Is "baby mama" a black thing?

Nope. The phrase may have originated there, but plenty of higher-class white studs these days find themselves with a "baby mama" -- the woman who bears their child out of wedlock, but without a permanent relationship between the parents.

In Wisconsin, a sentencing judge used the term, and the defense jumped on his remarks:

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals vacated Landray Harris’ sentence for possession with intent to deliver cocaine, holding that the Caucasian judge’s comments on the African-American defendant’s lifestyle and his “baby mama” could create a reasonable perception that the sentence was imposed at least in part because of race.
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Under existing law, the attorney general argued, Harris is not entitled to relief because he is not claiming that the sentence was unreasonable or excessive.
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In its reply brief, the attorney general remarked that a sentence is not based on race “just because one or a few of a sentencing judge’s comments could reasonably be construed as reflecting racial stereotypes.”

If the court of appeals decision stands, the attorney general warned of a “chilling effect” upon sentencing judges.

“[S]entencing judges may be reluctant to consider or discuss relevant and important sentencing factors,” the attorney general argued, noting that information about a defendant’s education or family life relate to sentencing factors such as character, dangerousness, and rehabilitation. Yet, the attorney general argued, these details can also “be construed as being related to race or racial stereotypes under the court of appeals’ analysis – particularly in hindsight.”

The attorney general warned that sentencing judges may resort to “more legalistic explanations and refrain from using the type of everyday language and colloquialisms that make the legal process more accessible and more understandable to non-lawyers.”

“[S]entencing judges may decide that it is safer to rely on appellate courts to fill in gaps in their analysis than to risk saying something that could later be used to support resentencing."

Tuesday, Wisconsin's Supreme Court heard the arguments:

Arguing for the state, Assistant Attorney General Rebecca Rapp St. John criticized the court of appeals for failing to specify the perspective from which the judge’s comments should be considered.

The state suggested that a sentence is valid unless the sentencing judge’s comments “are such that any reasonable person who heard them would question the sentencing judge’s ability to sentence the defendant without considering race.”

But Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson asked how well that standard might work in practice.

“One of the things about ‘reasonable’ is that there are ‘reasonable’ people on both sides,” Abrahamson said. “Some may say it is reasonable to think it is racial and some may say it is reasonable not to think it’s racial, right? So if that’s it, if reasonable people can differ as to whether this is a racial thing, defendant loses? Defendant has to show that every reasonable person would think this is racial?”

St. John responded that the proposed standard was difficult to articulate, but that it should address her concern that “two out of three court of appeals judges can look on Wikipedia at a couple of terms out of context and vacate a sentence based on that.”

“So I think the threshold has to be higher than just a reasonable person could think it,” St. John said.