Imus & Sharpton situation: What part of the statement was 'racist'?

Imus called the Rutgers womens basketball team nappy hair'd hoes...what is racial about this? maybe its sexist, but not racial. About half the team is white and there is even a latina on the team.

I would think Sharpton is the racist for assuming that its a basketbal team so its gotta be geared toward blacks.

Imus %26amp; Sharpton situation: What part of the statement was 'racist'?

Imus isn鈥檛 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鈥檝e given us (black people) an excuse to avoid our real problem.

You鈥檝e 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鈥檝e 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鈥檚 1965 and delude ourselves into believing that fixing your hatred is more necessary than eradicating our self-hatred.

The bigots win again.

While we鈥檙e fixated on a bad joke cracked by an irrelevant, bad shock jock, I鈥檓 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鈥檚 or Snoop Dogg鈥檚 or Young Jeezy鈥檚 latest ode glorifying nappy-headed pimps and hos.

I ain鈥檛 saying Jesse, Al and Vivian are gold-diggas, but they don鈥檛 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鈥檚 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鈥檓 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鈥檛 do anything outside the norm for shock jocks and comedians. He also offered an apology. That should鈥檝e been the end of this whole affair. Instead, it鈥檚 only the beginning. It鈥檚 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鈥檙e supposed to believe that the comments of a man with virtually no connection to the sports world ruined Rutgers鈥?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鈥檛 listen or watch Imus鈥?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鈥檚 cool to be a baby-daddy rather than a husband and a parent? Does he tell his listeners that they鈥檙e suckers for pursuing education and that they鈥檙e selling out their race if they do?

When Imus does any of that, call me and I鈥檒l get upset. Until then, he is what he is 鈥?a washed-up shock jock who is very easy to ignore when you鈥檙e 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鈥檚 no money and lots of danger in that battle, so Jesse and Al are going to sit it out.

To reach Jason Whitlock, call (816) 234-4869 or send e-mail to jwhitlock@kcstar.com. For previous columns, go to KansasCity.com

Imus %26amp; Sharpton situation: What part of the statement was 'racist'?

Youre right, its not racist. I agree. All this over dramatizing of this is just stupid and ignorant.

Imus %26amp; Sharpton situation: What part of the statement was 'racist'?

NO, I think Don Imus, Open his Big Mouth and used his Apology an act to Really Provoke Sharpton and the Black Community, Tha's Rude, How dare he do that.

Imus %26amp; Sharpton situation: What part of the statement was 'racist'?

Imus said it without thinking about it.....

Sharpton and Jessie Jackson are exploiting this situation, while so many African-Amercians say the "N" word to each other but apparently that's ok....rap stars degrade women, police, and say the "N" word and profanities but that's apparently ok....

Sharpton once went after this white policeman who insisted he raped a black girl, TAWANA BRAWLEY and spread feces over her.....the girl later said she did it to herself.....Jessie Jackson had a child out of wedlock....so these 2 clowns are not the best role models for African-Americans....