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

Upsetting and humiliating for everyone involved.

But it seems like all 3 handled it well in the moment, it’s the BBC to blame for airing it, it’s the discourse that will cause the real upset.

As my old Dad says, you can’t argue with stupid!

The BBC threw John under the bus by broadcasting it. The show is on a 2 hour delay why didn't they edit it out?

The comments online today have been disgusting and show how little people understand tourette's and haven't seen the film. Very sad that the movies success had been tarnished by this.

And yours is embarrassing. Imagine coming onto a thread and being so loud, yet so wrong.

Maybe go and get informed about his condition and then come back and type a coherent thought.

I think both things can be true at once.

Hearing that word shouted and how awful it must have been for those men - it made me feel sick hearing the word. It was truly shocking. I’m not sure that just saying “oh he didn’t mean it” lessens the impact of them hearing the word.

But equally I understand JD has a disability and the tic and shouting out of the word was entirely beyond his control, and does not indicate that he is subconsciously racist. You can’t isolate or sideline him because of that as that would also be discriminatory. People saying “oh I would never think that word to risk shouting it out” are missing the point about the impact of the disability and its severity.

I can completely understand how all men involved must feel like absolute shit today.

I think people can and do understand that it is involuntary

but also maybe for many black people its the constant reminding that being black having to deal with hurtful words despite how they are said/why they are said its can still be painful, cause hurt and anger and this needs to be justified or explained that it is not really meant

I think we can all understand that Tourette's is a terribly debilitating condition and respect that language used it can still be harmful and hurtful to others at the same time

Lets see how quickly some will jump on the people are too sensitive type of comments

I notice you ignored the part about where do we put people who have these involuntary conditions, the asylum would have been where they found themselves in days gone by.

But the intent is irrelevant? Either it's abuse because of the intent, or the word is abusive in of itself, even when the intent isn't to abuse. The OP is claiming the latter.

I wonder if Johnson and Lindo were at least given a heads up. Doing your job and having a racial slur hurled at you out of nowhere can be quite a different experience to at least being warned somebody in attendance has a condition that makes racial abuse likely and so it may happen.

A bit like reading a book set in a time period and so you kind of expect to read racism / anti-semitism etc. versus reading something and it coming up at you out of nowehere.

His involuntary behaviour
FFS watch the film and educate yourself

His behaviour is involuntary. It's a disability.
Think about what you're shaming here.

I’m not the object of specific slurs due to my heritage. I’ve been abused for various things over my life- my sex, my weight, the way I speak, being posh, using long words… but not racism.

So I know my suggestion comes from privilege. But maybe we should stop making lists of language that is offensive and must not be used, and stop giving words power over us.

We all use words and phrases that are offensive to someone. It’s often brought up on here. The example I noticed most recently was actually incorrect, claiming that ‘invalid’ was an offensive word for a disabled person. Oh, there was a died by/committed discussion here recently, too.

How about we stop the obsession with the words, and count the intent instead.

Stop giving words power. They are sounds and letters, that’s all.

Some people have Tourette’s

Some people are just thick

Who is ‘bending over backwards’? He has an unfortunate neurological condition that means his brain seizes uncontrollably on whatever it deems most offensive in a specific scenario. People should not be subjected to racial abuse, no. Neither should I have had to deal with being called a cunt very loudly throughout lectures when I had a student with Tourette’s and coprolalia in my module as a beginning academic. But what was the alternative? Exclude a student with a disability from my lectures?

Yes, he was! A white person calling a black person the n word is racist regardless of context.

One have have Tourettes and be racist. Both can be true.

in a better world, the BBC not editing it out would show how far we've come in understanding conditions like Tourettes, and it would just fly under the rader without comment because we know the background.

However... yes, they probably should have edited it out and avoided the idiots calling a man with a disability racist.

What about blind people? Exclude them too? Those with down syndrome? All in a shed paid for by the taxpayer.

Honestly, the fact that some people are free to have these criminal views and walk around all disability free with not a care in the world is the most disgusting fact this thread has highlighted

I think I’m uncomfortable because majority of sympathy is being directed towards John. I don’t think enough attention is being paid to the impact this will have had on the actors presenting. Instead people are saying “ well it’s involuntary so MBJ and DL shouldn’t be the least bit affected/hurt”.

This. I find the BBC does sometimes get an undeserved battering but here they deserve it.

Maybe this is their way of fighting allegations that they are too "Woke" (whatever that means), airing racial slurs but editing out comments supporting of Palestine!

Gotta redress that balance somehow.

FWIW @Crawse , I don't think you're being unreasonable.

I accept Tourettes causes your mouth to involuntarily release your thoughts, but the fact that he has Tourettes doesn't negate the fact that his thought when he sees a black man is 'N'; or that the behaviour is harmful to whoever is on the receiving end of it.

We can argue voluntary vs involuntary all day long, but involuntarily headbutting me doesn't mean I don't hurt 🤷🏾‍♀️.

Don't be stupid.

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

Leaving something in that highlights exactly why a nominated film was made (and for people to educate themselves on if they didn’t already know, like you evidently), and yet another boring political ‘Free Palestine’ statement by privileged actors at an award ceremony when they should just be thanking their agents, mums, granny’s dog etc etc. I’m with Ricky Gervais.

Yeah really weird as to why you can’t understand this editorial decision making 🙄.

It's called coprolalia, and some people with Tourette's suffer from it. It's a really distressing condition to have as you can imagine.

Their brains basically make them shout out the most socially inappropriate or offensive things possible in a particular situation. As a lot of people don't know about it, the sufferers wind up assaulted, socially isolated, arrested etc.

You can even see from responses on here and on wider social media today what happens. John Davidson is now being called a racist by people all over the world at what should be a really proud and happy time for him.

Easy for you to say