Thursday, April 12, 2007

Thoughts on the Don Imus Firing

NBC news is reporting right now that radio “shock jock” Don Imus, having just recently been dropped from MSNBC's TV broadcast, is now being let go by CBS, meaning that his radio show is going to be cancelled altogether.

I have mixed feelings about this whole situation.  I used to watch Don Imus on MSNBC early in the morning before going to work.  I think his acerbic wit is hilarious; however, I used to get really perturbed at his use of certain slang terminology with reference to certain body parts.  It really used to bother me.  If he was knocked off the air for that, I would completely understand and probably be in favor of it.

This whole tempest that has blown up over his passing reference to the Rutgers women's basketball team as “nappy-headed ho's,” though, if you ask me, is just way overdone.  Do I think it's okay to make such a reference?  Absolutely not!  But the guy was really only satirizing the type of talk that is prevalent in the hip-hop community, and everyone knows full-well he didn't really believe the literal meaning of those words.  Nevertheless, Imus deeply and sincerely apologized over and over, and he was obviously sincere about it.  I think the two-week suspension he was originally given would have been commensurate with his tasteless and senseless remark.

But, looking at the bright side, his foul mouth is now, at least temporarily, off the airwaves.  Personally I'd much rather see Howard Stern shown the door.

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