For what it's worth - my parents wouldn't have approved a black face costume in the 1940's!! I'm not saying they were the most enlightened people on the face of the earth, but we were cautioned not to use the n-word EVER, and though we never really had contact with people of color that much, we were taught respect for people in general.
Having said that, I must add a caveat that as a very young child I glibly recited the "eeny, meeny, miny moe" rhyme for counting off teams but I never associated the n-word with a person - I just thought it was like a nonsense word like all the others. As I grew I realized the meaning and was completely horrified.
So I guess it is clear that as a nation we need to take off our blinders, and realize while we profess tolerance on one level, there may be other aspects of our thinking/experience that are truly, though probably mindlessly, offensive.
Probably a whole lot of us shouldn't be picking of those first stones.
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