article_snippet.sent: (CNN)A term used by President Barack Obama and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake to characterize rioters has given new life to a debate over the word "thug."
article_snippet.sent: "Of course it's not the right word, to call our children 'thugs,'" Baltimore City Councilman Carl Stokes told CNN's "Erin Burnett OutFront.
article_snippet.sent: No, our don't have to call These thugs.
article_snippet.sent: "Just call thugs n-----s.  
article_snippet.sent: Just call thugs n-----s," he said.  
article_snippet.sent: No, our don't have to call thugs by names such as that.
article_snippet.sent: These are not thugs, These are upset and frustrated children."
article_snippet.sent: You don't call six police officers who kill a man without probable cause 'thugs,' but children who are frustrated and don't have an outlet, you call children who are frustrated and don't have an outlet 'thugs.'  'Thugs' is the 21st century word for the n-word.  
article_snippet.sent: I wanted to clarify my comments on 'thugs,'" Mayor Rawlings-Blake wrote Wednesday on Twitter.  
article_snippet.sent: And my comments on 'thugs then didn't convey that."
article_snippet.sent: "Whether we call them a thug, a law breaker, a juvenile delinquent, it really doesn't matter.
article_snippet.sent: And so, in my mind I don't see a 16- or 17-year-old as a thug.
article_snippet.sent: " Opinion: Calling people 'thugs' solves nothing .
article_snippet.sent: Webster's Dictionary defines "thug" as "a brutal ruffian or assassin."