NEW YORK - CBS fired Don Imus from his radio program Thursday, the finale to a stunning fall for one of the nation's most prominent broadcasters.
Imus initially was given a two-week suspension for calling the Rutgers women's basketball team "nappy-headed hos" on the air last week, but outrage continued to grow and advertisers bolted from his CBS radio show and its MSNBC simulcast.
"There has been much discussion of the effect language like this has on our young people, particularly young women of color trying to make their way in this society," CBS President and Chief Executive Officer Leslie Moonves said in announcing the decision. "That consideration has weighed most heavily on our minds as we made our decision."
Rutgers women's basketball team spokeswoman Stacey Brann said the team did not have an immediate comment on Imus' firing.
Time Magazine once named the cantankerous broadcaster as one of the 25 Most Influential People in America, and he was a member of the National Broadcaster Hall of Fame.
But Imus found himself at the center of a storm as protests intensified. On Wednesday, MSNBC dropped the simulcast of Imus' show.
Losing Imus will be a financial hit to CBS Radio, which also suffered when Howard Stern departed for satellite radio. The program is worth about $15 million in annual revenue to CBS, which owns Imus' home radio station WFAN-AM and manages Westwood One, the company that syndicates the show across the country.
The Rev. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson met with Moonves on Thursday to demand Imus' removal, promising a rally outside CBS headquarters Saturday and an effort to persuade more advertisers to abandon Imus.
Sumner Redstone, chairman of the CBS Corp. board and its chief stockholder, told Newsweek that he had expected Moonves to "do the right thing," although it wasn't clear what he thought that was.
The news came down in the middle of Imus' Radiothon, which has raised more than $40 million since 1990. The Radiothon had raised more than $1.3 million Thursday before Imus learned that he lost his job.
"This may be our last Radiothon, so we need to raise about $100 million," Imus cracked at the start of the event.
Volunteers were getting about 200 more pledges per hour than they did last year, with most callers expressing support for Imus, said Tony Gonzalez, supervisor of the Radiothon phone bank. The event benefited Tomorrows Children's Fund, the CJ Foundation for SIDS and the Imus Ranch.
Imus, whose suspension was supposed to start next week, was in the awkward situation of broadcasting Thursday's radio program from the MSNBC studios in New Jersey, even though NBC News said the night before that MSNBC would no longer simulcast his program on television.
He didn't attack MSNBC for its decision "I understand the pressure they were under," he said but complained the network was doing some unethical things during the broadcast. He didn't elaborate.
He acknowledged again that his comments about the Rutgers women's basketball players a day after they had competed in the NCAA championship game had been "really stupid." He said he had apologized enough and wasn't going to whine about his fate.
Sharpton and Jackson emerged from a meeting with Moonves saying the corporate chief had promised to consider their requests.
"It's not about taking Imus down," Sharpton said. "It's about lifting decency up."
Sheila Johnson, owner of the WNBA's Washington Mystics and, with her ex-husband Robert, co-founder of BET, called Imus' comments reprehensible in an interview with The Associated Press. She said she had called Moonves to urge that CBS cut all ties with the veteran radio star, and was worried that what he said could hurt women's sports.
"I think what Imus has done has put a cloud over what we've tried to do in promoting women's athletics," she said.
Several sponsors, including American Express Co., Sprint Nextel Corp., Staples Inc., Procter & Gamble Co., and General Motors Corp., have said they were pulling ads from Imus' show indefinitely. Imus made a point Thursday to thank one sponsor, Bigelow Tea, for sticking by him.
The list of his potential guests began to shrink, too.
Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham said the magazine's staffers would no longer appear on Imus' show. Meacham, Jonathan Alter, Evan Thomas, Howard Fineman and Michael Isikoff from Newsweek have been frequent guests.
Imus has complained bitterly about a lack of support from one black politician, Harold Ford Jr., even though he strongly backed Ford's campaign for Senate in Tennessee last year. Ford, now head of the Democratic Leadership Council, said Thursday he'll leave it to others to decide Imus' future.
"I don't want to be viewed as piling on right now because Don Imus is a good friend and a decent man," Ford said. "However, he did a reprehensible thing."
Imus' troubles have also affected his wife, author Deirdre Imus, whose household cleaning guide, "Green This!" came out this week. Her promotional tour has been called off "because of the enormous pressure that Deirdre and her family are under," said Simon & Schuster publicist Victoria Meyer.
People are buying it, though: An original printing of 45,000 was increased to 55,000.
Imus still has a lot of support among radio managers across the country, many of whom grew up listening to him, said Tom Taylor, editor of the trade publication Inside Radio.
Yet he's clearly became a political liability for a major corporation CBS. (General Electric Co. owns NBC Universal, of which MSNBC is a part.) NBC News said anger about Imus among some of its employees had as much to do with ending the MSNBC simulcast as the advertiser defection.
Bryan Monroe, president of the National Association of Black Journalists and vice president and editor director of Ebony and Jet magazines, met with Moonves on Wednesday. It seemed clear Moonves and his aides were struggling with a difficult decision, he said. He urged them to take advantage of an opportunity to take a stand against the coarsening of culture.
"Something happened in the last week around America," Monroe said. "It's not just what the radio host did. America said enough is enough. America said we don't want this kind of conversation, we don't want this kind of vitriol, especially with teenagers."
Rutgers' team, meanwhile, appeared Thursday on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" with their coach, C. Vivian Stringer.
At the end of their appearance, Winfrey said: "I want to borrow a line from Maya Angelou, who is a personal mentor of mine and I know you all also feel the same way about her. And she has said this many times, and I say this to you, on behalf of myself and every woman that I know, you make me proud to spell my name W-O-M-A-N. You've really handled this beautifully."
Imus said earlier Thursday he still wants to meet with the team.
"At some point, I'm not sure when, I'm going to talk to the team," he said. "That's all I'm interested in doing."
Rev. DeForest Soaries, who is Stringer's pastor and has been helping negotiate the terms of the meeting with Imus, said he had not yet talked with Imus or coach Stringer but said: "Right now, as far as I know, the meeting is still on."
Soaries said the fact that Imus was off the air on both MSNBC and CBS took some pressure off of the upcoming meeting with the Rutgers women.
"This removes the burden from Rutgers women to determine the status of Imus' employment," Soaries said in a telephone interview.
....Ya know, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson aside.....for once, I gotta applaud CBS. I think they did the right thing. Imus had no right to insult the team like that.
On the other hand, I don't know about Oprah. This isn't exactly about black women, per se, than it is about women's sports in general. Honestly, women athletes outside of basketball get a lot of flack too. What about them?
But enough from me. What do you all think?
So this is like the only thing that can get us talking about women's basketball, huh?
Re-write the CBS president's speech to what he really said.
"We did a cost-benefits analysis and realized the amoung of bad publicity would be more costly then the advertising revenue we'd continue to get from Imus's audience and decided to cut our losses." I'm sure it won't take long before he joins the ranks of the numerous other radio hosts who have been banned from FM and AM and found solace in satelite radio.
God, why did it have to be Imus. I can't stand Imus. When my dad used to drive me to high school, he'd put him on WFAN. Trust me, I knew the guy was a rascist long before he insulted a target innocent enough that the outrage reached national-media level performance.
I do not want to defend this guy, but I see this as a blow against free speech and victory for the corporate media mindset of taking the path of least resistance.
I just can't wait 'till the talking about this is over.
I can't watch espn without hearing about it.
While I really don't know anything about Don Imus, and there are likely things I don't know to make a good decision based off of this, I would like to say that a single quasi-racist remark should not make someone lose their job. People get caught up in the moment, and say things they don't necessarily mean. You're just simply too hard to please if you expect a man to speak to you as a job and not trip up just once.
Unless he's literally, "White power, get those [racial slurs] back in the fields," I'm not buying too deeply into this.
~Nytloc Penumbral Lightkeeper
Actually from what I understand this is NOT a one time out of nowhere thing with Imus. He's come under fire for his comments before, its just that this was pretty much the straw that broke the camels back and he wound up finally pissing off the wrong people in the OMGWTF NUCLEAR EXPLOSION kinda wrong way.
So don't listen to the guy. o_o
I don't know the full details here, can soeone else confirm or deny that this is another case of political correctness gone horribly out of control?
Seriously, if he said this about WHITE womens basketball, would he be out of a job?
lolz, SX. It went beyond political correctness.
He's always been racist. I believe in free speech and I don't know that this is as big of a deal as anyone has made it out to be.
The problem is not Imus. The problem is the continuous reflection by mainstream (that is to say white) media of black women as oversexed yet unattractive. I'm tired of this being focused on Imus, this is a historical and social issue.
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Seriously, if he said this about WHITE womens basketball, would he be out of a job?
Since when does white women has so called 'nappy' hair?
Now if a black radio host had said something racist about a white team, would we be hearing this? No, because its not politically correct! 
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While I really don't know anything about Don Imus, and there are likely things I don't know to make a good decision based off of this, I would like to say that a single quasi-racist remark should not make someone lose their job. People get caught up in the moment, and say things they don't necessarily mean. You're just simply too hard to please if you expect a man to speak to you as a job and not trip up just once.
Don Imus is a "shock jock", a hateful, synical racist bastard who makes a living of telling things as they are, ignoring PCness, and, quite often, going too far.
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Since when does white women has so called 'nappy' hair?
My little sister has nappy hair. >=( He just got called out on it because it used to be a racist comment and he was using it as such, and he didn't imagine that anyone would take it seriously.
I don't really listen to Imus myself, but it's things like this that sort of drive me mad.
Whenever a black guy calls another black guy the a racial slur, they laugh it off and continue on their way.
If a white guy calls a black guy the same thing, the black guy goes "OH NOES YOUR A RACIST. BLACK POWER!" That's a bit hypocritical and stupid.
Of course, the media can say anything they want about Imus. My brother had his radio on and Imus had a fundraiser going on in his show. Can you say over $2 million raised for cancer research (at least around the time I left for school anyways)?
I've seen maybe two or three broadcasts of his show, and by "broadcasts" I mean listening for a minute or so before I got bored and switched to the Weather Channel.
Anyway, as George Carlin put it, they're just words. What really matters is the context in which you use them.
This is the first time Don Imus has been considered halfway relevant in about 15 years. Just in time for him to get shuttled off the airwaves, too.
Good riddance.
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Whenever a black guy calls another black guy the a racial slur, they laugh it off and continue on their way.
If a white guy calls a black guy the same thing, the black guy goes "OH NOES YOUR A RACIST. BLACK POWER!" That's a bit hypocritical and stupid.
This is what I was talking about. now that he's been fired, Imus is going to be seen as a victim of political correctness and justify faulty logic like that.
Not to mention it's a little confusing because I don't think anyone here was talking about "the a racial slur".
I agree with Astrid that I think this has a lot more to do with views on women then views on race.
Though it can be both.
Anyway, long story short, everyone else was doing it is never a justifiable excuse.
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Of course, the media can say anything they want about Imus. My brother had his radio on and Imus had a fundraiser going on in his show. Can you say over $2 million raised for cancer research (at least around the time I left for school anyways)?
Hey, not that Imus isn't generous, he just hates people. His work with the Imus Ranch and his support of kids with cancer and SIDS is fantastic, but, as a person, he's not very pleasant.
So don't lsiten to his show.
Hey, not that Imus isn't generous, he just hates people. His work with the Imus Ranch and his support of kids with cancer and SIDS is fantastic, but, as a person, he's not very pleasant.
So he's like a racist Dr. Gregory House!
...Only without everything that makes House cool!
I'm sorry if I have to bring the Constitution (American of course) to this conversation but here goes:
The First Amendment protects your ideas as long as you are not insulting or defaming someone or somebody. I saying that all Sonic fans are all losers and need to get a life and have a girlfriend/boyfriend to [explicit] on weekends is an example of defaming. Another example would be this little conversation:
Person 1: "You need to lose wait. You are going to die."
Person 2 (who is fat): ** loses temper and beats Person 1 **
[This little conversation happened in real life. Luckily, I was not neither person one or two].
Personally, on these days I feel that anyone doing something like Don Imus (regardless of who that person looks like) would probably get himself/herself into hot water with anyone. Unfortunately, that's not how it works in real life: we got something called "double standards".
At any rate, I would say "follow SX's advice and don't listen to the show" but that's impossible: the show's canceled and any syndication of this show is probably down the drain when it's all over.
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The First Amendment protects your ideas as long as you are not insulting or defaming someone or somebody
That's an extremely broad defination. If that were the case, there would be no such thing as an op/ed columnist.
True there are protections under the law against slander and libel, but there are distinct legal burdens you have to meet in order to prove them such as actual malice and proving that you were harmed in some way by the speech.
If the first amendment didn't protect insults, it wouldn't be much good now would it? It's a cliche, but it's not there to protect speech you like, it's there to protect speech you hate.
Don Imus?
No idea who he is, but with that name...
Totally some evil sadist warlock in disguise. Come on, Donimus? Eeeeevil.
I saw him he's old O_OI didnt know nappy was a word so I didnt get why it was bad.
lolz, nappy's an old world
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Seriously, if he said this about WHITE womens basketball, would he be out of a job?
Can you please tell me where there is this thing called "Black women's basketball" and "White women's basketball?" Just because most of the players on Rutgers are Black doesn't make it "Black women's basketball." Watch the NCAA Women's tournament before making silly statements please.
In fact, it would be nice if people actually understood the fact that the entire conversation was a zillion times more sexist than racist. It is not only about basketball, though it just so happened that this time it was a comment about a basketball team. It would also be nice if people actually would recognize that if only Sharpton/Jackson were complaining, that Imus would still be on the air. Imus & his buddies ticked off a lot of people (with power) with their sexist conversation because of the target. That's all. People are focusing on the racist part because that's "easier" for the national consumption. This country has race/gender issues that go back centuries, but it's currently cool to pretend that these issues are "behind us." It's also infinitely easier to pretend to talk about Black/White issues than to pretend to talk about men/women issues.
To me, this isn't a freedom of speech issue because this is not the government arresting Imus. Any corporation/business has the right to hire/fire anyone that they feel is helping/hurting their bottom line. Also, corporations/businesses have to right to pull their support for something that they feel may hurt their bottom line. This doesn't become a freedom of speech issue until I hear Imus being arrested for what he said. We all have the right to say what we want. We don't all have a right to a radio show. If we do all have the right to a radio show, then I want my own.
I do get tired of hearing about "what if a Black guy said something about a White guy" stuff. Those of us who listen to ESPN as often as I do know that a Black coach recently lost his job because he said stuff about Jews. I think everyone here heard about Tim Hardaway's comments about gays and how he lost out big time as a result of it. So please, stop the so-called "double standard" nonsense. When Black people do something against other groups it is dealt with just as often as it is dealt with when a White person or [insert group here] does it. The Black coach in question in comparison to Don Imus was a nobody (and even I'll admit that I've forgotten his name). That's why it didn't gain national attention. For every White/Black/[insert group here] that is dealt with, there are a zillion others that aren't (ala why personally what Imus & company said was tame in comparison to others I've heard but circumstances conspired against Imus this time). It goes in every direction relatively well. It just so happens that the White person in question is usually a lot more well-known so it gets a lot more attention. Deal with that aspect of life, but stop it with the "only Whites are persecuted for their actions" stuff. It just isn't true.
Also, it would be nice if we acknowledged that there will always be group dynamics that exist. If my friends call me "silly" or "stupid" or whatever, my reaction will be a whole lot different than if a stranger did the same. Then there's also the problem of equating what one sees some people doing as being representative of the entire group. I may have Black skin and female, but I know full well (and any person that knows me) that if you use certain terms to address me that you better be prepared for a massive dressing down and the color of your skin nor your gender will save you from it. I also know that I'm not the only one with this attitude that shares either my skin color or my gender. So, the general "[insert group] uses the words among themselves" excuse doesn't hold much water with me because for it to work it would mean that everyone in the group is okay with it (which is never true) or that you are ignorant of the fact that there are such things as group dynamics (which breakdown along many lines, such as race, gender, orientation, family, friends, regional, national, etc.).
Anyway, between this and elsewhere I think I've ranted enough. ;p
Wot Srol said.
It's entirely about profit. The news isn't that Don Imus is a racist and a sexist (though I had no idea who he was other than being in the Ducktales YTMND), but that he finally got a bunch of media people to come down on him and was insulting people who were seen as innocent enough to get advertisers to jump off the ship.
The PC (persecution complex) patrol will jump on this as racism, and it is to a point, but there's more to it. I think numerous factors contributed to this becoming a circus, besides Imus being white. Besides wondering what the reaction would be if a non-white said this, what about someone who isn't employed by large "news" networks? Did the team get a double whammy of sexism from both sides, chauvinism then victimization? Was it the product of a slow news day or activists noticing him, given his history of saying offensive comments before? My reaction when hearing what he said was that it just sounded ridiculous, out of nowhere, and worst, sincere. I think a big factor here is that he's an old man and a redneck, and the statement was absurd and reminiscent of dem old timey racists in Oh Brother Where Art Thou?. Hearing him use hip language like "coulored" in other quotes just built up the image.
Per usual, TR says it best.
Nowadays I just wait for her to show up as the voice of level-headiness and righteous indignation. No point in me adding fuel to the fire when all it takes is one post from her to put everything in perspective.
Al Sharpton (+ friends) will get nowhere be crucifying Imus unless he goes after comedians and rappers too. Some of the content in their songs and routines are thousands of times worse than anything Imus could say ("all black people are gang members/pimps/hos" much?), and there's much more of it. He's just a bag of hot air to me, burning the wrong man at the stake, unless he works for overall equality.
I've never heard a rapper or comedian claim that all black people are gangstas/pimps/hos/etc.
We got an English assignment on this issue that was assigned today.
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Al Sharpton (+ friends) will get nowhere be crucifying Imus unless he goes after comedians and rappers too.
They have been. It's not "Al Sharpton (+ friends)" fault that the media doesn't make as big a deal of "Al Sharpton (+ friends)" protesting Nelly, Jay-Z, Boondocks, etc. that it did of them protesting Don Imus. If people read "Black" or "Women's"-centered media more often, then this wouldn't be such a red-herring of an argument. The fight against comedians/rappers has been going on for more than a decade from my own awareness of it (as well as against Don Imus--which is another ignored fact), which even I'll admit probably isn't when it started. However, all struggles are like this. It takes going after a specific target, along with a certain sentiment, to get things going. Remember, the protesting only got Don Imus a 2 week suspension. It wasn't until after Rutgers had their news conference and it was deemed that the Women's basketball team was "classy" that he lost it all.
Ah. Kay then, nevermind.
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It's not "Al Sharpton (+ friends)" fault that the media doesn't make as big a deal of "Al Sharpton (+ friends)" protesting Nelly, Jay-Z, Boondocks, etc. that it did of them protesting Don Imus. If people read "Black" or "Women's"-centered media more often, then this wouldn't be such a red-herring of an argument. The fight against comedians/rappers has been going on for more than a decade from my own awareness of it
... they went against Boondocks? That makes no sense... that show was doing what nobody else doing (besides Cosby); calling out the mainstream African-Americans that keep the streotypes alive and telling them to STFU and get their @#$! straight. Of course, it's a cartoon, so nobody got it.
And comedians? How the hell can you go up against comedians? That's an all out open soap box to @#%$ and make people laugh. Don't like? Too bad, don't listen.
I swear I can never decide if I like or dislike the Sharpton. Some stuff he does is great. Some other stuff is just WAYYYY the f out there.
Edit - just to stay on topic, Imus is a dick and always will be a dick. Glad he's gone.
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.. they went against Boondocks?
Yes, it's because it uses the n-word. They don't care who/what you/it are/is, using the n-word is bad. That's where Boondocks comes in.
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Yes, it's because it uses the n-word. They don't care who/what you/it are/is, using the n-word is bad. That's where Boondocks comes in.
That's just crap, then. 😛
If it's blacks calling other blacks the n word; who really cares?
i loved boondocks. it was way smarter than critics give it credit for.
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If it's blacks calling other blacks the n word; who really cares?
That's the attitude of some people. This Black person cares. And all my students know never to use that word (among others) in my presence. Some Blacks do care--and more than some may think. ;p
I know Bill Cosby cares.
I don't understand, out of the hundreds of insulting words, how THAT word in particular got so ingrained into the "black" culture (I use quotation marks for a reason). Doesn't that seem a little, y'know, ironic? Stupid?
That's the attitude of some people. This Black person cares. And all my students know never to use that word (among others) in my presence. Some Blacks do care--and more than some may think. ;p
Thanks, Red - I was watching an interview with Maya Angelou on CNN a few nights ago, and she was really laying into the whole gangsta scene with a "Hate is hate" angle, whether it's claiming to be big and clever and deserving of adulation for "We're taking it back!" (Clerks 2, anyone? *ducks*) or otherwise.
I wouldn't know this for sure (maybe someone could enlighten me), but I'll be willing to bet that there're plenty of black people out there who disapprove very actively - news values just dictate that when you're aiming for a WASP readership, black people quietly doing positive things are less interesting than demonising.
I'm a black man and I disapprove it. And yes, they never really show anything positive about blacks in the news
I'm black and I don't like the word, either. Although it really doesn't help that black people call each other the "n" word as a slang term for "friend" and laugh it off like it's all right to say. It really needs to stop, especially since I've always found it very degrading.
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I don't understand, out of the hundreds of insulting words, how THAT word in particular got so ingrained into the "black" culture (I use quotation marks for a reason). Doesn't that seem a little, y'know, ironic? Stupid?
Blacks have been using the term to address each other ever since it was created centuries ago. It's just that it became taboo for anyone who isn't Black to use the word due to the 1950s-70s. That's actually the only difference. Now there's a fight between those who wish to "reclaim" the word as a Black only word, those who are sincere in that anyone should be able to use it to address anyone regardless of skin color, and those who just basically want the word to be sent to the dust-bin of history where only "racists" use it. I could be more specific about the varying sides (because there is more to it than what I've posted) in the dispute over the word, but that I think is general enough.
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And yes, they never really show anything positive about blacks in the news
Obama says hi.
And the abuse of the n word is the least of our worries...
Even Obama is getting branded. Fox News is the king of doing that.
Well, they try at least, but the thing is that the guy is spotless.
The best they could come up with to defame him was that *gasp* HE'S A MUSLIM!
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Well, they try at least, but the thing is that the guy is spotless.
Depends on your viewpoint. Obama's voting record is more to the left than Hillary Clinton's.
Well, he's black
They're only angst because he isn't JC Watts.
