The only thing I heard/read was that he said, “I’ll talk to your mama outside.” I don’t even know what that is suppose to mean. I’m not at all defending Gates. It sounds like there was more to it than that and I was just wondering what exactly he said. I’m a mom and I’m sure those types of (obscene) words would offend my children more than they would me, even though they were attributed to me. I’m just curious. It sounds like there are fighting words I’m not aware of.
When one of my now-grown sons was in 2nd or 3rd grade, he got off the school but VERY upset. After a while he said that one of the other kids said something bad about his mom (to wit, me). After some more teeth pulling, he revealed that the other kid had referred to my son as a muthuh******. Nice in early elementary school in a highly rated,lily white suburb, don’t you think? In street terms, that is how I translate any ‘mother’ ‘momma’ reference.
Back in the 70's we called that kind of banter 'jive turkey talk'. It's low class and moronic but par for the course for a liberal, leftist gutter professor like Gates.