Don Imus and Your First Amendment Rights

[mikecentola]

It's pretty hard not to know what has happened, but what is all of your opinions on what has happened with Don Imus....from ridicule from the "reverends" and his termination from CBS Radio...

[slowtaco]

You know.. Like anything else, everything gets blown out of proportion.. Okay... His comments were at worst inappropriate. Should he have been fired, no! Even a 2 week suspension was steep. However.. Al Sharpton is a disgrace of a human being.

[nysulli]

the reverends are an embarrassment to the black community, and to humankind as a whole. they cry wolf so often i just don't listen, it just makes me sick everytime i hear either one of them open their mouth to spew out their race-baiting bullshit.

yes the comment was in poor taste, but it was said with no malice, and he was sorry for saying it, much more so then the last incident involving an entertainer uttering racial slurs.

there are far bigger issues facing the black community then an old radio talk show host saying "nappy headed hoes", what about all the black on black crime?

and i wonder how those 4 duke lax players are doing now that these 2 have pretty much ruined their reputations, even if they never were found guilty, the accusations are certainly no joke, screw these 2 scumbags

one final question, how the hell do these 2 make their money? every time that question is brought up, something comes out about possible misallocation of funds from some organization, but its always swept under the rug

[mikecentola]

Yeah, with the action that is taken with Imus, it should only be fair that they go after the hip hop labels for their use of the n-word and other anti-white / anti-women lyrics.

Those duke guys that were found not-guilty because that girl lied... that girl is in for a world of hurt, and maybe the reverends as well. Those duke guys were lucky that they came from a wealthy family and could afford decent lawyers, and now they are going to sue the shit out of the DA and maybe everyone else.

[Celtic1982citleC]

This is a very hard matter to discuss. I listen to ESPN Radio 99.9% of the time when I'm in the car and they've discussed it from every angle imaginable. The vast majority feel, considering the past of Imus and the number of warnings he has received, that his being fired was more than justified largely due to the fact that he didn't insult a "person" this time but an entire team. Also, by insulting a women's college basketball team and attacking their race/appearance he was offensive on more than just one level. You had womens rights activists as well as civil rights activists who had a problem with it so it was a much larger issue than some of the things Imus had said in the past. Remember, Howard Stern was fired several times from different stations for saying much less. Generally when you're too sexually explicit or use vulgar language on the air that's one thing. But in this case a specific group was insulted on more than one level. CBS/MSNBC were very well in their right to fire Don Imus. I personally feel they should've done it from the start rather than suspending/then firing him because it made it look like they were gaging damage control to see how bad the reprocussions would be prior to taking action. This could be argued all day but ultimately Imus violated the rules of his job and was fired for it. Nothing to do with his amendment rights. I have the right to tell a customer to fuck off at work, but that doesn't mean I have the right to be employed where I am. Keep that in mind.

[gsxtc]

idk even know what happened nor do i care, but from what i 'heard this guy imus said somthing racial about a black girls b-ball team and "hurt" them.....boo i think i say 1000x worse than whatever this guy might have said, boo . everything looks like it was just blown up by the news and how dare we ever say anything about blacks that havnt allready been said by themselves

[nysulli]

its so difficult to say though, yes he had been warned a ton of times, but thats just it, for 40 years he's gotten away with off-color comments like that with only a slap on the wrist, hell i'll go as far to say it has a lot to do with why he still has the ratings that he does, but this one comment all of a sudden was the straw that broke that camels back

i agree with their action to suspend him at first, because if someone like jesse jackson and al sharpton had not made such noise about this comment it would have been forgotten within days and that would have been the end of it

and hey, thats exactly what happened after that black guy beat the crap out of 2 old ladies in NYC to steal like 30 bucks from each of them, but no, no one got behind that as a sign of how out of control violent crime is, and it disappeared in a week

maybe if these 2 bigots got behind an issue that was internal to the black community that they felt was degrading the community as a whole, I might give them more credit, but until then, their a poor substitute for real leaders like MLK and malcom x, who i'm beating would be to busy speaking out about the violence against one another to give any attention to Imus

Rev. Jesse Jackson, ruining lives of white folks who make 1 questionable decision since 1982

[waltbabyluv]

I dont even like Imus but I think it is bullshit he was fired, he said something "wrong" and apologized, what did they want him to do? Suck ever black dick in the country? Or give black people money so they dont have to work. You can sugarcoat everything if you want or you can look at things this way. There is a huge problem with black people in this country, they are lazy, they are on welfare living on our money, they are trouble makers, and they make no attempt at getting jobs or being decent people. All they do is have babies when they are 14 and reproduce, in the small city of hudson down here by where i live there are 4 very large buildings that is all housing from the governemt for this scum. It is ALL black people 98% maybe. Them and there families have not worked for generations. They take advantage of the white man and the government. Im tired of this shit and the way this country is going. And i dont want to hear, its not all black people doing this.....bullshit, go to a ghetto and it is just about all black people. I am NOT racist but I am tired of this shit. I dont care what Don Imus said, but why doesnt AQl Sharpton go after Dave Chappelle, or Chris Rock for saying ******, or for making fun of blacks. Which is a whole other topic. Its funny, even these rich successful black guys are ashamed of there own people in this country. Well im done, I dont care what any of you really say, Ive seen alot more than most of you if not all of you and if you guys could see this shit you would be disgusted. And no, im not going to blame it all on George Bush like everyone else. Being a white male now days is not what it used to be.

[mikecentola]

Well race aside, I still think its ridiculous that they are going to try and impose government control over this now. Goodbye freedom of speech (whatever was left of it)

[nysulli]

walt, i agree with you on the points that a certain group of minorities are lazy, and live off welfare and abuse the system, but keep in mind in other parts of the country, white people are just as bad.

yeah, the system is screwed, and i'd love to see all the bottom feeders who do nothing but put a strain on our economy without making an effort to contribute to it cut off, and have their government money given to the families of those who have been laid off from quality jobs, or taken huge paycuts just to keep a job, i'm talking hard working blue collar types that used to have solid jobs at places like kodak who now struggle to keep food on the table for their kids

but travel to a place like olean, NY, you'll see plenty of white folk abusing the system like you mentioned in hudsen, so its not a problem unique to black people, its just that our government has allowing people to be leaches on the system for to long, but thats a whole seperate issue

the issue of freedom of speech is our own problem, that freedom is gone because anytime you say something that could offend someone to the slightest, they raise holy hell, people are to damn sensitive, well guess what folks, life is a zero-sum game, its not all peaches and cream, people are gonna have ideas and thoughts that offend the shit out of you, you just gotta suck it up and not cry about it, then maybe imus would still have a job.

Its the same with kids getting hurt, this past week something tragic happened at a HS lax game, a kid was stretching, his teammate took a shot on goal that missed by a foot or 2, and happen to hit an exposed part of the base of the kids head from his helmet moving while stretching, and unfortunitly, that kid died, its a tragedy, but now their looking at all the safety gear because of 1 incident in 20 years, leave it be, it sucks that he died, but crap like this happens, people just need to learn to accept that life sucks sometimes, and that not every turn of events needs to be life changing for the whole world

[Celtic1982citleC]

Bottom line:

FCC sets rules

Imus had been warned several times

Imus was ultimate fired for violating rules set forth by the FCC

Claim race, gender, anything you want. He was legitimately fired for doing something clearly outside the realm of what is considered acceptable on public airwaves.

This isn't a freedom of speech issue as I already stated. It's not an issue of black or white, man or woman. It's a right or wrong issue. Imus was wrong. He got canned.

Again, if you were at your place of employment and a woman walked in and you called her a "nappy headed hoe" and she complained. I'm sure you wouldn't get a 2 week suspension. You'd be in the unemployment line.

Keep the meat of the matter in mind, not the sizzle.