So sad that "Anus" lose his job for voicing his opinion . I guess it's true what's happening in this country as far as our basic rights of speech . So I guess if I call all of those that support this firing a bunch "Whining,Wimpering, Colostomy bags" ! That would make me an enemy of preferred speech ?

the president of rutgers, while introducing the captain of the team, explained that she is an excellent piano player. that seemed strange. should we be astonished. is she also "articulate."

I AM IN FULL AGREEMENT... Mr. Don Imus' comments via public airways were appalling and irresponsible. HOWEVER, for him to lose his job and still allow the continuance of degrading and explicit lyrics blaring from hip-pop and rap stations across our country, makes no sense at all! We need this incident to make a difference NOW, to make changes effective NOW. If we aren't going to actively do something about the vulgarity pollution on our airways, then Don Imus will have lost his job in vain...

I don't know about the Rutgers basketball team, but the people who comment on gothamist are surprisingly articulate compared with most internet message boards.

Dick Cavett wrote a very interesting piece in the NY Times yesterday - here is a snippet from it:

"...Some of the seeming astonishment expressed about how well-spoken, attractive, articulate and self-possessed the basketball players are — all true — at times bordered a bit uncomfortably on Obama’s being called (surprisingly?) “articulate” and “clean.”

Would a white team be surprisingly articulate?

I don’t know all the questions to be asked about this. Some of them would be: Who said the words? What was the context? How damaging were the words meant to be, and how damaging were they in fact? What is known of the speaker? Is he a racist? Does he discriminate against black people? Has he ever done anything good for them?..."

Too bad Sharpton has no influence over the rappers who coin such terms as disparaging "nappy-haired hos." And no amount of spin by Snoop Dogg can justify such characterizations.

Imus may be stupid but he's not criminal. However, Snoop Dogg is both.

I've listened to the context, and I just can't figure out how "nappy-headed hos" was supposed to be a joke. Maybe he didn't actually mean it, sure, but a joke? Not so much. I'll buy "playful insult", but not "joke". And as a playful insult, it fails; it's not playful, merely insulting.

And while I'm not supporting Snoop Dogg in any way--I think he's much more reprehensible, in just about every way--there's a difference between making comments like Imus's about specific people and rapping/singing generally offensive lyrics.

No turning the other cheek when I Ass has been doing this for 30 years. The only reason why it wasn't mentioned was that it wasn't checked. He's been calling people "gorillas" for ages.

His luck just ran out. He should of stayed a "shock Jock" and not a faux news current events show, that would of been a better excuse.

I applaud Cal Ripken Jr., I applaud GM, I applaud Staples.

I suppose you like to hear your mother, daughter or sister called a whore.

"what ever happend to practice what you preach?"

Whatever happened to Turn the Other Cheek?

Meanwhile the real bigots are laughing their white asses off. As are their listeners.

The latest is that Ana Marie Cox, the former Wonkette that built a career on saying offensive things amidst a culture that isn't welcoming to them.....anyway, she says why she will no longer do the Imus show.....

time.com/time/nation/article/0...

Imus' stupid comments or not, this may be the bloggersphere's biggest sellout moment.

Meanwhile the real bigots are laughing their white asses off. As are their listeners.

I'd say it's a very good business and moral decision.

We must start somewhere and this is where it's going to start.

And, to think Easter was just last week.

what ever happened to practice what you preach.

A good business decision, but morally stupid one. The context is what counts and Imus is no hater of black women athletes. Look at his work post-Katrina...certainly some black women athletes from NOLA should be standing up for him. Oh wait, that would force them to take a politically unpopular stance.

The whole situation is stupid.

Has everyone lost thier minds? Doesn't anyone see the double standard that is so clear and apparant here? Imus made a joke . . . a bad joke. It was a small comment over a 30 year career!!! I am sure everyone here has said something stupid in their lifetime - you just didn't happen to be on tape. I am not an Imus fan but he is on the radio today RAISING MONEY FOR SICK CHILDREN!!! He has been doing this for over 15 years and raises $3M a year for this cause. What have all these rappers and "journalists" (and I use that term loosely to the people reporting this story) done for humanity. Also, this is such a non-story - what about Iraq, education, health care, literacy, and pollution just to name a few small issues that are taking a backseat to this ridiculous story. We need to defend free speech it is what seperates us from everyone else. Yes - Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and everyone else has the right to say what they want but no one needs to lose their job for this. "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." Voltaire

www.kansascity.com/159/story/6...

Imus isn’t the real bad guy

Instead of wasting time on irrelevant shock jock, black leaders need to be fighting a growing gangster culture.

By JASON WHITLOCK

Columnist

Thank you, Don Imus. You’ve given us (black people) an excuse to avoid our real problem.

You’ve given Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson another opportunity to pretend that the old fight, which is now the safe and lucrative fight, is still the most important fight in our push for true economic and social equality.

You’ve given Vivian Stringer and Rutgers the chance to hold a nationally televised recruiting celebration expertly disguised as a news conference to respond to your poor attempt at humor.

Thank you, Don Imus. You extended Black History Month to April, and we can once again wallow in victimhood, protest like it’s 1965 and delude ourselves into believing that fixing your hatred is more necessary than eradicating our self-hatred.

The bigots win again.

While we’re fixated on a bad joke cracked by an irrelevant, bad shock jock, I’m sure at least one of the marvelous young women on the Rutgers basketball team is somewhere snapping her fingers to the beat of 50 Cent’s or Snoop Dogg’s or Young Jeezy’s latest ode glorifying nappy-headed pimps and hos.

I ain’t saying Jesse, Al and Vivian are gold-diggas, but they don’t have the heart to mount a legitimate campaign against the real black-folk killas.

It is us. At this time, we are our own worst enemies. We have allowed our youths to buy into a culture (hip hop) that has been perverted, corrupted and overtaken by prison culture. The music, attitude and behavior expressed in this culture is anti-black, anti-education, demeaning, self-destructive, pro-drug dealing and violent.

Rather than confront this heinous enemy from within, we sit back and wait for someone like Imus to have a slip of the tongue and make the mistake of repeating the things we say about ourselves.

It’s embarrassing. Dave Chappelle was offered $50 million to make racially insensitive jokes about black and white people on TV. He was hailed as a genius. Black comedians routinely crack jokes about white and black people, and we all laugh out loud.

I’m no Don Imus apologist. He and his tiny companion Mike Lupica blasted me after I fell out with ESPN. Imus is a hack.

But, in my view, he didn’t do anything outside the norm for shock jocks and comedians. He also offered an apology. That should’ve been the end of this whole affair. Instead, it’s only the beginning. It’s an opportunity for Stringer, Jackson and Sharpton to step on victim platforms and elevate themselves and their agenda$.

I watched the Rutgers news conference and was ashamed.

Martin Luther King Jr. spoke for eight minutes in 1963 at the March on Washington. At the time, black people could be lynched and denied fundamental rights with little thought. With the comments of a talk-show host most of her players had never heard of before last week serving as her excuse, Vivian Stringer rambled on for 30 minutes about the amazing season her team had.

Somehow, we’re supposed to believe that the comments of a man with virtually no connection to the sports world ruined Rutgers’ wonderful season. Had a broadcaster with credibility and a platform in the sports world uttered the words Imus did, I could understand a level of outrage.

But an hourlong press conference over a man who has already apologized, already been suspended and is already insignificant is just plain intellectually dishonest. This is opportunism. This is a distraction.

In the grand scheme, Don Imus is no threat to us in general and no threat to black women in particular. If his words are so powerful and so destructive and must be rebuked so forcefully, then what should we do about the idiot rappers on BET, MTV and every black-owned radio station in the country who use words much more powerful and much more destructive?

I don’t listen or watch Imus’ show regularly. Has he at any point glorified selling crack cocaine to black women? Has he celebrated black men shooting each other randomly? Has he suggested in any way that it’s cool to be a baby-daddy rather than a husband and a parent? Does he tell his listeners that they’re suckers for pursuing education and that they’re selling out their race if they do?

When Imus does any of that, call me and I’ll get upset. Until then, he is what he is — a washed-up shock jock who is very easy to ignore when you’re not looking to be made a victim.

No. We all know where the real battleground is. We know that the gangsta rappers and their followers in the athletic world have far bigger platforms to negatively define us than some old white man with a bad radio show. There’s no money and lots of danger in that battle, so Jesse and Al are going to sit it out.

I seriously can't believe these talkbalks! I listened to more offensive lyrics on my ipod this morning on my way to the office. And Snoop, I'm glad you decide your decency values on the merits of those you are offending. Anyone else know this chorus,

"Anywhere I go a fly girl will please me, east to west college girls are easy"

Just say, 'I want black people to be able to use certain words that white people cannot' The honesty will be refreshing...

This is Bush's fault. It should be obvious that he is trying to keep the country's attention away from the war in Iraq.

oh my god. i agree with snoop dogg on something.

imus is a complete jerk and should be fired effective immediately.

Imus: who cares, minimum thirty years since it has mattered. Same with Stern, or any other jerk who believes that screaming can take the place of substance.

Meanwhile, though, tell me that Snoop & Co.'s never-ending, far-worse statements about their own sisterhood were all made for that group's betterment? Sure, just like the "gangstas" saying it's OK to shoot cops is only to help make John Law more alert whilst out on patrol. BTW glad Snoop had the composure after his court appearance -- for, what was it, trying to get on a plane with a gun, again? -- to "bark" into a phone. Model citizen. Quote him, though, quote him! Don't worry that he apparently cannot speak English.

Give me a break with this sh1t. These jackasses are asking ("axing") for the inevitable backlash, and they will get it, because I cannot be the only heretofore race-blind honky who has had enough -- ENOUGH -- of this crap.