For white people like me, it might 'just be a word'. But we should bear in mind that anyone who has been subjected to that word as a vicious weapon, used to threaten and abuse them and their families, is going to feel very differently about it.
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Maybe but Fiona Pilkington and her mentally retarded daughter Francecca, must have suffered much worse abuse than a single word thrown at them, but who was there to protect her? There were no specially introduced laws to stop their abuse.
It is also certain that the police would have been round to her house like a shot, if she had been either black or Asian, and had complained that the thugs were using the "P" or "N" words against her and her family.