In my youth in Pennsylvania and Maryland, before the civil rights movement, "colored" was the most polite way in which whites referred to negroes (the other acceptable term). I was often amused by the fact that in Pennsylvania (not in Maryland) the term "colored girl" meant "maid" or "cleaning lady" ("char", to Brits). One white lady might say to another, "Well, they're pretty well off -- she has a colored girl twice a week.", this even though the "girl" might be 30, 50 or 70 years old.
When we moved from PA to Baltimore in 1953, I was surprised that the newspapers always identified colored with the word "negro" in news stories, as in "John Smith, negro, was arrested yesterday ..." but they never said, "Tommy Chu, chinese, ..." or "Chauncey Cholmondely, white, ...".
Modern-day black crusaders' tirades notwithstanding, it amazes me how much improvement there has really been in race relations in the USA in the last 40 years. Not that we don't still have a ways to go.
