Shit. It definitely is... a unique situation. I get where you're coming from, words aren't magic, you're not gonna set somebody on fire with a word. But there's not a lot logical about the situation, it's just layer after layer of unspoken fuckin weight. Maybe I'm wrong and we are taking a step back solely out of politeness, as a sort of taboo, flaunting logic for feels. It just feels like at this point saying "the N Word" is what one does, because saying the word is so provocative as to be an act unto itself, like there's no neutral way to even say it. Now, "it's just what we do as a society" is not a good excuse to keep doing shit, so asking questions like this is good. At some point, if we're using all sorts of different subtext, we aren't even communicating, right?

At the very least, (and bear with me, this is gonna sound super cheesy) words absolutely can make a person feel bad, and that's where I have to politely disagree with your last sentence. We don't get to choose what offends or doesn't offend us, it's a reaction. We do get to choose to act on our feelings in dumb or smart or rash or cruel ways, but being offended is like sneezing, it's involuntary, and we do feel it for better or worse. I guess I personally choose to try to limit how much I offend people, like I try not to push people out of my way. But I'm rambling. If people could stop being so gat danged racist, maybe we could have a real clean discussion about all this and bring logic back into the conversation, but racism is anathema to logic, and muddies the whole thing