Mosley, who is Black, left the show.
Black author and writer Walter Mosley admitted in an op-ed for The New York Times that he quit his job as a writer on a television series after he was “chastised” by human resources for using the N-word on the job. Although Mosley did not reveal which show he quit, The Hollywood Reporter claims that it was CBS All Access’ Star Trek: Discovery. Sources tell THR that showrunners Alex Kurtzman and Michelle Paradise were informed that someone in the writer’s room complained after hearing Mosley use the N-word several times. HR called Mosley to inform him that usually, they fire people for using the N-word but instead, he would just receive a warning not to say the word at work. HR cited company policy about using words such as the N-word, which is forbidden.
“Earlier this year, I had just finished with the Snowfall writers’ room for the season when I took a similar job on a different show at a different network. I’d been in the new room for a few weeks when I got the call from human resources. A pleasant-sounding young man said, ‘Mr. Mosley, it has been reported that you used the n-word in the writers’ room,'” Mosley wrote in The Times. “I replied, ‘I am the N-word in the writers’ room.'” Mosley stated HR said that he was free to use that word in a script, he “could not say it.” Mosley then clarified, “I hadn’t called anyone it. I just told a story about a cop who explained to me, on the streets Los Angeles, that he stopped all n—ers in paddy neighborhoods and all paddies in n—er neighborhoods, because they were usually up to no good. I was telling a true story as I remembered it.”