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Ellen's scenarios are in fact repeated every day on right wing radio. Look at Limbaugh, look at Coulter. The examples are endless. The neocons unmercifully trash anyone, man woman or child, who doesn't adhere to their dogma. And these are serious charges, not meant as jokes, not said facetiously. We all know Imus didn't mean the Rutgers team really were women of low morals.

The situation _is_ surreal. Why slam down on a failed stupid joke and tolerate more destructive calumny?

This situation is sureal. There are male prostitutes. If some of you free speech gentlemen with your sense of humor, were called a whore by a popular tv host, and you were identified by name, group, place of work, etc. should that person keep his job, and keep on doing this, because of free speech-- lest america stops being a free country if he's not allowed to call you a whore. Then your wife is shamed, and your kids are humiliated out of school, etc, etc. Sounds sureal? Well, was there any less reason to do this to the rutger's team than it would be to you?????

It says something about a society who justifies hate filled commentary about a group of defenseless people for freedom of speech. It reminds me of Nazi Germany. It seems to me more like the misuse of freedom of speech. Thomas Jefferson must be rolling in his grave right now. Where is the common decency and respect for people? What a nasty, sick, mygonistic society we are where regular women doing what they love are called such terrible names for no intelligent reason. Imus is an elderly man, has he not gotten past his teenage years?

I would appreciate some responses from all those who write in supporting Imus:

Why do you think his insult to the rutger’s team women was ok, or not that bad? I am trying to understand the mind set. Is it that imus’s fans just can’t bear to reject imus for anything, so they won’t admit the insult was bad?If they admit this rutgers insult was bad, what is the consequence of that for them? How bad would the insult have to be, or to whom, to reject Imus?. Can you give an example? Or is it that they just enjoy insulting people, and imus gives them the go ahead to admit it, since he is on the airways, and big networks give him the seal of approval. Therefore nasty, hostile, insulting language no longer seems so, but is almost meaningless? Calling women prostitutes means nothing--we know the women are really not prostitutes? Does “free speech” make anything ok? Is this the psycology of this situation?

Tell me if the following has validity: If the listeners enjoy imus put downs, it must make them feel superior to the insulted one, and they derive self esteem and personal satisfaction from this. That’s why they criticize political correctness, because they need cover for their own desire to put down others to build themselves up and make themselves feel good.
Someone said, if he can’t feel superior to blacks, then who can he feel superior to. Is this the idea here? Please write in clue me in to this…..thanks.

Though I'm no fan of Don Imus and he should pick his targets more carefully, I feel him being publicly flogged by society speaks badly about us. It's not a First Amendment issue, but a thought expression issue.

If you want to say/feel/express something, without committing a crime, do it. If not, don't. Some people will be offended, but it's better to offend than be silenced. That's what thought regulation, a social disease as much as racism and bigotry, has done, and soon, no one will write an eulogy for the human race that has damned itself by being afraid of itself.

Paulo:

Feel free to criticize Imus: just don't organize a mob to pressure advertisers to fire him.

Advertisers and corporations can do whatever they want to do, and do. Hence the 1950s McCarthyite blacklist. What you don't want to do is encourage blacklists and other forms of censorship by, e.g., organizing a mob to promote, not criticism and a public debate, but rather a boycott of somebody whose speech you find offensive.

Last night on Larry King Live, the interviewer (not King) asked Al Sharpton and other guests whether Imus should be "allowed" to call Cheney a war criminal, as Imus apparently did on yesterday's broadcast. Quod erat demonstratum, as far as I'm concerned.

at the insistence of an in-law, i listened to Imus a few times (as much as i could stand). frankly, i could never understand why he was given a "first chance." but then, i'm a fan of Brian (chuckling).

RCTobin, by saying that attacking what someone says is wrong, is in itself a violation of the principle you just explained. If it's wrong to criticize what someone says, then by that same logic, it would be wrong to say it. You can't enshrine one form of speech and then declare the speech that stands as a rebuttal to it as invalid.

Not only that, but by your logic, you've stripped the companies of any rights whatsoever as well. Any show is going to have "an audience" whether it be an audience of one or ten million. Should a company be forced to keep someone on the air because they have an audience or if they can get advertisers to advertise? Does that make any sense? A company has the right to put whoever they want on the air.

And yes, the right-wingers have every right to go after a leftist show... and rest assured that they do.

But to sum it up, to say: "You can't criticize someone for what they say because it's free speech" is itself an assault on free speech.

1. It is disingenuous to claim that there is no free speech issue involved in the Imus firing because the company that broadcast his show was private. From what public organizations do you obtain your news and commentary, other than PBS and NPR? Virtually all the media are privately owned. To shut someone down on a show such as Imus's -- i.e., one that deals with current events, even if satirically --is to censor.

2. Imus is obnoxious, but popular. If attacking him via his advertisers so that he was taken off the air was okay, then right-wing attacks on liberal commentators are also okay.

3. In my opinion, no attack on speech is okay. As long as he had an audience (hence the advertisers), Imus should have remained on the air.

4. So now Imus is threatening to give hell to all the hypocrites who hid under their desks when the mob came for him; I sure hope that he does. That's an Imus show that even I might listen to.

I'm black, but I won't listen to Imus when he comes back - and it has nothing to do with race. His act is just tired - cancelling Curtis and Kuby for Imus will come back to bite WABC big time.

Imus has been able to charge advertisers a premium rate despite his dismal ratings over the last 10 years or so. This probably won't continue going forward.

Jessie Jackson and Al Sharpton, as much as they would like to be, are not Martin Luther King. God bless them they have the right to say whatever they want but they have seemed to have forgotten that everyone else has the same right. Oh and I’d go nuts if I was forced to watch sponge bob for 24/7….

1. I've been listening to Imus for almost 30 years -- he's the Original Shock Jock, nothing and no one is sacred. How come, all of a sudden, Al Sharpton & Jesse Jackson are on top of this? Are they not aware of the volume & on/off buttons on a radio or TV? And who are they to tell me what I can or cannot listen to? How would they feel if I came into their homes and made them watch SpongeBob 24/7?

2. Where was the outrage when Imus' notorius description of the Rutgers women was continuously reapeated verbatim in the print media? As recently as last week in the New York Times.

3.

Joan, shame an America where all nasty, hate filled speech is OK. In Germany after their history with Fascism, and racism, for fun and profit, a person today can go to jail for making Imus’s comments.
Also, how much money was Howie Kurtz making while hating himself.

Re # 38 :
Whoever said anything about the idea that an industry making money could somehow not involve hypocrisy?

Fiction, art and music are one thing --
the idea that it should be acceptable for a popular radio host to apply the moniker of "nappy headed hos" to a group of young, female athletes does definitely qualify for consideration of what standards are here at stake.
How to make "the punishment fit the crime", however, is also a matter up for debate.

He may have well been punished unduly by the debate alone.

The cost of public life?
If there's blood in the water, the sharks will come a feedin'!

Sorry, I don't buy it. I'm quite sure that many of the people who were insulted by Imus were hurt, whether they were "public figures" or not. For the advertisers, audience, guests, pundits, etc. who had gone along with Imus's brand of humor for years and in some cases gotten rich from it to all of a sudden jump on an outrage bandwagon when the target became black, female athletes is the rankest hypocrisy.

I will add, however,(to my previous comment, #31), that the group he attacked were, in fact, particularly vulnerable (to my mind, college athletes do not qualify as "public figures"); what made his comment so distasteful, was that he, as a (tacitly) powerful, white, male media figure, by way of an ill-considered, offhand remark, to have drawn alleged negative attention to the "looks and sexual behavior" of a group of innocent young women. The argument that this was any sort of "hate" speech may certainly be called specious, as it was intended as a humorous use of vernacular -- but it failed as humor, was potentially hurtful and he is being paid to know better.

Joan: "Why is the Rutger's Women's basketball team deserving of special protection; it's hardly the most vulnerable group in the world."

I don't think it is protection, but condemnation.

It is a issue of these then-18-20 year-old students going to college, playing a sport, and achieving more than anyone thought they could that year. They did everything right, then they got insulted for their looks and then all of the attention is on the words and not the season.

Jon P, I had not heard anything about an FCC ban against him. I haven't heard anybody calling for any government action against him. If that has happened, then that's wrong and I would stand opposed to that.

In 1996, Kane and Abel released "Jealous Again"," and the lyrics "crappy-headed, nappy-headed ho's" were meant a lot less facetiously than Imus' quote. No one got all worked up about it then.

Imus is really into music, had to know the song, had to be referencing it. Humor--even unfunny humor like most of Imus'--is based on flinging stereotypes around. If it all follows one demeaning stereotype, that's awful. Imus' humor--and serious endeavors--do not follow the racist line.

More challenging to get excited about is the fact that arrant, endemic racism STILL exists in North Carolina. I returned recently, thinking it must have changed by now. It hasn't. Less overtly violent, yes, but societally-enforced abject poverty is violence enow.

Also obscene, to me, are the arrant lies spread by neocon talk radio, and the fact that this overblown, trivial nonsense blew the missing white house email scandal off the front page.

My take on his original comments had to do with looks and has been a long issue with females in athletics. The good looking ones get endorsements with the not-so-good-looking ones are called various names. (For example, Anna Kornikova in tennis won endorsements because she was considered "sexy", even though she never won a tournament)

When Imus was talking about the Rutgers-Tennessee game, I am sure he saw or was told about Candice Parker who is talented and very attractive and that was the reason for his comparison with the Rutgers team.

His words were meant to shock. That's what he is--a shock-jock!

Should he have been condemned: absolutely! Should he have been fired: that was up to his bosses.

The funny thing is that everyone now knows that Rutgers was in the Championship game, but only those who follow the sport know who won the game [Tennessee]!!!

Paulo, your right, its not a freedom of speech issue right now. But a lot of people think he should not have been let back on the air. Who is going to ban him? Its one thing if no radio stations pick him up. But it is a very dangerous and very real bad thing if the FFC bans him from being on the air. That’s what we should all be very worried about, not what he said or didn’t say or who likes or doesn’t like...

That's a good point --
he put his foot in his mouth.
But in the context of free speech,
where our struggle is more with shades of gray
than black and white,
the subtleties of what is acceptable
is an appropriate debate.
In a democracy it ultimately should be the debate
which determines our standards.

I was driving to work one morning during one of WNYC's interminable pledge drives and switched to WFAN. One of Imus' lackeys was in the process of comparing Joscelyn Elders, who was then the Surgeon General(?) to "Aunt Jemima." That was the day I stopped listening to anything on that station. This was my own personal censorship and that was as far as I was willing to go.
My thought is that he should not be allowed to return to radio because he will just insult many people again - but, there's just too much money to be made off of his insensitivity.

A lot of black people call themselves names and disrespect their own race. Apply the same standards to everyone.

I wish Brian and some of the callers and posters were people who had actually listened to Imus, either today or in the past.
I agree with the caller who spoke of the sexist aspect of Imus' offense, rather than the racial overtone. I have been listening to Imus for years, and some of what he says does make me cringe, but the overall show is worthwhile. For MONTHS before the Rutgers incident he had been introducing his wife, Deidre, whose interests are in environmental cleanup and toxin removal, as "the green ho." It always made me cringe, BUT THIS WAS NEVER MENTIONED ANYWHERE.
I say, take his apology at face value, and see if he holds his discourse to a higher level. Al Sharpton called Jewish business owners in Harlem 'white interlopers,' which incited a fatal arson incident, for which he has never apologized, and yet he, too, has a radio outlet. Imus has been flayed enough. Now let him get back to the business of flaying politicians of all stripes, which is too little done in our media, even WNYC, which I do love.

Imus wasn't censored. If he was censored, the government would've pulled him off the air. That didn't happen. His radio company decided that the PUBLIC heat was just too intense and that it wasn't profitable for them to keep him on the air. There is NO free speech issue here.

Taher, you are dead wrong on the facts. Imus used almost exactly those words to describe media critic Howie Kurtz. Not only was Imus not fired for that anti-semitic crack, but Kurtz remained a big Imus fan! That was but one of many, many examples of Imus's insulting people (and groups) for fun and profit. No one seemed to care until the butt of the joke was the Rutger's Women's basketball team. I don't get it. Either it's legitimate for Imus's audience to find this type of thing entertaining or it's not. Why is the Rutger's Women's basketball team deserving of special protection; it's hardly the most vulnerable group in the world.

I will also agree that he wouldn't have gotten another radio gig if he'd made a racist comment about Jews. But that has nothing to do with a different set of standards for whites and blacks. As I pointed out, African American media personalities have repeatedly made inappropriate comments about whites without issue. But in the case of anti-Semitic comments, the reason he'd be kept off the air is because Jewish people make a disproportionately large number of people in the media business while African Americans make up a disproportionately small number of people in the media business. I'm not saying they "control" the media or some conspiratorial accusation, but they do have a lot of influence in the business.

What he did was rude, wrong, disrespectful and raciest. But at the end the day, this is the United States of America and there is a thing called free speech. Free speech is not always what you and I want to hear. You have to take a good with the bad. To sensor Imus would do far more harm in the long run for everybody’s freedom of speech then whatever stupid things he could possibly say. There is no gray area with freedom of speech. Remember, if you don’t like it, don’t listen to it, nobodies forcing you to like in many countries where they don’t have freedom of speech. Do we really want to become one of those countries just because the Don Imus’es of this country are good at putting their foot in their mouths?

I think "words" are a perfectly legitimate reason to fire someone. This is especially true in radio where words are really the only things a radio host has. Market forces got him fired... and apparently market forces are putting him back on the air. I'm not particularly thrilled about it. I never cared for him to begin with, but I do feel that the whole incident was hyped to the point that people didn't even know what they were upset about anymore. He was eventually being accused for the things the media did in the aftermath that he had absolutely no control over.

What's with that one woman who ALWAYS calls in? You can recognize her nasal voice a mile a way. I wish the screeners would stop letting her on the air. Her opinions are always very one side and uninsightful.

Imus would never by on radio again if he called a Jewish guest a "large nosed kike,” there the difference. One set of standards for whites, and one set for people of color.

1. Imus should not have been fired -- these were words...no more. What's with all this oversensitivity?
2. Apparently he's got 2 black sidekicks now. When will he have to add Hispanics, Hindus, Asians, whatever? After all, don't we have to be DIVERSE???? MULTI-CULTURAL????
3. Am disappointed in Imus -- he's been too nice about all this.
4. When is the media gonna fire Al Sharpton???

Blacklisting someone for life is certainly an extreme reaction to bigotry on the air, just as it is for more extreme cases, like felons who have served their time.

At the same time, I don't feel a lot of pity for a nationally syndicated radio talk show host who is, no doubt, very well paid. The man was given, through a mixture of hard work and other people's good will, a major public platform for sharing his views. He squandered that platform, and I personally think it's outrageous that, when millions of voices in this country aren't heard, we let yahoos like him continue to come back on air.

Imus has always been a waste of electricity and will continue to be. I'm disappointed that you continue to waste more electricity to comment on him.

What made the outrage "faux" was the fact that many people who cared nothing about this case, people who if they had heard the broadcast themselves would've just disregarded it, were coming out and expressing "their" outrage which was basically what their publicists told them to say.

To those who think that words can affect people so much, the solution is very simple: if you believe that the majority of human beings are so shallow and fragile that they can be affected by mere words, petition the government to have the 1st Ammendment repealed. Because freedom of speech guarantees that someone somewhere is going to say something that you don't like.

Apology, schmology. We're supposed to believe Don is now the poster child for political correctedness on the air? I don't think Don Imus is in any way sorry for what he said. He's only sorry that it caused a scandal and lost him his job. He made that whole "I'll never do it again" speech so he could have a show again, not out of any genuine remorse. Please. He's like the thief who's not sorry he stole but is awfully sorry he's going to jail.

Wannabee's vs. the Jigaboo's... as a black man i must say that i'm a touch flattered at Imus's reference to a Spike Lee movie... He did in fact touch upon a real dynamic issue in the African American community and yes... personified these women with the eintire plight.... MOVE ON!!!!

This woman doesn't know what she's talking about. Black comedians, commentators, etc. have been allowed to say whatever they want about whites for years with impunity. I heard a DJ on 97.1 a few years ago who basically called for the extermination of white people, and nobody did a thing.

How could anyone take the comments of a 75 yr old man seriously using the term "nppy headed hos?" He doesn't KNOW they're "ho's" that's a term used in popular black culture and an older geezer's adopting the term is supposed to be ironically funny. He routinely called his wife the green ho. As far as "nappy " goes look to rappers who use the term constantly ..... or movies that name themselves "ho ho ho" He had to pay for society's lack of an Irony gene.

boycott his advertisers if you don't like him

what makes you think the outrage was "faux"...[edited]

If Imus really changes his tone maybe it will be a good example to other comics. To me, hateful speech is not acceptable from anyone.

John, the reason is because one person heard his remarks this last time, and that one person set out on a crusade to destroy him. And she succeeded. Because once it was out there, people jumped on the bandwagon and faux outrage came out from everyone.

An aspect of this story was missed. I heard Imus and Bearnie go on about the men's college teams--"thugs crackheads etc"--in previous years. Not a word of outrage from the "upright media." Why the difference?

I have never understood and still do not understand what the logical argument was for firing Imus because he insulted the Rutgers Women's basketball team. Imus has insulted numerous other groups and individuals, and that's in fact why people listened to him -- they thought that insults were entertaining. I can understand the logic of "get this junk off the air -- insulting people is not entertaining," which would have led to his being fired long ago or never having been hired, and I can understand the logic of "yeah, he insulted the Rutgers women, and so what? What makes them different from every other group?" But the position that this group *only* is an inappropriate target makes no sense.

The Imus show without Imus but with the guests who hold their noses and show up when he's the host--now that's a show I'd listen to.

But coming to think of it, there is a show with those kinds of quality guests. In fact there are several of them--on WNYC!

Sure...he made a mistake, lost his job but why would he lose a job for life? If he doesn't get this job, does that mean he shouldn't be allowed to hold any job?

The question to me is not whether Imus should be let back on the air, or whether his apology was sufficient. To me the question is, why not create a show for someone with a different point of view, to add to the diversity of discourse in our media? To put Imus back on the air, wasn't a relatively popular liberal talk show host taken off the air? This is why I listen to public radio, which is not completely bound to the revenue of its programs.

Well, what bothers me with this is the idea is that somehow he is OWED a platform because he was fired. This free speech argument is a corruption of the term and th idea. The government cannot shut you down, but a private company is not obligated to provide anyone and everyone with a platform to speak. We can't ALL have a radio show...

Why not?

WOuld you prefer that he was whipped? Beheaded? Even murderers are given a second chance. Even AL SHARPTON got away with BLATANT racism with the Tawany Brawley caper. And he didn't apologize.