The Imus Mess

I

IMUS was never a must for me

Imus is going down – at least on MSNBC on television and CBS on radio and with major advertisers and with politicians and journalists and other celebrities who’ve lent credibility to his show so many years.

I’ve never listened to or watched Imus or any other shock jock. Just as I refused to watch a sitcom that famously billed itself as a show about nothing (Seinfeld), I’ve refused to participate in the shock jock cult. There’s too much to be shocked about in the real world to support repugnant, outrageous, insulting commentary as entertainment, often at the expense of the underdog.

Why Imus and his producer felt the need to denigrate 10 young women who had overcome great odds to reach the final game in the NCAA basketball championship is beyond understanding. These young women, ages 18 to 20, were not “nappy headed” (Most seem to have perms, for god’s sake!). And there is absolutely nothing to indicate that these very disciplined, very academically sound young women are “whores”. (Definitions: “a prostitute; a person considered sexually promiscuous; a person considered as having compromised principles for personal gain”)

Hmmm. That last definition sounds more like Imus than the Rutgers team.

II

Where are White women?

Imus did not just insult Blacks, but also women. Quickly this became an Imus versus “the Black community” conflict. The sexism in his no-infamous line has pretty much been ignored except by a handful of Black women. And so I ask again: Where are White women?

III

There is power in protest

If anything, this fallout from Imus’s on-air idiocy has demonstrated the power of speaking out and of making economic demands that can influence social policy. It was one thing for the Rev. Al Sharpton to use his various bully pulpits to speak out; this went to a whole new level when major advertisers listened and decided to withdraw their support for Imus’s show.

Vote with your hands. Change the dial. Don’t listen to the Imuses of the airwaves. But if the other Imuses out there say something as despicable as he did, don’t fear to use the power of the purse. Encourage advertisers to withdraw their support.

I’m encouraged by this mobilization of this particular coalition of the willing. Now it needs to carry on to assault those aspects of hip-hop culture that have usurped that culture and turned it into something that makes an Imus comfortable with referring to Black women as whores. There are big corporate bucks out there behind this aspect of hip-hop. Let’s go after them.


IV

Post-embarrassment “therapy”

Imus didn’t rush into therapy for alcoholism or temporary mental illness or whatever the way other celebrities have done after getting caught with their inner-hatred unleashed and facing the loss of income.

But that 2 ½ hours at the New Jersey Governor’s Mansion with the Rutgers team and its coaches must have been more intense than anything Isaiah Washington or Mel Gibson experienced during their rush-to-therapy after expressions of homophobia (Washington of television’s Grey’s Anatomy) and anti-Semitism (Gibson, the actor, director and producer) or racism (Michael Richards, the comic most famous as a character on Seinfeld).

V

Once again Sen. McCain called it wrong

As various Imus regulars – politicians, journalists, etcetera – announced their intent to boycott Imus’s show, McCain said he accepted Imus’s apologies and would gladly return to Imus In the Morning.

He can’t get it right. Just a few days ago, after visiting a market in Baghdad surrounded by about 100 heavily-armed soldiers and with military helicopters hovering overhead and sharpshooters positioned on rooftops, he came back espousing the Bush administration party line: The streets are much safer in Baghdad these days; the war is being won.

And then he had to admit, after public humiliation by not just US bloggers but also by Iraqi civilians who know otherwise, that he’d been wearing rose-colored glasses and had “misspoke.”

Is this man ready for his closeup as a viable presidential candidate?

St. Patrick's Day

The united states of us requires effort.

I have heard so many people say that they have no knowledge of what St. Patrick’s Day is all about except that it involves Irish people and drunkenness. There is much more to St. Patrick’s Day than that.

I have heard so many people say that they know nothing about Black History Month because they are not Black. Or they don't understand Chinese New Year because they are not Chinese. Or they ignore Columbus Day because they are not Italian.

I have heard so many people presume that Thanksgiving is about turkeys and football, but don’t realize the religious base for it. Or don’t see a commonality of purpose in celebrating Thanksgiving and Kwanzaa or Easter and Passover.

If the US in the United States are to truly be that, we need to reach beyond our limited concepts of from whence we’ve come. Even if that means rejecting some of that which our parents or teachers have burdened us with.

I have heard too many people say that Christianity is Catholicism and that’s it. As a good and faithful Baptist, I try to explain Protestants to them.

I make a point of expressing my Irishness this time of the year and using the opportunity of the holiday to generate discussions – in pubs no less! – about the connections between Blacks and Irish in this country. The Irish were considered the “niggers” of the British empire and then, after a few decades here, considered themselves to be White. Google the Draft Riots for a start. A lot of people of Irish backgrounds ended up in the antebellum South and a lot of us are their descendants, whether acknowledged or not.

In this nation, with all our resources, there is no excuse for not knowing more about our neighbors and workplace colleagues.

I am proudly Irish this weekend – and am preparing to cook my corn beef-and-cabbage luncheon for friends of any hue and religiosity – after an Irish breakfast at one of the nearby firehouses in Harlem.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Hardaway's Big Mouth Costs Him

Obviously, Tim Hardaway forgot to study the play book before going off on a homophobic tirade on a radio show just before the National Basketball Association's annual All-Star splash.

So the former star player has lost a PR gig as an official representative of the league in the leadup to the big game, which will be held in Las Vegas this weekend.

"It is inappropriate for him to be representing us given the disparity between his views and ours," NBA commissioner David Stern said after Hardaway’s anti-gay rant created a storm.

Hardaway has a right to his views, but he doesn’t have a right to represent the corporate NBA, which likes to make money and put forth a face of tolerance when, as everyone knows, a lot of folks associated with the league probably agree with Hardaway. Why do you think John Amaechi waited until he had retired from professional basketball to disclose that he is gay? (His newly published memoir is "Man in the Middle.")

Hardaway, apparently not comfortable enough in his own sexuality and ignorant enough to believe that homosexuality is contagious, said, while discussing Amaechi’s revelation:

"First of all, I wouldn't want him on my team. And second of all, if he was on my team, I would, you know, really distance myself from him because, uh, I don't think that is right. I don't think he should be in the locker room while we are in the locker room."

When the radio host challenged him, Hardaway went on and on: "You know, I hate gay people, so I let it be known. I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people. I'm homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States."

Maybe it’s views like Hardaway’s that “shouldn’t be in the world or in the United States.”

His handlers tried to clean up the mess he’d made by issuing a statement that you just know he did NOT write: "As an African-American, I know all too well the negative thoughts and feelings hatred and bigotry cause. I regret and apologize for the statements that I made that have certainly caused the same kinds of feelings and reactions.”

At least he didn’t claim to be checking into gay rehab -- either to become more sensitive to gay people or to be cured of one's own flirtation with homosexuality -- the way the actor Isaiah Washington (“Grey’s Anatomy”) did or the way the disgraced evangelical preacher Ted Haggard did.