It's 2016, and an on-air news reporter can't do his job without being called "n*gger."

Steve Crump, an award-winning veteran television reporter at WBTV in Charlotte, North Carolina, just finished a report on the effects of Hurricane Matthew when a white man began hurling racial epithets at him.

The man, 21-year-old Brian Eybers, was filming Crump and his camera crew while they were walking back to their van and then reportedly called him "n*gger."

"He was doing commentary of the neighborhood," Crump told the Charlotte Observer. "Then he starts off saying, 'There's a black guy walking around here, no he's a slave, no he's the N-word.'"

Crump, the great-grandson of slaves, confronted Eybers about the racial slur he hurled at the TV reporter, according to the Charlotte Observer. He asked to spell the word Eybers just called him.

"N as in Nancy. I as in indigo. G as in grant," Eybers responded.

Once Crump and his crew began to leave, Eybers blocked the van from driving away. That's when Crump called local law enforcement. Eybers was arrested at the scene, and then charged with disorderly conduct and possession of drug paraphernalia for a glass pipe.

Crump has spent decades filming documentaries on civil rights and racism in the United States. He said he has interviewed many members of the Ku Klux Klan — and not once had they ever called him a n*gger to his face.

"None of them have ever called me the N-word," he said to the Charlotte Observer. "We may not see eye-to-eye on racial issues, but not a single Klansman I've interviewed in 35 years of doing this stuff has stooped to this level of vulgarity."