I found this entire thread interesting and enlightening. As a white Jewish female lawyer and lifelong NYC’er, my immediate thought at seeing the thread title was that this was going to be a discussion about people who fake personal injury accidents. Seriously, when there is a slip on a banana peel case, you must question the color, shape, thickness, smell, etc. of the peel to try to determine how long it had been on the ground. I never before thought to question the racial motivation, but I do see the connection with allusions to apes and monkeys. However, as a card-carrying Darwinist, I believe that we are ALL descended from monkeys and apes.
As for the word “thug,” I, like @Sue22, have used the word to describe people of threatening and criminal demeanor, without regard to race. The origin of the word is from “Thugee,” a group of violent robbers and thieves who roamed India several hundred years ago. I was not aware that AA people believed that this word is intended to demean them.
I currently have a pineapple on my dining room table. S14 brought one at Costco last week and I think he would about die of shame if he was aware that it signaled a willingness to “swing,” especially since he bought it for me as a gift! We are planning to cut it and eat it tomorrow. I am not planning to share this alternative definition with him.
Likewise, I thought grapefruit was just a citrus that I enjoy sprinkled with Sweet and Low. It was not until I read an article the other day in which Jada Pinkett Smith described “ing” that I had ever heard of this practice.
In any event, I feel so sad that we are still, as a nation, in a place where young people legitimately feel that a banana peel is a threatening thing. I don’t doubt their fear and I don’t believe they over-reacted in the first instance, but I do wish that there had been perhaps an experienced facilitator or psychologist present who could have appropriately handled the ensuing discussion. So sad…