This past Saturday I met a young man who styles himself as a man of street wisdom, having grown up on the mean streets of West Baltimore [basically the film set for The Wire]. He had some points of agreement with the author concerning the article ‘My Jungle Bunny Neighbors’ and offered to do an interview.
Now Mister LaFond, the original Negrodamus was a black comedian from the seventies. Not wanting to misrepresent, and since I have already gone by the street name ‘Fatzilla’ I would like to be known to your readers as Negrodamus-Zilla.
As for the word spelled niցցer that, to me, is not a racial term. That word is used to describe a low down nasty person, whether he’s white, black, Tiger Woods or whatever.
Now nigga, that’s black man. As such this person lives according to the rules of niggadom, which is three-tiered order of life featuring evolution and devolution of the person in accordance with his character or lack thereof.
Basic Nigga
At the bottom you got your basic, off the assembly line, nigga. Your basic nigga is defined by the following characteristics:
1. One, he runs through hos, all up in that nastiness
2. Two, can’t trust his ass around your baby’s mamma, which is, essentially, an expression of the number one condition of niggadom above
3. Three, slingin’ dope, sellin’ drugs, doin’ stupid shit that ‘ill get him locked up
4. Four, loud—instigating fights. Now this is where the type splits, ‘cause though all your basic niggas confirm to the conditions of niggadom enumerated above, from here down you have some divergence—so here we got your loud, fight-instigating nigga, who half, or even most of the time, ain’t shit; don't have shit, ain't worth shit, en can’t throw down
5. Five, niggas like to fight, or at least start fights—appeals to that hardheaded ghetto mentality
6. Six, is really an alternative to four, being the quiet nigga, who is the dude who actually hurts you, shoots you, does the fightin’. Now if this nigga and that loudmouthed nigga get together and get on the same page—hell’s yes, you got some bad shit happenin’
7. Now, your seventh expression of basic niggadom would be what you call your tie-dyed nigga who will go both ways, the dude who has the sense not to run his mouth with the cops or some other crazy quiet nigga, but will break out the mouth on some loudmouthed nigga who ain’t shit
Street Nigga
Now your street nigga is as likely as not to be a tie-dyed nigga. He isn’t loud except when he has to be, generally less of a joiner and more of a leader. His basic characteristics are:
1. One, loyal; he’s not going to fuck your baby’s mamma for instance, not going to steal from you, etc.
2. Two, he will fight, but just to take care of business, not just ‘cause of some stupid shit
3. Three, some education, high school GED, community college, maybe military, and is not afflicted with the stupidity common to the basic nigga
4. Four, hangs out, still keeps in touch with the basic niggas that he came up with, remembers where he came from, is in a position to maybe counsel some of these hardheaded basic niggas into evolving
5. Five, reliable, which is basically an expression of the loyalty and education coming together as discipline to form a man you can count on
Ivy League Niggas
The Ivy League Nigga does not want to believe he is a nigga—though he still is. He really only has three characteristics:
1. One, turns his back on the hood. It’s all well and good to get out, but this nigga done forgot who he was and where he came from; don’t drink beer anymore but sippin’ wine from a glass.
2. Two, untrustworthy; will not be there for you, is always lookin’ out for number one, don’t even remember your name though he does and just wishes he didn’t
3. Three, better than you. No matter what skanky shit this dude did back in the day, he’s GQ now, pure. He ripped off someone to get where he’s at, and don’t remember that. He maybe used to sling dope and now even he don’t even inhale.
Overall this person has either forgotten or denied his past, and that is the Three Tiers of Niggadom.
