Well she did use an "n" word to describe him. Fortunately it wasn't the "N" word.

"Nice little colored boy," is not a compliment. If it were a white boy, she wouldn't have used his skin color to describe him. Secondly, she seemed surprised that the boy was doing something nice, because "colored" people are sometimes assumed to always do the opposite.

Who are the seven people that don't like the fact that what's kosher to say changes? Two examples: Stephen King writes about an interracial couple that were born several decades apart (time travel was involved). She's black, he's white, she gets annoyed when she gets called black because growing up, that was a slur (colored, like the grandma says, was the accepted term). He says if he called a kid "colored" growing up, he'd have gotten beat up. Second: read what Lincoln (you know, dude who ended up FREEING THE SLAVES) had to say about black people. He was so radical, he broke the country, but he'd be considered super racist today. Learn your history; the things you say and think today will probably be very offensive to the people of 80 years from now.

Just because something was acceptable once does not mean it's still acceptable now. Next time you get a toothache, pack some willow bark into your mouth instead of going to a dentist. I'm the ninth thumbs down.

As a person of color (half white, half black, if you're curious), I'm inclined to give people the benefit of the doubt. Is it frowned upon now? Sure. Was it when she was growing up? Probably not. I went to school with two kids that would give me crap for being (partially) black. One was kidding. The other had family in the Klan. You can tell the difference between someone who means it negatively and someone who doesn't. She didn't (probably). By the way-- the willow bark thing? Not a one to one comparison. I grew up with a dentist. I also grew up calling people "black." I've yet to make the switch to African-American (which I think is the term now) unless they're actually *from* Africa (I know a few people like that; I also refuse to call some of my friends 'Italian American,' so it's fair). Point being, if I don't do it (and many of my family members on both sides my age don't either), how can I reasonably expect someone much older than me to do so? Lotta glass in the house, so I don't throw stones-- I would hope that when I'm that age and say something like "homosexual" that my grandkids show me more mercy than you guys do.

it's all in the context. Considering some of the idiotic things people used to say and believe about different races, using the word "colored" isn't a big deal.