Niggas vs. Black People

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"Niggas vs. Black People" is the title of one of Chris Rock's most famous and most controversial compositions. This bit, which appeared as track 12 on his 1997 album, Roll With the New, as well as his 1996 HBO special, Bring the Pain, is widely considered to be the breakthrough routine that established his status as a comedy fixture after he left Saturday Night Live.^{[citation needed]}

Essentially an eight-minute rant about behaviors that Rock sees within the black community; he describes "niggas" as a cohort whose behavior is usually detrimental to the image of other black people and embody many negative African-American stereotypes. The "niggas," he said, glorify ignorance and sloth, and show excessive pride for fulfilling any minor responsibility. Rock rejects the view that this image of African-Americans is purely cultivated by the media. In the routine, he says, "When I go to the money machine tonight, alright, I ain't looking over my back for the media: I'm looking for niggas!"

In a 2003 interview, Rock claimed that he "stole" the idea for the bit from the song "Us" from the 1991 Ice Cube album Death Certificate.^[1]

The controversy caused by Rock's constant use of the word nigga led him to remove the piece from his act. In a 60 Minutes interview, Rock said, "By the way, I've never done that joke again, ever, and I probably never will. 'Cause some people that were racist thought they had license to say nigger. So, I'm done with that routine."^[2]

As an example of the routine's cultural impact, in the second episode of NBC's The Office, "Diversity Day,", Steve Carrell's character performs a bowdlerized version; the result is a daylong racial sensitivity seminar for the office staff.