I think it's lost meaning starting with 2011 (thanks, Obama). See: http://chronicle.nytlabs.com/?keyword=racist
Notice how frequency of use spikes by 500% over last 5 years. That means that either the world has got immensely more racist, we started noticing it more or the word has just got diluted to where it doesn't mean anything (by a factor of 5, to be precise).
I happen to think it's the latter.