This might sound dumb, so bear with me.
I grew up in a super poor city, predominantly black. All my friends from there listened to hip hop where it was used a lot, they said it, their families said it, etc…
What I did was sub that word with another when I was singing. It became a habit. I thought that was a better idea than getting into the habit of singing it, where I might slip up and say it around them (since it was commonly used around there).
It’s a lot easier to create a new habit than break an old one, you know?
Yeah it’s different down here. All the history down here, plus some of the older white folks still using that word… ugh.
And KRS One is one of the best MCs of all time imho!