John Davidson shouting the N word during the BAFTAS

[Crawse]

John Davidson has Tourettes and is a campaigner for the condition. Whist Michale B Jordan and Delroy Lindo were presenting he shouted out the racial slur. It’s extremely uncomfortable to watch. I feel terrible for the two presenters. I’m really conflicted on this one.

What are your thoughts?

No one should be subjected to abuse. That is my bottom line. Maybe the fact I was called P*** (I’m half Indian) growing up has influenced my views. I obviously recognise Tourette’s is involuntary.

https://edition.cnn.com/2026/02/22/entertainment/baftas-2026-tourettes-racist-slur

You’re assuming that the actors are feeling the same way you would feel. My mixed race (half white half Asian) DD regularly gets racially insulted at work by customers - both white and Asian. It’s water off a duck’s back to her, she’s the most thick skinned person I’ve ever met. It makes (white) me 100 times more angry than it does her.

What is with this modern obsession with choosing a ‘side’? You don’t need to come down on one side or the other. You can express sympathy for BOTH sides at once. Feeling sympathy for JD doesn’t mean you don’t also feel sympathy for the actors, or that you’re racist. The whole #TeamWhatever is madness.

I've been called many a racial slur. The intent behind it matters more than the slur itself.

A man in the street calling me a slag is really shitty and intimidating.

Dd calling me a slag as part of an involuntary tic is nothing because its part of her disability.

(Dds tics haven't had any racist language thus far so that's why I've used this example).

Nonsense.

It's nothing to do with impartiality as this is an independent person of the BBC choosing to make their own personal statement with no reflection on the BBC. That's an easy stance to take. The BBC chose not, because they are too scared of causing offence in that area given how much criticism they have received to date, to while also choosing to air racial slurs within the same event. They are both clearly in the same bracket.

They could have made a very easy editorial decision to simply cut it. And they willfully chose not to. There is no balance between 'offensiveness and disability'. Davidson would not have been impacted in the slightest had the BBC simply cut his racial slurs.

I'm fascinated as to why it's often obscenities and racial slurs that Tourettes sufferers can't stop themselves shouting.
There must be so many non-offensive words stored in their memory banks that could trip out instead.
Weird that those black presenters were assailed by the n word instead of one of a thousand other, benign, nouns.

Well, first I'd have to know the person had Tourette's. Then I'd have to believe that they were being truthful about it, and not just taking the piss (far more likely, statistically). If I knew they had Tourette's, I'd be polite, of course. But I'm afraid I wouldn't seek to be around them any more than I had to be, as I don't enjoy being verbally abused.

People also never seem to think about the fact that the person being abused also has their own issues and struggles, and being called a slur might just be the last straw. There's no consideration for the other person.

What if, for instance, a person with Tourette's calls a woman recovering from an eating disorder, or even just one struggling with insecurity and low self-esteem, a 'fat cow' repeatedly? And even knowing it's Tourette's, that tic exacerbates her feelings of dysmorphia or self-disgust, and causes mental health issues for her?

I don't know - it's difficult to balance. But I do know that we can't just let people do whatever they want because they can't help it. Is verbal abuse over that line where someone's actions need to be curtailed? I don't think so. But equally I don't think you can expect someone to like a person flinging applicable insults at them, which might cut to the quick.

the choosing to be offended line ...

language can be hurtful

its not up to you or anyone else to decide when it is hurtful or who is offended

In that scenario, you’d seat them in a space with a carer (or two) so the blow can’t catch anyone out. I live near a home for people who need two carers with them when they are out and about as they may need to be contained.

I can’t think of an equivalent mechanism for Tourette’s. It must be awful to live with. Exhausting.

I can clearly remember a couple of occasions where I’ve said something extremely inappropriate and uncharacteristic. Think, swearing in front of my in laws to be the first time I met them, children present, when I don’t generally swear at all.

So you would tell the bride that she is an awful person for taking steps to prevent her colleague shouting abuse at her on her wedding day?

If anyone has actually bothered to watch the original documentary, you can see teenage John shopping with his mum - he keeps shouting "fuck off" as well as random involuntary noises, and he's so uncomfortable and embarrased he is literally holding his own lips shut to try and keep the words inside.

He's lived like this for decades, I honestly don't understand why people can't extend compassion to him. Of course it's horrible being on the receiving end of a shouted slur, but for any sane, mature person, understanding the context - that it was a tic, no harm intended, the person is distressed - would mean you can put that in perspective.

Yeah, I am not interested in being thick skinned like this or letting it roll off me. This normalises abuse.

The nature of the condition. It’s based in anxiety. The thing you really really don’t want to say, that you are most anxious about. It’s not likely to be ‘fluffy bunnies’!

If your fictional bride prevents a person with a disability - any disability - attending their wedding purely because they find that disability insulting then yes, I would think less of her.

Once again, with crayons if necessary, John Davidson's condition is entirely involuntary. If the queen can give him an MBE despite it I'm sure someone can cope with it at a wedding.

What are the statistic of people faking tourettes please?

You don't have to be around disabled people if you choose not to be.

Nobody in that room has to be around John again.

Part of being in society is sometimes having to be around those annoying disabled folk sometimes.

No. If I was black, and this person was calling me the n-word over and over, or if I was overweight and he called me a 'fat cow', or if he called me a slag after I'd talked about pulling on a night out, etc...

That's the issue. People with Tourette's don't tend to call a fat white girl an n-word, or a skinny black man a 'fat slag'. More often than not, from what I've seen, there is a tendency to match the insult to the person. That would bother me.

Because it means that they are thinking those things when they look at you.

I woulnd't expect anyone to tolerate a racial slur. I would expect everyone to extend understanding to people with neurological conditions, and recognise that they have not been subject to verbal abuse.

"That's the issue. People with Tourette's don't tend to call a fat white girl an n-word, or a skinny black man a 'fat slag'. More often than not, from what I've seen, there is a tendency to match the insult to the person. That would bother me."

Yes that's literally what the condition is (coprolalia). It's saying the most socially inappropriate thing in the given situation @OtterlyAstounding

Please click on the link above and educate yourself, and also look up the word 'involuntary' while you're at it.

This is a reasonable discussion. I would like to hear their thinking and justification. There’s a radio programme- feedback?- where they respond to complaints. I’ll listen in.

Because their brain chooses the worst thing they could possibly say in that moment.

No, it means they have internalised the most taboo things to say in these situations. Like shouting bomb threats while passing through airport security. There would be nothing taboo about calling a white woman an ethnic slur associated with with black people or a thin man of any race a fat slag.

Only 1% of people have been diagnosed with Tourette's, and only 10% of people with Tourette's have coprolalia, so I'd say the chances some idiot is faking it to yell an insult on the street are probably pretty good these days.

So if someone had a compulsion to masturbate in public, would you have the same reaction? That everyone is unreasonable to find it upsetting?

No. Again, as has been said many times, the tourettes picks the most offensive word it can at that exact moment. Everyone knows what would offend a fat woman or a black person but luckily our brains don't decide to make us shout it out loud.

No, it means their brain is going "oh look, an overweight person, what's the worst thing I could think of to call an overweight person" and then the tic causes the mouth to blurt it out without any concious thought whatsoever.

It does not mean the person secretly wants to say the insulting things.

Once more:

https://tourette.org/resource/understanding-coprolalia/

Underlining the word 'choose' repeatedly does not make it true that these are the same choices. They will have a policy not to air contentious political statements. The decision to broadcast the n-word is in a different category. It's not political and is a balance between showing the real existence of people with Tourette's vs those protecting those who are offended by hearing the word. You can come down on either side of that balance but I don't think either decision (to broadcast or not) is wrong.

Exactly what I said. They look at the person, and their brain involuntarily picks out the most appropriate insult, in their opinion.

I don’t see why you can’t understand @OtterlyAstounding . If he was racist, then he wouldn’t worry about shouting racist abuse and his tic would be different. By definition he’s going to shout the thing he doesn’t believe.

Was it John who had a lot of trouble getting through security an airport, because he couldn’t stop himself shouting that he had a bomb. The thing that going to be most problematic in that situation what gets shouted. It is contextual.