I've said this before in pre-schism GAF and was brigaded by dumbasses, but in New York City literally everyone says the word when growing up. It is simply another way to say 'dude', until we get into University/College and realize that blacks from other states are extremely sensitive to the word... but say it all the time themselves.
So yeah, my take is that making a word exclusive to one race is fucking stupid, especially when it's used so freely in popular (but shitty) music on the radio. Either take the NYC approach so that it has no offensive meaning anymore, or delete the word from existence.