WATCH: Classroom erupts when white teacher argues with black students about who gets to say the N-word

A school in Gainesville, Florida is investigating an incident that involved a teacher arguing with black students about the propriety of saying the N-word.

Local news station WUFT reports that Robert Cecil, an English teacher at F.W. Buchholz High School, was caught on camera talking with students about who is allowed to use certain racial slurs.

"If you’re black, and you say 'n*gga,' but you don't say ‘n*gger,' 'cause that's like..." Cecil began.

"We can say it!" a black student in the class interjects.

"It's a free country and freedom of speech, right?" Cecil replies while raising his voice.

Cecil wrote to WUFT and apologized to everyone who was offended by him saying the N-word, but insisted that he was making a valid point about black people using it in everyday speech.

"I detest the N-word more than any other word in the English language," said Cecil, who then added that "this word and its variants are said casually among subsections of our population."

He also said that the students filming the video did not show his entire point in which he made it clear that it was unacceptable to use the N-word.

"In no way was this response to my students using this word, which was videotaped without my permission, meant to be disparaging to anyone," he said.

Watch the video below.