Yes, for Tom Oliphant to say “solidarity forever” in the face of blatantly racist remarks is inexcusable. Is getting on the tv that much of a head rush for these freaks?

I’m so disappointed.

So what do you all think about tying disgusting rap music lyrics to this story? Fair question, or trying to distract from the central question.

Rap lyrics are a straw man. What did rap music have to do with Imus’s remark beyond only the most fleeting connections via one of the words he used? And one that, unfortunately, wormed its way into mainstream expression, long, long ago. Ho has been mainstream at least 15 years. It stopped being a rap-only phemonemonen as soon as Meg Ryan used the term in a movie (Sleepless in Seattle, I believe).

So blaming rappers for Imus’s racism is both disingenuous and ridiculous, a desperate attempt to blame someone else–anyone else–for his bad behavior.

Roger @
48

I just want to note that Imus was virtually the only mainstream media figure who identified the Katrina mess as the racsist clusertfuck that it was. So now we get rid of him, and keep Rush, and Glenn Beck, and Michael Savage, et al.

It’s a bit like a circular firing squad. I don’t for a minute believe that Imus is a racsist. It was a stupid, racsist remark, but its perfectly possible for both halves of that statement to be true. I think his apology was sincere. Where are the apologies from Rush, Beck etc?

A. He was not the only one to identify the Katrina disaster for what it was. Eventually it was too big a clusterfuck for even Fox Noise to ignore.

B. Who says this stops with Imus? This is the trigger to a larger conversation about responsibilities of corporations making money off the commons-like the airwaves. If Glenn Beck is sleeping easy tonight, he’s an idiot.

C. Like it or not, someone who has a pattern over years of making outrageous racist and mysognyistic statements and when called on them considers himself a victim is both a racist and a mysogynist. No matter how nice he might be to sick children.

I’d be /very/ surprised if Fox ever identified the victims of Katrina as the victims of a racist goverment. Imus did.

As for B, well, I guess I do. Its just my opinion, but I’m pretty confident in it. A large part of the reason this has played out the way it has (IMHO) is that Imus is such an iconoclast that he’s attracted enemies from both sides of the aisle. It was this unification of enemies that fed the /enormous/ energy thats been summoned up here. Do you really think the next stupid thing out of Ann Coulter’s mouth is going to attract anything like this attention? I don’t. The whole ‘faggot’ thing got, for the most part, a big collective yawn. Sure, a few newspapers dropped her. And I think at least one picked her up. But it doesn’t matter. She’s sails along, pretty much unaffected. Imus acts like an ass, but I don’t think he’s /really/ a racist. He just runs his mouth, and his big mistake her was his choice of targets. And I fully expect he knew it and regreted the words pretty much the second they left his mouth. So the real racists get to stay and comment smugly about all this.

Get real. If you think this kind of speech belongs in the public discourse you are dead wrong.>

The problem is too many people are looking at these remarks in a vacuum. And if you had actually read either of my posts instead of just regurgitating the same old, same old you’d have understood that I wasn’t defending Imus or what he said.

Obviously he should be condemned.

Apparently we hear what we want to hear and read what we want to read.

C. Viviam Stringer and those dignified young women from Rutgers were rightfully outraged and furious. But they also showed a great deal of patience and restraint. And they were willing to meet with this guy. I thought that was beyond gracious and really courageous for a group of 20-years-olds. I wonder how many here would have the same courage and the same dignity.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to hope that the rest of society could move beyond the shrill and look for solutions beyond the obvious.

Yesterday I heard Shawn Hannity describe Teresa Heinz Kerry as a “scumbag.” Now there isn’t of prepH in the world to treat the Hannity’s, Becks, and Limbaugh’s. But scumbag? Is that appropriate on the air?

This is a far bigger issue – on a lot of levels – than just the heinous and insensitive remarks of one guy.

I just want to note that Imus was virtually the only mainstream media figure who identified the Katrina mess as the racsist clusertfuck that it was. So now we get rid of him, and keep Rush, and Glenn Beck, and Michael Savage, et al.

It’s a bit like a circular firing squad. I don’t for a minute believe that Imus is a racsist. It was a stupid, racsist remark, but its perfectly possible for both halves of that statement to be true. I think his apology was sincere. Where are the apologies from Rush, Beck etc?

A. He was not the only one to identify the Katrina disaster for what it was. Eventually it was too big a clusterfuck for even Fox Noise to ignore.

B. Who says this stops with Imus? This is the trigger to a larger conversation about responsibilities of corporations making money off the commons-like the airwaves. If Glenn Beck is sleeping easy tonight, he’s an idiot.

C. Like it or not, someone who has a pattern over years of making outrageous racist and mysognyistic statements and when called on them considers himself a victim is both a racist and a mysogynist. No matter how nice he might be to sick children.