Worst Take of the Week: Piers Morgan on the N-Word vs Everybody Reacting to Uber

Welcome to Angus Take House – a weekly column in which I will be pitting two of the wildest takes the world's great thinkers have rustled up against each other. This is your one-stop shop for the meatiest verdicts and saltiest angles on the world's happenings. Go and grab a napkin – these juicy hot takes are fresh from the griddle.

TAKE #1:

What's the story? A group of white sorority girls at the University of New Hampshire have come under criticism after a video went viral of them singing along to Kanye's "Gold Digger" – n-word and all.

Reasonable take: Dead easy, lads. The n-word changes meaning depending on who says it. When black people say it, they are able to re-tool and reclaim it. When white people say it, they are only able to re-enforce the violence of its original meaning. So as white people, it's a basic symbolic gesture to avoid saying it, even if it appears in a song we really like and we've had a whole bunch of Bud Lights (or whatever Americans drink). You getting to rap along to "Gold Digger" doesn't trump everything.

Gammon and Egg Take: Why can't I say it though?

Firstly, I know the line is "don't pay Piers Morgan any attention", but I don't buy that. He's not a canary; he's a very well paid journalist who, like it or not, informs a lot of people's opinions. It's important to engage and have his pants down where possible.

This piece is a greasy Morgan take on the classic "but black people say it to each other" line. He thinks it's ridiculous that the white sorority girls are being criticised when it was Kanye West who put the word in such a commercially successful song. In his words: "How can it possibly be racist to sing along to a song that was No1 in America for TEN WEEKS?" The whole thing quickly turns into Piers Morgan doing *extreme thinking face emoji* and saying the n-word literally 22 times. So much. You know that horrible chill that flushes up your back when you hear a white person say the n-word? That times a thousand. Genuinely – try to read it without shuddering like you just got a text from a dead relative.

The big pink legend wraps up by pointing out that because Kanye West (a black man) makes money "exploiting white audiences" with his records, the white audiences who buy them are entitled to sing the racial slur as much as they like. In Morgan's eyes it is totally unreasonable to expect paying Kanye fans not to get their money's worth! Who are black people to say which lyrics they are allowed to repeat? Lyrics they paid to hear!!

The University of Hampshire has announced it won't be pursuing any investigation into the behaviour, and it's unlikely – in fact, inconceivable – that Piers Morgan or the Daily Mail will be penalised in any way for an article that repeats the word over and over again. So really, what Piers Morgan, and every other weird white bloke with an unmanageable desire to say the n-word, actually mean is that they want to be able to say it without being challenged or criticised.

Gammon man then pulls some mad meta-shit at the end and closes saying that actual racists might listen to songs like "Gold Digger" and take it as a green-light to use the n-word themselves. "'If black people use it, why can't I?' shrieks their warped, twisted logic."

In the words of 2016: congratulations. You just played yourself.

TAKE #2:

What's the story? TfL have announced they won't be renewing Uber's licence to operate in London, calling the company "not fit and proper" and citing "potential public safety and security implications" as chief concerns.

Reasonable take: I actually don't know. I don't know what I'm supposed to think any more.

Twitter Meltdown Mixed grill: Cheap travel is good, but so are worker's rights, but getting rid of Uber means those workers lose their jobs, but black cabs will start making money again, but they are racist, but Uber isn't safe, but neither is the night bus… hold on, is this Soviet Moscow?

This whole Uber thing will probably turn out to be a red herring. Chances are they will sort out their differences with TfL, but in the meantime Twitter is currently gorging on its own insides as it tries to work out what the ultimate Uber take is. It has created a strange take stalemate. Everybody is staring at each other, unsure which opinion is the best, trapped in a 17-rounds deep game of hot-take Twister.

The basic tension comes from the fact that while Uber has been taking liberties with workers' rights, they also provide an affordable and efficient service across the city – as well as thousands of jobs for said workers. Uber is both a good and a bad thing. It is nuanced. Yet trying to deal with nuance on Twitter is like trying to cook a carbonara in a toaster.

That said, the worst takes are probably the ones coming from well-to-do, right-wing London Twitter, whose main takeaway seems to be: "fuck workers' rights, how am I going to get home from Soho house with a nose-bleed at 6AM on a Saturday morning now?" See you on the night bus, boys.

Prime cut: No contest. Old white man defends drunk white women's right to use the n-word, and uses the opportunity to say the n-word over 20 times – oh, and is paid to do so by a publication that has built a readership on prejudice. Just a terribly written, ugly thing from a dark, infantile character. After all, there is no greater symbol of white privilege than the continued successes of Piers Morgan.

@a_n_g_u_s