Pointing out stories you may have missed. Even as news breaks that the Rutgers women’s college basketball team has accepted the apology by axed radio host Don Imus for his sexist and racist comments, Tim Reid of Times Online (see link below) has encapsulated the story in all its angles. This is an edited version of his report.He has called the black tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams “two cooma-chucka, big-butted women”, the African American news anchor Gwen Ifill a “cleaning lady”, and the Palestinians “stinking animals” — and he has always got away with it. Now America’s most famous “shock jock” has been dismissed by CBS and NBC for his racially charged insults against a university women’s basketball team. Don Imus must be asking himself why his latest insult provoked a level of outrage powerful enough to end his career.
Imus, 67, told listeners last Wednesday, after the mostly black Rutgers women’s college basketball team had been beaten in the national championship final against the University of Tennessee: “That’s some rough girls from Rutgers. Man, they got tattoos. That’s some nappy-headed hos there.”
Imus forged his highly successful career on misogyny, racism and homophobia, and everybody — not least the media and political elite who appeared on his show to hawk books and ambitions — knew it. When he insulted the Rutgers team at 6.14am on Wednesday, April 4, there was no reaction — except from Ryan Chiachiere, a 26-year-old researcher for a liberal watchdog, Media Matters for America. His job was to monitor the Imus in the Morning show. He downloaded the comments from the televised transmission of the CBS radio programme, which is aired by the cable television network MSNBC, and posted it on his group’s website. From there it was sent to hundreds of journalists.
Imus dug himself deeper into a hole with an appearance on a radio show hosted by the Rev Al Sharpton. After apologising, he lost his cool by calling his questioners “you people”, a phrase loaded with pejorative racial undertones. A mutiny was setting in at NBC, led by two of the network’s on-air African American stars, Al Roker, a weatherman, and Ron Allen, a reporter. They posted blogs calling for Imus’s dismissal.
By Wednesday morning, as Jesse Jackson, the civil rights activist, joined the calls for dismissal, eight leading sponsors of the MSNBC transmission deserted a show that was rapidly become a public relations disaster. The boycott was started by American Express, which is led by Kenneth Chenault, an African-American. Sprint Nextel and General Motors soon followed. On
Wednesday night — a full week after the remarks were made — NBC finally dismissed Imus.
On Thursday CBS faced overwhelming calls for his dismissal. That night Leslie Moonves, the CBS president, announced that Imus had been dismissed. He called it an “important step . . . in changing the culture” of public life.
News source: Times Online.
6 comments:
David,
Do you think your blog will ever be as influential? Leading to the firing of someone? That is some pretty influential blogging. Well, someday when you get there, you'll need to use your power carefully.
Hi Deborah,
Not just influential, but responsible in more ways than one. This is the 21st century, and his views are simply not acceptable.
By the way, I did some investigatipn and it was my stuff-up entirely that led to your blog being omitted from the list.
Please accept my humble apologies.
David
I have a very different take. Imus talked for 20 hours a week and his ratings depended on saying edgy stuff. From all that talk there's bound to be silly stuff you can construe as racist by picking his phrases.
He said something very stupid and had apologized repeatedly and that should have been enough. His detractors like Jesse Jackson have had affairs and fathered an illegitimate daughter while married.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson
I'd think that is treating women more like Ho's than what Imus did in a botched joke, echoing what black rappers say all the time. Bill Maher called this chorus of protests by hypocritical black leaders "fake outrage."
I guess this super PC environment is here to stay and is the new form of censorship. I saw an MSNBC online poll - 26% agreed and 74% disagreed with the decision to fire him. So I guess I'm not the only one sickened by this...
-Sandip
Hi Dave,
I stumbled into Imus a few weeks ago and wondered who this strange person was (as it turns out, there IS a whole segment of Americans who DID NOT watch his show); he seemed garbled, and I couldn't make much sense of anything he said. Certainly wasn't impressed.
Whether or not he should have been fired, the more important issue is a fresh focus on our society, which has got into the habit of tolerating and cultivating what is much less than acceptable. Perhaps this will be a start in another direction.
I certainly hope so. I would NOT be happy if anyone used the 'h' word in reference to my granddaughter, within or without the context of a rap song.
Carol Mc
Hi Sandip,
I know where you;re coming from. The ``shock jock'' culture promotes controversial views - and the media has to answer for that trend.
I see your point, though. I reckon you should replace Judge Judy on TV - I can just see the title now, `Judge Sandip'.
Thanks for a terrific perspective - and thank you too for pointing out the percentages from the online poll.
Cheers
David
Dear Carol,
Like you, I'd never heard of Imus before the issue blew up - and that's precisely why I thought Tim Reid's report on TimesOnline was so good, because it encapsulated the entire story, in all its various angles.
Thanks for taking the trouble to comment.
Have a great weekend.
David
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