I can’t refute what you are saying because it is a matter of opinion.
Words can be used to slander a whole race, but that doesn’t mean those words aren’t accurate in other scenarios - some times even backing up the racist using of the word.
“Thug” has been used as short had for any young black male. Of course that is wrong, most are not “thugs” in any sense of the word. Of course there are people of all races who not only fit the definition of a thug, but SELF IDENTIFY as one.
You can’t just blanket label as such and such “bad” or “racist”, when in reality that isn’t the case. Is it the case SOME of the time? YES, and feel free to call attention to it’s misuse and when it is used to hurt. But because some people use it to hurt others, doesn’t mean we should just add it to the bank of “Words you can never say”. It never works. Even if you lock up words like stupid, idiot, ugly, etc, new words will just emerge.
Even the dread n-word has lost much of it’s teeth. I guarantee you, if we added up the number of times it is uttered in a day in 2016, it’s use as a racial slur is now the minority of times. At some point if the language continues to evolve, it may actually become benign to the point we use it in common speech like “dude”.
