Blue:
Well, therein lies the quandary. It's a dilemma borne, IMO, of misapplications and excesses of relativism, moral or otherwise.
Prior to about the 1970s or so, proportionately few folks would have looked askance at the panoply of racist remarks and actions one may have taken. In some instances, and for some individuals, that insouciance included the most heinous of acts right up to and including rape and homicide. It's not that such thoughts and the utterances and behaviors borne of them were morally/ethically right; it's that a huge share of the population, the white majority that held legal, social and political sway, (1) ascribed to racist notions, (2) allowed apathy to overcome their will to reject racist notions, and/or (3) selfishly acquiesced to applied racism (discrimination), and for some folks it was a mix of the three.
In the decades since the '70s, it became increasingly unacceptable socially to be seen in public as an overt racist, but "behind closed doors," the same forms of forbearance as before persisted. Thus evolved the period of "smiling faces," a time in which it become difficult to know who harbors racist/bigoted sentiments and, in turn, subtly acts on them. But that one isn't an overt racist/bigot as people used to be doesn't mean one isn't a racist on the "DL."
When minorities encounter white folks, they can and routinely do give the white guy the benefit of the doubt....until/unless that white person does or say something that shows s/he holds some sort of racist notions in his/her head. At that moment, one, minorities in particular, must ask themselves "was that white person just putting on o a show so as not to seem racist/bigoted because seeming so can cause them more bother than they want to face?" Obtaining an existentially accurate answer to that question is nigh impossible, especially if the person's full "story" hasn't been exposed. The person whom one just offended doesn't know one well enough to have that much info on one, and there's no way for them to obtain it; they know one just offended them.
There's also the matter of white folks deigning to tell minorities what is and isn't racist, what is/isn't racially offensive. Really? What 400+-year-long legacy of systemic, institutionalized racism, from overt or otherwise, have whites, individually and as a segment of society, been subjected to whereby they are well placed to know? In a word, none. Simply, one cannot hear literally millions of people say "X is a racial affront to us," respond to them by telling them they are mistaken, and proceed to keep doing/saying "X," thinking that "X" is okay to do or say, and in so doing expect also to be taken seriously when one claims to be not a racist.
When we stop expressly and tacitly teaching our kids that racist notions are in some way acceptable, racism will no longer exist in people's minds. But one must know what racism is in order to refrain from passing it on.
