An anecdotal aside... I've been to just about every state of the union (spending a lot of time in coastal states with a Naval facility), and I've never heard racial slurs used in a derogatory manner (as opposed to in colloquial jest), more than Berkeley, CA. That genuinely surprised me, considering the public impression of Berkeley being a progressive hippie haven of acceptance and spirituality. I thought I was being punked by my "friends," until I ran into more and more random people dropping shit like "nigger," "spic," and "wetback" left and right. It was said so casually, too. It was never directed at any specific person that was present, mind you, but privately among themselves. It was also odd they felt comfortable enough to do this when I was around, despite me looking reasonably Latin American (at least I think so). At least I never heard any non-ironic gay slurs. Ann Arbor, near-north Chicago, Virginia Beach, Hampton/Newport News, D.C., and Baltimore were also pretty bad, while I rarely saw it in deep Southern states (though, I felt I was ignored more in Southern and Southwestern states).