Double standards

Isiah Thomas uses the "it's ok for a black man but not for a white man" defense in his sexual harassment trial;

NEW YORK — To New York Knicks coach Isiah Thomas, hearing a white man refer to a black woman using a certain vulgar term would be "highly offensive."

But he said he wouldn't be so offended if he heard a black man use the same term to refer to a black woman.

"I do make a distinction," Thomas said in a videotaped deposition played for a jury Monday in his sexual harassment trial.

A former female team executive, Anucha Browne Sanders, is seeking $10 million in damages on her claim that she was fired because she accused Thomas of harassment. She has said that Thomas repeatedly called her by the word, "bitch," which the Knicks coach was addressing in the videotaped deposition.

He denied calling Browne Sanders vulgar names.

"I never cursed at Miss Sanders," a mild-mannered Thomas said in the tape, which was projected on a big screen in a packed federal courtroom in the second week of the widely publicized trial.

"Now have I ever used curse words around her, yes, but at her? No," Thomas said in response to questions posed by attorneys.