"Stupid wingnut says something stupid" thread

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Nibblers?

shortened form of ealier popular name for the snack, "nigger babies."

Is this verifiably true? Because it has that odd tang of myth. Not that I doubt that people have called licorice nibs "nigger babies", but just that lots of little tidbitty things are called "nibs", with a completely different and verifiable etymology going back centuries as a word used to describe a morsel or small scrap of food, which makes me think that "nigger babies" came after "nibs" and not the other way around.

Like, some redneck looking at a package and asking his friend "Whut tha fuck is a nib anyway?" and his friend saying "I dunno, they're  little and black, it's probably short for nigger baby" and then they both laugh like it's the funniest thing ever and tell all their friends, and an urban legend is born.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yeah, this is a total urban legend originating in one of those shitty email forwards. I call bullshit.

[LMNO]

"Nib" is totally a word on its own.

Wiki:

To make 1 kg (2.2 pounds) of chocolate, about 300 to 600 beans are processed, depending on the desired cocoa content. In a factory, the beans are roasted. Next they are cracked and then de-shelled by a "winnower". The resulting pieces of beans are called nibs. They are usually sold in small packages at specialty stores and markets to be used in cooking, snacking and chocolate dishes.

Through pattern-matching transference, it is easy to postulate the name derived from what it looked like.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

Yeah, this is a total urban legend originating in one of those shitty email forwards. I call bullshit.

I tried to verify but couldn't find anything reliable that refuted it. If you did, I concede the point. It just seems like it would be true, because I despise consumer culture and I always assume the worst.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yeah, this is a total urban legend originating in one of those shitty email forwards. I call bullshit.

I tried to verify but couldn't find anything reliable that refuted it. If you did, I concede the point. It just seems like it would be true, because I despise consumer culture and I always assume the worst.

Keep in mind that if you are trying to verify a claim, you are looking for positive evidence that it is true, rather than the absence of evidence that it is false.

Although I 100% believe that people have called various candy "nigger babies", the fact that "nib" is a commonly used word with a well-traced etymology and has been used for cocoa nibs, coffee nibs, and other small morsels for hundreds of years while there is exactly zero evidence other than a fairly sketchy email forward about using slave infants as crocodile bait that the candy descriptor "nibs" has racist origins, I'm going to go with the preponderance of evidence (as well as the less-outlandish claim) on this one.

Also, I am deeply suspicious of things that "just seem like they would be true".

[LMNO]

See also "Picnic" and "Niggardly".

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, come ON:

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Nibblers?

shortened form of ealier popular name for the snack, "nigger babies."

Is this verifiably true? Because it has that odd tang of myth. Not that I doubt that people have called licorice nibs "nigger babies", but just that lots of little tidbitty things are called "nibs", with a completely different and verifiable etymology going back centuries as a word used to describe a morsel or small scrap of food, which makes me think that "nigger babies" came after "nibs" and not the other way around.

Like, some redneck looking at a package and asking his friend "Whut tha fuck is a nib anyway?" and his friend saying "I dunno, they're  little and black, it's probably short for nigger baby" and then they both laugh like it's the funniest thing ever and tell all their friends, and an urban legend is born.

When I was a little kid, they had a store across the street from the school with loose penny candy - you walked in and asked for so many pieces of this and that, and paid. And I heard kids ask for "n- babies", with NOT A WORD from the adults working there, who matter-of-factly filled the order. Same thing at the fireworks stands with the "n- chasers".

I don't see it going from that to "nib", either, though. The rest of us called them "licorice babies".

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Looking it up, I saw a few claims that Sugar Babies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar_Babies_%28candy%29) were sold under the brand name Nigger Babies until the 1960's, but I haven't been able to find any evidence of this at all, and I also saw claims that Chocolate Babies (which I remember from my childhood) were sold as Nigger Babies, but history doesn't seem to agree with that, either. http://www.collectingcandy.com/wordpress/?p=6384. I DO, however, remember my mom commenting about how when she was a kid they had an offensive nickname, and I am betting that's it. There were also Licorice Babies, and I would not doubt that people also referred to those as "Nigger Babies".

I can see how the combination of an actual existing offensive nickname for a candy could get conflated with the word "nibs" for people who were not particularly literate, to the point where it became urban legend.

I can also see how someone might want to exploit the potential for conflation by creating a false history and infographic for putting in an email forward in order to amuse themselves and see what they can get people to believe. I mean, I would certainly never do anything like that, but I can see how other people would.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Nibblers?

shortened form of ealier popular name for the snack, "nigger babies."

Is this verifiably true? Because it has that odd tang of myth. Not that I doubt that people have called licorice nibs "nigger babies", but just that lots of little tidbitty things are called "nibs", with a completely different and verifiable etymology going back centuries as a word used to describe a morsel or small scrap of food, which makes me think that "nigger babies" came after "nibs" and not the other way around.

Like, some redneck looking at a package and asking his friend "Whut tha fuck is a nib anyway?" and his friend saying "I dunno, they're  little and black, it's probably short for nigger baby" and then they both laugh like it's the funniest thing ever and tell all their friends, and an urban legend is born.

When I was a little kid, they had a store across the street from the school with loose penny candy - you walked in and asked for so many pieces of this and that, and paid. And I heard kids ask for "n- babies", with NOT A WORD from the adults working there, who matter-of-factly filled the order. Same thing at the fireworks stands with the "n- chasers".

I don't see it going from that to "nib", either, though. The rest of us called them "licorice babies".

Yep, I'm betting that the people who remember these candies being "sold as" nigger babies actually remember asking for them by that name, and clerks didn't correct them. They were probably below reading age at the time and didn't know that wasn't the name on the box, and just assumed it was because that's what everybody called them.

Ah, the good old days... 

I can also ask my dad, as he was born in 1929 and used to love him some motherfucking candy.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Origin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMHO8zyTPyU

So a guy told another guy a story about alligator hunters using slave babies as bait for alligators to explain the alligator sneaking up on the black baby on the licorice drop package.

And that's totally plausible because it makes perfect sense to use a slave infant valued at $80-100, to catch an animal whose hide you can sell for $10. Instead of, say, a rabbit or a puppy, which could be had virtually for free.

I should stop being so amazed that people believe this shit, but I just always am.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

More origins (very racist content, ahoy!) http://www.authentichistory.com/diversity/african/3-coon/7-alligator/

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Nibblers?

shortened form of ealier popular name for the snack, "nigger babies."

Is this verifiably true? Because it has that odd tang of myth. Not that I doubt that people have called licorice nibs "nigger babies", but just that lots of little tidbitty things are called "nibs", with a completely different and verifiable etymology going back centuries as a word used to describe a morsel or small scrap of food, which makes me think that "nigger babies" came after "nibs" and not the other way around.

Like, some redneck looking at a package and asking his friend "Whut tha fuck is a nib anyway?" and his friend saying "I dunno, they're  little and black, it's probably short for nigger baby" and then they both laugh like it's the funniest thing ever and tell all their friends, and an urban legend is born.

When I was a little kid, they had a store across the street from the school with loose penny candy - you walked in and asked for so many pieces of this and that, and paid. And I heard kids ask for "n- babies", with NOT A WORD from the adults working there, who matter-of-factly filled the order. Same thing at the fireworks stands with the "n- chasers".

I don't see it going from that to "nib", either, though. The rest of us called them "licorice babies".

Yep, I'm betting that the people who remember these candies being "sold as" nigger babies actually remember asking for them by that name, and clerks didn't correct them. They were probably below reading age at the time and didn't know that wasn't the name on the box, and just assumed it was because that's what everybody called them.

Ah, the good old days... 

I can also ask my dad, as he was born in 1929 and used to love him some motherfucking candy.

Great idea, bet he'd remember tons of stuff like that. It was still around, but (luckily) dying away when I was a kid - I do remember seeing these (kind of a fucked up nod to pressure from the NAACP).

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Nibblers?

shortened form of ealier popular name for the snack, "nigger babies."

Is this verifiably true? Because it has that odd tang of myth. Not that I doubt that people have called licorice nibs "nigger babies", but just that lots of little tidbitty things are called "nibs", with a completely different and verifiable etymology going back centuries as a word used to describe a morsel or small scrap of food, which makes me think that "nigger babies" came after "nibs" and not the other way around.

Like, some redneck looking at a package and asking his friend "Whut tha fuck is a nib anyway?" and his friend saying "I dunno, they're  little and black, it's probably short for nigger baby" and then they both laugh like it's the funniest thing ever and tell all their friends, and an urban legend is born.

When I was a little kid, they had a store across the street from the school with loose penny candy - you walked in and asked for so many pieces of this and that, and paid. And I heard kids ask for "n- babies", with NOT A WORD from the adults working there, who matter-of-factly filled the order. Same thing at the fireworks stands with the "n- chasers".

I don't see it going from that to "nib", either, though. The rest of us called them "licorice babies".

Yep, I'm betting that the people who remember these candies being "sold as" nigger babies actually remember asking for them by that name, and clerks didn't correct them. They were probably below reading age at the time and didn't know that wasn't the name on the box, and just assumed it was because that's what everybody called them.

Ah, the good old days... 

I can also ask my dad, as he was born in 1929 and used to love him some motherfucking candy.

Great idea, bet he'd remember tons of stuff like that. It was still around, but (luckily) dying away when I was a kid - I do remember seeing these (kind of a fucked up nod to pressure from the NAACP).

That's amazing!

Another reason the "nigger babies" brand candy struck me as suspect is because this kind of thing is HIGHLY HIGHLY collectible and there is a shit-ton of dialogue about it all over the Web, and the complete lack of ads/old boxes/history on the subject struck me as unusual, for something as commonplace and popular as those candies. Usually, you google something like that and you get a bunch of hits, often including eBay auctions for ads or labels. Try googling "Nigger Head Oysters", a product which was assuredly infinitely less popular, and you'll get 13,100 results, including countless photographs of cans and labels. Google "Nigger Babies Candy" and you get 3600 results, almost all of them either Urbandictionary entries from the last couple of years, or asking whether the damn things ever really existed.

[LMNO]

Example:

This was a thing.