IMUS: So, I watched the basketball game last night between -- a little bit of Rutgers and Tennessee, the women's final.
ROSENBERG: Yeah, Tennessee won last night -- seventh championship for [Tennessee coach] Pat Summitt, I-Man. They beat Rutgers by 13 points.
IMUS: That's some rough girls from Rutgers. Man, they got tattoos and –
McGUIRK: Some hard-core hos.
IMUS: That's some nappy-headed hos there. I'm gonna tell you that now, man, that's some -- woo. And the girls from Tennessee, they all look cute, you know, so, like -- kinda like -- I don't know.
That evening, the watchdog group Media Matters for America posted a story on its Web site addressing the issue."; GrapevineImus[i++] = new Array("","Protests begin","The Rev. Jesse Jackson leads a protest outside NBC's Studios in Chicago on April 9.","http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/ap/b4d624dd-85cc-4dda-b50e-8678146cc7d9.htease.jpg","","", "", "", "", "", "left", "Charles Rex Arbogast", "AP", "110", "71", "#000000", "", "", "", ""); GrapevineImus[i-1].body = "By Friday April 6, the firestorm against Imus was raging.
The Philadelphia chapter of the NAACP and the National Association of Black Journalists condemned Imus' comments.
\"Imus needs to be fired. Today,\" NABJ President Bryan Monroe said.
Rutgers President Richard L. McCormick and NCAA President Myles Brand jointly issued a statement calling Imus’ comments \"unconscionable.\"
After CBS Radio and MSNBC decided to suspend Imus for two weeks, other protests ensued. \"This is a two-week cooling-off period,\" Jackson said. \"It does not challenge the character of the show, its political impact or the impact that these comments have had on our society.\""; GrapevineImus[i++] = new Array("","From MSNBC.com message boards","","","","", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", ""); GrapevineImus[i-1].body = "“It would do all of us no good at all to have the 'I-Man' fired for his remarks. A suspension is in order and I'm quite satisfied with the current length, his apologies and the classy display thus far by the Rutgers womens' team. Mr. Imus has said he will finally seek to have black representation on his morning staff and will actively book African-American guests on his show in the future.
\"... I [have been] very aware of Don's show since the days of WNBC when he and Howard Stern were stable mates. My daughter called me this morning to ask my opinion since she knew I've listened for nearly 30 years. I told her that this is an opportunity for us as a nation to communicate not denigrate … Don Imus unwittingly did us a favor because the country is \"talking\" about race. This is a good thing. We're not bashing Bush today. I'm not the father of Anna Nicole's baby. Who cares about ‘American Idol’? Britney Spears is where? No, we're talking about women, dignity, respect and hopefully healing. …”
Posted by alskizo
“… The real outrage should be directed towards the music industry that not only encourages and glorifies derogatory words like these, but rewards. I'll bet that several of the members of the Rutgers basketball team own some of these records. Why don't they get outraged when Jay Z, Nas or 50 Cent call women hoes? Because they’re black, they’re allowed? The lyrics don’t attack them personally, like Imus did, but they should be outraged that these artists are degrading women to begin with. Hypocrites. All of them.
“I'm not agreeing with what Imus said at all. He had a brain fart. But, this crusade to get him fired is just so misdirected because these so-called black 'leaders' of the community can't face the fact that the term is used and glorified by their own people. Time for them to face the music. Literally. …”
Posted by JosephNY
“I find it very interesting that a public personality makes demeaning, stereotypical, extremely inappropriate remarks about a group of young ladies, people call him out about the offensive remarks, and a group of protesters attack the people that call out the personality. What's more interesting is that the people that were offended at the personalities' inappropriate remarks are accused of being racist. How ironic!!”
Posted by jtt-esq
“Imus was just trying to be clever, not racist. He is one of the best interviewers on this planet and needs to keep his job. He apologized so let it be done. Many worse comments are made by black comics and no one objects. Minorities need to get the 'chip off their shoulder' and deal with more important issues than what Don Imus says.”
Posted by MickeyD77
“I don’t agree with Imus getting fired. I believe in freedom of speech. I also believe in the ability to rise above the insults and remarks made for purposes to entertain. I also believe in being responsible to your audience and knowing when you’ve done wrong then you apologize. If we take this position then anyone can take a stance from anything in the arts, film, literature, etc and personalize it to the point where they feel victimized.”
Posted by Joniano"; GrapevineImus[i++] = new Array("","The apologies","","","","", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", "", ""); GrapevineImus[i-1].body = "Imus issued two apologies. The first was on Friday April 6 on both his WFAN and MSNBC programs. \"It was completely inappropriate, and we can understand why people were offended,\" he said.
New York's WFAN-AM, Imus' flagship station, also apologized, as did CBS Radio, owner of WFAN.
Imus issued a second apology on Monday April 9: \"Here's what I've learned: that you can't make fun of everybody, because some people don't deserve it. And because the climate on this program has been what it's been for 30 years doesn't mean that it has to be that way for the next five years or whatever because that has to change, and I understand that.\"
Despite the apologies, MSNBC's simulcast of \"Imus in the Morning\" was canceled on April 11. CBS Radio, parent of WFAN, fired Imus on April 12. "; GrapevineImus[i++] = new Array("n_hardball_capus_070411","From Steve Capus, NBC News president","","http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Video/070411/n_hardball_capus_070411.htease.jpg","","", "v", "", "fdc5c143-0e8a-4473-9d97-c54814aeccde|", "", "left", "", "", "110", "147", "#000000", "", "", "", ""); GrapevineImus[i-1].body = "The following is an excerpt of an April 11 statement on the Imus controversy by Steve Capus, NBC News president. Capus spoke on that evening's broadcast of \"Hardball\" with NBC's David Gregory, not long after MSNBC fired Imus and ended its simulcast of \"Imus in the Morning.\"
Click on the image to see the video.
“I think he is a complex man, and I think in many ways, he is a good man. ...
\"But I also believe that those were racist comments. And I believe that it comes — that there have been any number of other comments that have been enormously hurtful to far too many people.
\"And my feeling is that can’t -- that there should not be a place for that on MSNBC.
\" ... I believed that Imus took some courageous and smart and appropriate actions, with the level of apology that you saw from him on the air day after day ...
\"There has been an opportunity to have a very important dialogue about race relations and everything -- everything that goes under that broad umbrella. ...
\"I hope we don’t squander this remarkable opportunity that we have to continue this dialogue that has taken place, to continue the dialogue about what is appropriate conduct and speech, to continue the dialogue about what is happening in America.\"
\"I think we have, as broadcasters, a responsibility to address those matters.\"";
GrapevineImus[i++] = new Array("n_simmons_lyrics_070424","What's happened since","","http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Video/070424/n_simmons_lyrics_070424.htease.jpg","","", "v", "", "d3eb05be-9b0a-4657-be2d-cfe4ef613b8a|", "", "right", "", "", "110", "147", "#000000", "", "", "", "");
GrapevineImus[i-1].body = "Media outlets and others have called for a national conversation on the issue. Some people, like hip-hop impresario Russell Simmons and Pennsylvania State University professor James Peterson, want an outright ban on certain words.
Click on the image to see the video.
• Talk-show host Charlie Rose and former Tennessee Rep. Harold Ford agreed on April 16 to gather a group of media and cultural luminaries to discuss the fallout resulting from the Imus controversy. Rose agreed to host the panel on his program, carried on PBS stations.
• A survey released April 19 found that a majority of Americans believe Don Imus’ firing was appropriate, but whites were twice as likely as blacks to think his punishment was too tough.
Majorities of both blacks and whites — 54 percent of whites and 61 percent of blacks — agreed with Imus’ punishment. But 35 percent of whites and 18 percent of blacks said it was too tough, according to the survey by the Washington-based Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.
• Bernard McGuirk, longtime producer for Don Imus’ syndicated radio show, was fired on April 19 by WFAN-AM for his role in the incident, CBS Radio spokeswoman Karen Mateo said.
McGuirk was one of Imus’ frequent on-air foils and was involved in the controversial exchange.
• Sen. Barack Obama, addressing the National Action Network convention in New York on April 21, called black Americans to take account of their own use of the words that got Imus and McGuirk fired.
\"I've heard those words around the kitchen table in some homes,\" he said. \"I hear them in the barbershop. I hear them on the basketball court. We all know that all of us have been complicit in diminishing ourselves.\"
• Hip-hop producer and entrepreneur Russell Simmons on April 23 said that the recording and broadcast industries should consistently ban three racial and sexist epithets -- “bitch,” “ho” and “nigger” -- from all so-called clean versions of rap songs and the airwaves.
\"It’s a clear message and a consistency that we want the industry to accept for more corporate social responsibility,” he said."; // END editorial data