Agree Jim. In general, I feel the slippery slope argument is used as a blanket pass. The two main things that are being discussed boil down to (1) songs about the Jewish 'blood libel', which started the thread; and (2) songs using a handful of specified racial slurs that are widely avoided.

Steve - "none of those quotes of mine have anything to do with my wanting to "reserve the right" to use words in a racist manner."

...Frankly, this is denying it's raining when it is. Your words are as plain as day, however much you might insist otherwise.

"You are a bit too enthusiastic, if you don't mind my saying so, about defining offensiveness for all the rest of us and prescribing for us which words we should never use... No-one is going to be condemned as racist for not objecting to Paul Robeson singing.." etc and so on

Steve, I sense your frustration at tying yourself in knots; I strongly suspect you've accidentally fallen into a position which you don't even believe in yourself.

However - I didn't raise that song or those words - YOU DID - with a really peculiar set of musings about YOUR OWN WILLINGNESS TO SING THE SONG, including - even - pondering (before discounting) purring it as a lullaby to a four-year-old!

It was *never* about criticising you or anyone else for listening to Paul Robeson. That is plain as day, across all of the posts above.

It was questioning your claim to be able to publicly sing those same words *because Robeson also sang them*.

You still seem highly averse to tackling the question of why - given Robeson's own jettisoning of those words - you seem more wedded to them than him...