I acknowledge and apology for my poor cut & paste job in my last post.

And, Mo I gather from re-reading your post more carefully that you are saying that in the UK spades is used as a negative referent for Black people by certain people-the same people who use the other offensive referents that you cited. I see that your statement doesn't speak to the frequency of its use. I'm not sure how often the term 'spades' is used in the UK, and whether Black people and/or non-Black people there have a visceral reaction to that word when it is used as an individual or group referent. What I'm saying is that "spades" as a referent for Black people isn't very common in the USA, and thus does not have nearly as much built-in historical and present day negative connotations as the 'n-word' which is still being used in the USA and elsewhere.