Does the Media Use the N-word to Loosely???

Originally published January 13, 2012

Gawker Blogger Fired after Kanye West N-Word Article

by AFRO Staff

A writer for a popular Internet website was fired after using the N-word in an article about rapper Kanye West. 

According to TheWrap.com, Seth Abramovitch of the gossip website Gawker.com was ousted from the publication after posting about Kanye West’s Twitter rant in early January. 

West took to the social network to voice his plans about DONDA, a new design company he wants to open in the future. West said the planned corporation will “galvanize amazing thinkers” and borrows its name from his late mother, Dr. Donda West. 

Abramovitch later poked fun at the rapper’s plans and created a DONDA acronym that used the n-word. 

“DONDA will be your everything. Just you wait and see,” Abramovitch wrote. “And what is DONDA? It’s an acronym for Dis Original N---a Dresses Aight.”

After the post drew wide criticism, Abramovitch later added an apology to the original article. 

“DONDA is actually the name of Kanye’s deceased mother, not the acronym above, which was meant to be the kind of thing Kanye would make up in a late-night creative writing fit, but has offended many people,” he wrote. “So sorry to everyone who was offended and for the confusion. Sorries all around!” 

Following the incident, Gawker’s new editor, A.J. Daulerio, fired Abramovitch because he said he believed Abramovitch's apology didn’t sound sincere. 

“I thought it was a half-*bleep*ed apology,” Daulerio told TheWrap. “I basically do not want people working for the site who do not care. I had a conversation with Seth and he told me he really didn’t care.”

Abramovitch objected to Daulerio’s claim. He said that in retrospect, he believed the article was a dumb joke that used an offensive term. 

Following numerous news reports on the incident, Daulerio wrote on Gawker that Abramovitch’s firing was not just a result of his post but a “series of events” that had occurred in the past. 

“To mitigate some of the damage done to his professional reputation as a result of my ill-timed public dismissal of him, I’d like to reiterate here that there were other factors before and after this DONDA mess which led to it,” he wrote. “I thought it was a *bleep* joke and some of the attempts to defuse the backlash were *bleep*ier, but that shouldn’t in any way tarnish his excellent body of work, which I’ve always admired.”