How did Andrew Young become an Embarrassment, you ask? Well, let me start by saying that there are moments in history when you expect more from the people who shape it. Andrew Young, one of the towering figures of the Civil Rights Movement, has dedicated much of his life to the struggle for justice, dignity, and equality. Yet, there he was on October 23, 2025, speaking with the Breakfast Club hosts, proudly and inexplicably using a racial slur to actively describe himself. To hear someone of Andrew Young’s perceived stature casually drop a racial slur at all, let alone as a descriptor for his own existence, is not just disappointing, it’s pathetic.
Is this the Same Person?
I mean, am I missing something? This is Andrew Young, right? Isn’t this the same person whose entire career has been built on an ethos of progress and decency? Didn’t he hold to the conviction that the fight for racial justice was about reclaiming dignity from hundreds of years of dehumanization? How, then, can we reconcile that with this moment of utter self-abasement? How can we reconcile that with him dehumanizing himself? How can someone who dedicated so much of his life to civil rights, engage in a verbal gesture so deeply disconnected from the Civil Rights Movement? The answers to these questions point to a lack of intelligence and integrity on the part of Andrew Young, combined with ignorance and a latent self-hatred.
The Breakfast Club interview was meant to be a celebration of his new book, The Dirty Work. Unfortunately for Andrew Young, the “dirty work” in this interview isn’t just about dealing with the behind the scenes work of the Civil Rights Movement. It’s about what happens when you forget history, or worse, it’s what happens when you use history as a justification for selective inattention. Someone of Andrew Young’s perceived caliber, in front of millions of listeners and viewers, casually playing with a word that insults the African diaspora each time it is uttered, cheapens not just the conversation, but the very essence of his role in the movement. After all of the marching and posing in photographs during the Civil Rights Movement, today, Andrew Young seems like a fake.
We need to ask ourselves: how did we get here? How does someone with a life story that should be a shining example of perseverance, intelligence, and moral clarity end up referring to himself with a word steeped in the very essence of oppression and advertising it globally? Don’t you wonder what happened to Andrew Young and how any of this took place?
The Reason is Clear
Who are we kidding? I’ll tell you how this happened. Andrew Young is not a man. A man is defined as an adult male (conversely, a woman is defined as an adult female). An adult is defined as person who is fully developed. On this podcast, Andew Young demonstrated that although he is a 93-year-old person, he is not a 93-year-old man since he not only presents the psychological posture of one who is under-developed but appears to have held this mindset for decades. He is not a person of integrity and moral clarity. He does not respect his heritage and he does not respect himself. Based on his wilful embrace of such a racial epithet, it is quite conceivable that Andrew Young has developed a disdain for himself and the position that he claimed to support during all of his years of “dirty work”. Unfortunately, when it comes to Andrew Young, we are observing self-hatred and a lack of introspection, plain and simple. You can’t dedicate decades of your life to ending a cycle of oppression only to turn around and perpetuate it in the very language you use to describe yourself. You can’t be a leader in the fight for liberation and human identity only to casually invoke the language of degradation. Where is the accountability from his peers, his colleagues, and those who surrounded him in that interview? Why didn’t anyone address this? Perhaps there were no men or women in the room that day. Perhaps there were no self-respecting, intelligent children close by either.
Let’s put this all into perspective, this isn’t about embarrassing Andrew Young. It’s about Andrew Young being an embarrassment. It’s about understanding the weight of our words and being conscious of the history that our words carry with no equivocations. There are no exceptions to this principle. Neither age nor alleged reputation is able to absolve you from your responsibility to this principle. Andrew Young’s walk is a cautionary tale, a glaring example of how someone can become intellectually lazy while resting on his or her perceived laurels in the public eye. How else can explain a “civil rights leader” calling himself by a racial slur. What a disappointment. Andrew Young is responsible for what he has learned through his life’s work and he should definitely understand that words, like racial slurs, are unacceptable to use.
Identity Crisis
The APA dictionary of Psychology defines an identity crisis as a phase of life marked by experimentation; changing, conflicting or newly emerging values; and a lack of commitment to one’s usual roles in society (especially in work and family relationships). For Andrew Young to invoke a racial epithet and substitute it for his identity in 2025, is not only tone-deaf, it’s a betrayal of the very principles he spent his life championing. His word choice and self-identification on that podcast stand as the actual “dirty work” of the Civil Rights Movement and a reminder that age does not equate to development or maturity. All over the world, the role of elder is one of honor. The elder is considered to be the standard bearer of responsibility and cultural direction. It is deeply saddening to observe an irresponsible elder in Andrew Young.
Iron sharpens iron so perhaps Andrew Young is either no longer iron, has never been iron or was not surrounded by any iron on The Breakfast Club podcast that day. You tell me.
We know…it’s difficult for us to square this nonsensical imposter with the idea of Andrew Young from the history books. That gentleman fought, bled, and sacrificed for dignity. Where is that dignity now? The same man who witnessed fire hoses and dogs in Birmingham, all for the right to be treated as a human, and argued for the right to be seen as a man both politically and socially, should never use such self-defacing language. It’s a tragic irony, that someone who appeared to understand the importance of language, who worked with others to craft messages of hope, empowerment, and equality, now reduces his use of language to something unintelligent, ignorant and damaging.
Dr. King’s Colleague?
At what point does a lifetime of advocacy for justice lose its authenticity? When does someone who has seen the worst of human behavior turn around and become complicit in it, even in his or her words? The fact that nobody in the room at The Breakfast Club podcast addressed this only adds to the shame of the moment. Where were his peers? Where was the outrage? There was none. Can you imagine why? Unfortunately, the logical conclusion is very sad. Despite, being fathers, mothers and successful business people, the people in that room must each identify with the same racial epithet. Either that or they’re all cowards. Since the former feeds the latter and vice versa, let’s agree that it’s both.
In the end, we are left with a bitter taste in our mouths and a sense of disbelief that someone of Andrew Young’s perceived caliber could so casually, recklessly betray the very history he fought so hard to shape. His new book may be about the “unglamorous labor of the Civil Rights Movement”, but now it cannot be separated from the moral mess he made in that interview. A moment that should have been an opportunity for reflection and wisdom was instead an opportunity lost. Consequently, for those of us who have followed his journey, it’s a moment of profound shame, disappointment and distrust.
Andrew Young is supposed to be smarter than this. He is not. He’s supposed to know better. He does not. When we look back on his legacy, this moment will be an unfortunate blemish—a departure from work that was advertised to be aligned with moral clarity. The irony of it all is devastating. We can only hope that moving forward, Andrew Young will remember the responsibility that comes with history, especially when it comes to something as sacred as language.
We can only hope that moving forward, Andrew Young will remember what it means to be a Civil Rights Leader.
That’s what ithinkie.
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” -Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Published: December 1, 2025
