Troy Maxon: Bitter Rasist or Product of his Time?

Fences, a play by August Wilson, portrays the life of negro trash collector Troy Maxon and his family. Throughout the play many slang and derogatory terms are thrown about in regards to African- Americans and whites alike,  and at first glance it may appear that Troy himself is a rasist, but upon further inspection it becomes clear that he is only a product of the time in which he lives. In a broader analyzation of things we see that Troy is a character (created by Wilson) who is cleverly used to comment on the real-life senarios that played out in Wilson's own reality. Wilson used the characters to highlight the progression of negros in society during the early 80's even though the play was set in the 50's when rasism ran rampant (just some alliteration for you). Troy thought very highly of the African American community and his use of words such as "nigger" were terms of endeerment and showed progression of society's tolerance. There was still a definite seperation in Troy's mind about the social standings of whites and blacks during this era, but it wasn't the spiteful seperation. Troy Maxon was not a racist, he was simply brought up in a way that in today's much less rasist world may appear that way.