Ifill on Imus
Posted on Tue Apr 10, 2007 at 01:17:00 AM EST
Tags: Don Imus (all tags)
For all their grit, hard work and courage, the Rutgers girls got branded “nappy-headed ho’s” — a shockingly concise sexual and racial insult, tossed out in a volley of male camaraderie by a group of amused, middle-aged white men. The “joke” — as delivered and later recanted — by the radio and television personality Don Imus failed one big test: it was not funny.[Imus'apologies] seem[] forced and suspect because he’s done some version of this several times before. I know, because he apparently did it to me.
. . . It was not until five years later, when . . . I was a Capitol Hill correspondent for the network — that I discovered why people were asking [why she did not appear on Imus' show.] It took Lars-Erik Nelson, a columnist for The New York Daily News, to finally explain what no one else had wanted to repeat.
“Isn’t The Times wonderful,” Mr. Nelson quoted Mr. Imus as saying on the radio. “It lets the cleaning lady cover the White House.”
More:
. . . This is not about me.It is about the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. . . . They are not old enough, or established enough, to have built up the sort of carapace many women I know — black women in particular — develop to guard themselves against casual insult.
Why do my journalistic colleagues appear on Mr. Imus’s program? That’s for them to defend, and others to argue about. I certainly don’t know any black journalists who will.
. . . So here’s what this voice has to say for people who cannot grasp the notion of picking on people their own size: This country will only flourish once we consistently learn to applaud and encourage the young people who have to work harder just to achieve balance on the unequal playing field.
Let’s see if we can manage to build them up and reward them, rather than opting for the cheapest, easiest, most despicable shots.
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