July 24, 2008
Nas Protests Fox News Over Racist Coverage

Photographs of Nas and other protesters outside the Fox News studios
Hip-hop star Nas, along with other protesters, were at the Fox News Channel yesterday, delivering over 620,000 petition signatures and charging the cable network offered racist coverage. Nas said, "Fox poisons the country with racist propaganda and tries to call it news," pointing at how Fox personalities called Michelle Obama a "baby mama," and added, "But the Obamas aren't the only targets. Fox's pattern of race-baiting and fear-mongering regularly focuses on black leaders, black institutions and ordinary black people." And he explained why he worked with the website ColorofChange.org to protest the channel:
"The organization saw me as someone who could be a part of it, and they reached out. I was like, 'Hell yeah, I'm a part of it!' This is a network that's been going after rappers ... yet Bill O'Reilly uses the phrase 'lynching party' for a woman. That's the worst term I've ever heard to disrespect a woman, and he says it on television. And he doesn't like rappers? Wow."In turn, Fox News said, "Fox News believes in all protesters exercising their right to free speech including Nas who has an album to promote." Nas also appeared on The Colbert Report last night. Before his interview with the Nas (who explained the controversial original name for his upcoming album), Stephen Colbert had gave some background to the feud between Colbert and O'Reilly. Videos after the jump:
Nas interviewed by Colbert:
Nas performs his anti-Fox song "Sly Fox" on Colbert:




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More race-baiting on Gothamist. Very clever. Let the ignorant comments commence now.
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sittin here eatin ma popcorn....
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Dead video links, Jen Chung! I only caught one confirmed typo though, so that's good for 11 AM, init?
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Why is this race-baiting? It's a news story. Bitch bitch bitch...
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I don't know if Fox is racist, but they certainly are culpable for the Iraq war. Their blind cheerleading, which still continues today, is directly responsible for dis-informing millions of ignorant people.
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In other news, water is wet.
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google Gothamist/racist/racism.
whine whine whine, pc pc pc.
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FOX should be called out for it's "fair and balance coverage". Everyone knows it's a conservative channel.
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People seem to have lost the ability to distinguish between racism and opinions they don't agree with. We just shout names at each other, and it's ridiculous. Fox News "poisons the country with racist propaganda"? I suppose Nas knows this from the countless hours he spends watching Fox News?
According to http://mediamatters.org/items/200802200001
in context of responding to comments about Michelle Obama not being proud to be an American, Bill O'Reilly said:
You know, I have a lot of sympathy for Michelle Obama, for Bill Clinton, for all of these people. Bill Clinton, I have sympathy for him, because they're thrown into a hopper where everybody is waiting for them to make a mistake, so that they can just go and bludgeon them. And, you know, Bill Clinton and I don't agree on a lot of things, and I think I've made that clear over the years, but he's trying to stick up for his wife, and every time the guy turns around, there's another demagogue or another ideologue in his face trying to humiliate him because they're rooting for Obama.
That's wrong. And I don't want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels -- that America is a bad country or a flawed nation, whatever -- then that's legit. We'll track it down.
Now I'm not a fan of Bill O'Reilly, don't watch his show. I've got better things to do with my time, and he generally comes off as smug and full of himself. I doubt that he really feels a lot of sympathy for Michelle Obama or Bill Clinton. His calling going after Michelle Obama a "lynching party" was probably not a good idea, and might be considered racially insensitive.
But for Nas to suggest that's the worst thing he's ever heard to disrespect a woman is pretty laughable.
I wish people would find something real to protest about, or just go to work or stay home.
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just postin to say how awesome nas is and how im eagerly awaiting his new album
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I don't know if Fox is racist, but they certainly are culpable for the Iraq war. Their blind cheerleading, which still continues today, is directly responsible for dis-informing millions of ignorant people.
Fox News is at fault? Because that's where our Congress and Senate turned to for information?
I suppose Fox News was encouraging Saddam Hussein not to cooperate with UN inspections in the years before and after 9/11?
Fox News was to blame for Hillary's voting in support of the war? Fox News was responsible for the passage of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002, or the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq?
What were all the other news programs and sources doing while Fox News was wielding such amazing power?
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Rap artists complaining about "racist statements"?
Rap artists lecturing on "civility"?
Does ANYONE see the irony here?
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eyekantspel, you buried the lead on the O'Reilly comment re: Michelle Obama. Try this:
"And I don't want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels -- that America is a bad country or a flawed nation, whatever -- then that's legit. We'll track it down. "
So, O'Reilly really said a "lynching party" is "legit" if there is "evidence" or "facts" that she thinks America is a "flawed nation".
Calling that insensitive is an understatement. O'Reilly is too smart to not know that using a word like "lynching" will stir things up. He used it on purpose.
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eyekantspel: They certainly are responsible. As is everyone who voted for it, and anyone who voted for Bush and the other idiots who got us in that mess.
The other media was only slightly less damaging than Fox. You see, Fox had a choice of whether to use their "news" organization (with an obvious conservative viewership) to do real reporting on the most important decision a nation can make, or to be a megaphone for Bush. They chose to be Bush-puppets. Thus, they are responsible.
The only people who had the cojones to speak the truth were (among others) Richard Clarke, Paul O'Neill, and Barack Obama.
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Its about time people realize where the racists went after that whole civil rights thing.
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This publicity stunt has nothing to do with his recent album called Untitled does it?? (Yes!)
Oh and what was the original name of that album? (Nigg3r)
And why did he change it? (for sales @ places like Wal-Mart)
Let get honest with ourselves and see what this is all really about: $$
oh, and Nas is a MC great btw.
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Fox is racist. They used their Hypnotoad and used it on Nas so he would call his album "N*gger" and make him like the people calling him "N*gger". Nas loves that word now. Even wears it on T-shirts. Foxnews is evil. And why is CNN constantly harping about the Black Experience in America? sounds like someone wants white guilt apologists to vote for Obama come the fall. Go to CNN's homepage for the last 3 months and it's always "Black this", "Obama that" so it's definitely not Foxnews that's bias.
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Check that, the album is untitled, not called Untitled
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@babyhitler
African Americans using that term isn't racism, but a response to it. Look up "reclaiming".
But looking at your name I'm assuming you're a troll.
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#20- Which is why there are more than a few blacks who would prefer that other blacks not use the word?
Let's keep goin' round-and-a-round-and-a-round...
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#20 - are you fucking kidding me? I know you are trying to say that blacks are trying to re-appropriate that word and take away it's meaning by doing so but it doesn't make a lick of sense. For example, Let's replace "N*gger" with "Asshole" and have two dudes in a conversation go at it "Hey asshole!" "Wazzup asshole?" "Nothing Asshole. Just chillaxin'" You see? that doesn't reclaim the word, it just makes it funnier to bystanders.
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@babyhitler: Wazzup Asshole? ;)
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There's just no moral outrage over whether Fox news is racist or anything else. We're inured to all the charges and countercharges. At this stage of the game, you either like them, warts and all, or you don't. What is really interesting here is watching Fox News become so self-parodying that every twist and turn on that channel reads like a bad SNL script.
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#20 = hypocrisy much? Nas & Kelis wore Ni*ger t-shirts to Grammy Awards, but since they're both black it's perfectly OK. ( though I found Kelis' tight yellow pants far more offensive).
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I really hate it when celebrities suddenly become political and moral people. Its usually right in time for a big release promotion of some sort. I think Nas has a point, but the fact that I know this is a publicity stunt just takes away from it.
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LOL ...
There are white people in the pictures, just standing around. =)
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"are you fucking kidding me" baby hitler?. I don't even know what you're trying to argue.
Are you arguing that it hasn't been a derogatory word that whites used against African Americans?
Or are you also trying to argue that if a person tries to use this word casually to diffuse that inherent degradation, that it isn't reclaiming? I mean words change meanings and connotations all the time.
Yes you can also use the word asshole enough to make it's meaning less offensive over time, but who cares? Just a weird comparison.
Let me actually give you an apt one, "In some cases, this reappropriation is so successful as to turn a previously disparaging word into the preferred term: for example, gay, previously an insult, is now strongly preferred to homosexual, both as an adjective and a noun." - Wikipedia