Imus in the Hot Seat

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE("Don Imus)</div>

How ironic!

While I don't follow him that much, he does not seem to be a racist - he offends everybody!

 

I guess it depends on whether you think calling black women basketball players "nappy-headed hos" is funny, or a disgusting racist remark. I fall in the latter category.
I don't listen to Imus, but I hear that this is not the first time he has made racist or bigoted remarks on the air. If that is so, I think he should be fired.
While I rarely agree with dbermanmd, I do agree that any other radio personality who makes racist remarks on the air should also be fired.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Apr 10 2007, 11:05 AM) [snapback]420788[/snapback]</div>

I don't think the world will "tumble", whether or not Imus is fired. And if he is, he'll probably get picked up by some other network, or he can just live off of the millions he's made already. So no one need concern themselves over Imus' welfare.
What exactly do you mean by, "deemed racist by that group that you have offended." Do you NOT agree that calling black women athletes "nappy-headed hos" and "jigaboos" is racist (and sexist)? And why do you call this a "very dangerous precedent." It's not even a precedent- other TV and radio broadcasters have been suspended or fired for similar comments. Anybody remember Jimmy the Greek?
And no- before any jumps in to defend Imus' freedom to express himself, this is not a First Amendment issue. Suppose, for example, your office receptionist makes offensive remarks to patients. You are entirely justified in firing that person. Likewise, MSNBC and CBS are entirely within their rights to suspend him, and to him fire him if that's what the ultimately do. Of course, that won't happen- this controversy will probably just generate more listeners, and it all comes down to ratings. If people stopped listening to this nonsense, then it would go away.
Now I am the biggest advocate for free speech (and a card-carrying member of the ACLU), and if Imus were arrested, or fined by the FCC, I'd be the first to argue in his defense. Free speech applies to all speech- offensive or not. But it doesn't mean that a radio network is obligated to broadcast it.

 

These kinds of things always run on a case by case basis. Extending per Dr. Berman's point is absurd, and just an excuse to do nothing.

Some anonymous blogger spewing racist junk is not equivalent to Imus. You don't have Presidential candidates queing up to try to mentioned by the anonymous blogger, whereas they willingly go on Imus.

He won't go off the air; he's too popular for that. If he did get booted someone else will just hire him. But that doesn't mean he shouldn't have to eat crow for a long long time for calling a bunch of girls attending a University "nappy headed hos" simply because they're black.

I mean, here's the nappy headed hos. How would you feel about it if one of these was your kid?

 

People who are saying he ought not to be sacked make weird comparisons. They compare a very widely broadcast shock jock with, say, a local journalist, or with themselves (!).

Realistically, dbermannmd, if you make a rascist comment, who is really going to give one rip? If you say it to a patient, in your capacity as a doc, well, that one's going to hurt. But in your sweats, on a rare fuel stop with the Prius, no one's going to be greatly affected.

But this guy, he's widely heard. He to a certain extent represents the broadcasting corporations who buy his show. All the freedom of speech rhetoric -- I'm sure it's really exciting to spout it, and I'm sure it makes us all feel like high school debate team mavericks once again. But I just can't see it in that light. His corporation is going to can him. It will happen. Just wait a few days. He crossed a line of public opinion, and now he will pay.

So what?

It's kind of like watching a tsunami crush a surfer who screwed up. You can stand there and watch it. You can wish the guy hadn't chosen that particular wave. But are you going to do something about it, or change what will happen?

I think any person who says something rascist like that, on public channels, about a team of young women... he ought to have his nice person fired, period, end of discussion. What if that were your daughter on that basketball team? If my daughter were on that team, let me tell you, I'd have words for this Imus schmuck.

Edit: You can follow me around with a tape recorder all day, for what I care. I do not ever, ever say anything that's in the same ballpark as what he said. I say stupid things, sure. But you're making a ridiculous comparison -- what we say in small circles, what we say to ourselves, versus what we say in the larger sphere of public information. Different, different. Just beating your chest and braying "freedom of speech" doesn't in any way exhibit having thought about it. Imus insists he's not a bad person, he just said a bad thing. He's wrong, and he's trying quite hard to let himself off the hook entirely too easily.

 

I don't listen to him and don't support this kind of show.

Rev. Jackson and Rev. Sharpton muddy this as they have definitely made racists comments in the past. I see both politics and hypocrisy mixed into this.

It's just a mess.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Apr 10 2007, 11:45 AM) [snapback]420808[/snapback]</div>

Come on, give people some credit for intelligence. Sure, there are some remarks that can be misconstrued. I might, for instance, innocently say something to you that a Jewish person would find objectionable, but in my ignorance had no idea I was saying something offensive. Hopefully, you would then accept my apology, and we would move on. I have no idea what words would be offensive to an Eskimo (my understanding is that they prefer not to be called "Eskimo") and neither do most people in our culture, but we all know what "ho" and "jigaboo" mean. There is no question that the words that Imus used were racist. He's a shock jock, he goes out of his way to offend, and he knows what he is doing. And would do you mean by EVERYONE? Everyone in the world? Sure, I would apply the same standards of decency to everyone, but that doesn't mean that everyone could be fired from their job for making that type of remark. If communicating to the public is what one is paid to do (that applies to both a radio announcer and an office receptionist, but not, for instance to a physician), then making a racist remark is a failure to perform one's job satisfactory and hence reason for dismissal.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Delta Flyer @ Apr 10 2007, 08:58 AM) [snapback]420823[/snapback]</div>

Agreed...

But does the fact that those two weren't called out for their behaviors mean that this guy shouldn't be, for his?

(Are we gonna have ourselves a down-home FHOP moral relativism flamewar here?)

 

Berman, yes, he had a legal right to say what he did. However, just about every company i've ever worked for or heard about has some sort of "code of business conduct". Where i'm currently working, the applicable section says:

Elsewhere in the code, it makes very clear that violation of the code - whether it's violation towards a coworker or a client - termination of employment is a possible result.

For media personalities, such comments or actions are (and should be) treated much more severely than for your "every day joe". While i might make a comment that makes one individual feel uncomfortable, a media personality risks offending a large segment of customers for the company.

In my private conversations outside of work, i might make some offhand remarks that someone could take offense to. However, at work i censor what i say. Incidents like this simply don't happen, because it's not appropriate for the workplace.

This individual should be canned by his company. What he said was rude, disgusting, and racist. It makes him and the company look very bad. It's simply not the image that a successful broadcasting company wants to portray.

 

zapranoth,

I don't defend Imus's remarks. Since I don't know what he does that well, I'm slow to say fire him, but if I did, I'd likely tell him to leave.

I don't like shock jocks - entertainment is easiest at the gutter level. The nature of their job is to gain audience by saying something so outragous as to almost get fired without it happening. Imus may have finally lost on this round of Russian Roulette.

Listeners support this - if they turned out shock jocks and their variants, it would not happen.

 

Somewhat applicable to the topic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5H5r4_CoJo

 

Gwen Ifill wrote a great response in the NY Times today, which deserves to be reprinted in it's entirety:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/10/opinion/...xprod=permalink

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Apr 10 2007, 11:45 AM) [snapback]420808[/snapback]</div>

It seems that Imus is an equal-opportunity bigot. I'm not Jewish, but it seems pretty clear to me that Imus's slur here is bigoted.

 

I think IMUS was much funnier in his early days when he was on WNBC in NY. When all the ladies used to call up, the first thing he would say is, "are you neked baby?" LOL. Plus he used to have a real cast of charachters, moby worm, Rev. Billy Salrjus or something like that. Now he's just another wind bag on talk radio:-(

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(larkinmj @ Apr 10 2007, 01:51 PM) [snapback]420899[/snapback]</div>

He hit these girls on two fronts with the first jab: the racist AND the sexist front in saying "nappy-headed hos."

Then to follow it up with the word "jigaboo?" That's just awful. I haven't heard that word since high school, thank God.

Anyone remember the Greaseman (shockjock) who got fired a few years back for his awful comments about the man from TX who got lynched by being dragged from a truck? (Byrd, I think his name was.) He was sacked immediately. It's up to the station/network to determine what their standards of listening are; the Greaseman would've maintained listeners, I've no doubt, but the station just concluded they didn't want him around.

Is NBC going to do the same? Depends on if he's crossed the line like the Greaseman did...and this isn't as offensive as what the Greaseman said, IMHO, but it's still awful. A DJ is an employee, and freedom of speech ends at the point that the employer deems. I'd like to know their standards.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(livelychick @ Apr 10 2007, 01:04 PM) [snapback]420909[/snapback]</div>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Byrd

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(livelychick @ Apr 10 2007, 02:04 PM) [snapback]420909[/snapback]</div>

Yes, I remember "the Greaseman". He once said, in reference to Martin Luther King Day, that we should shoot four more so that we could get a whole week off from work. The really scary thing about that psychopath was that he was also a deputy sheriff in VA.