The Dog is out to prove that his bark is worse than his bite.

In his first TV appearance since his hit A&E show was shelved following the leak of an eight-month-old phone conversation with his son in which he liberally uses the N-word, Duane "Dog" Chapman tells Fox News that he has always felt a certain kinship with black people and, as for using the N-word, "never did it out of hate."

"There's a special connection that I thought I had between me and black America," the emotional Dog the Bounty Hunter star told Fox's Hannity & Colmes. "And I used to say, 'I'm black, too.'

"In other words, my whole life I've been called a half-breed, a convict, king of the trailer trash, this and that…so when I stood there and said, 'I kind of know what you feel like, because I've been there, too,' that I felt that I could embrace and like, as brothers…say the word."

"I now learned I'm not black at all, and I never did it out of hate," Chapman continued. "This sounds so stupid. I always did it out of love. Other white guys would be like, 'Boy, who does Dog think he is? Dog can say that.' And black guys would be with me and walk with me and respect me.

"So, I went too far with that."

Chapman, a Honolulu-based bail bondsman by trade, spent 18 months in prison on a murder charge in the 1970s before putting his intimate knowledge of the criminal mind and the lengths people will go to avoid the rap to good use. Impressed by the footage his crew shot while it was searching for convicted rapist Andrew Luster in 2003, A&E gave him his own show.

The cable network pulled Dog the Bounty Hunter from its schedule indefinitely, however, on Friday, two days after the National Enquirer's Website posted a recording of Chapman spewing the N-word and other expletives during an eight-month-old conversation with his son Tucker, whose girlfriend, Monique Shinnery, is black.

But, according to Chapman, while he has learned his lesson about casually using one of the most offensive words in the English language, there's apparently way more bad blood between him and his son than meets the ear.

On the tape, which Tucker sold to the tabloid for a rumored $15,000, Chapman says that he's uncomfortable having a black girl around "because we use the word n---er sometimes here. I'm not going to take any chance ever in life of losing everything I've worked for 30 years because some drunken n---er heard us say n---er and turned us into the Enquirer magazine."

"So, I will help you get another job, but you cannot work here unless you break up with her and she is out of your life," Chapman tells his son. "I can't handle that s--t."

When asked why his son, who has spent time in prison for armed robbery, would set him up like that, Chapman was mostly at a loss, but had at least one possible explanation.

"I don't know why he would do it, unless there's some kind of habit or something he needs the money for," Chapman said, answering in the affirmative when Sean Hannity suggested that the "habit" possibly plaguing Tucker could be drug-related.

But while Chapman spoke solemnly about his son, he was driven to tears when talking about the reason his reality-TV world is hanging in the balance.

"Of course I know the story and I know America's story," the choked-up star said. "But I never realized that [using the N-word] is like stabbing a black person in the heart. I would never do that to any kind of person. I have always taken pride to be the white guy that can talk to the black people, that can refer to them truly as a brother from a different mother.

"But this is America and this is entertainment and that doesn't fly here."

And, in light of the overwhelming response to his version of brotherhood: "I will try never, ever, ever to use that word again."

"There is no excuse," he said. "I'm guilty, and I will take my punishment. But the end of what I said is I will do everything there is in my power to make sure people have forgiven me."