I said yesterday that I'm not a Don Imus fan. Never listened to his show but have heard from time to time about the controversies his "humor" cause.
And I suppose it is because Imus has been peddling the shock jock shtick for 30 years that I have a hard time understanding the current furor over, say, something he said five years ago.
And then I really have a hard time understanding how Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are now the arbiters of what racist remarks are ok and which are not. That I really have a hard time with.
So, sure, I think calling the Rutgers women's basketball team a bunch of "nappy-headed hos" for no apparent reason other than they are black women is shameful (just like Atrios), but I also tend to think insulting black women is wrong when you are putting them down for their political beliefs. This is what Garry Trudeau did by calling Condoleezza Rice "Brown Sugar" in his Doonesbury comic strip. As Michelle D. Bernard says at the Independent Women's Forum,
At first glance, Trudeau’s comic strip seems merely to depict President George W. Bush and Dr. Rice discussing Richard Clarke, the former counterterrorism adviser to Presidents Bush and Bill Clinton. In the strip, after waxing on about Clarke’s portrayal of Dr. Rice in his book, Dr. Rice asks the President whether he had heard of al Qaeda. The President quips, careful 'brown sugar,’" evoking the painful stereotype of the black woman as a hot-blooded minx.
It is not lost on me that in musing about President Bush’s reported penchant for giving nicknames to people around him, Trudeau also suggests that this is how President Bush views Dr. Rice. Needless to say, it seems that that the President’s respect for Dr. Rice is profound.
In Trudeau’s cartoon, the president was not giving Dr. Rice a nickname. He was putting her in her place. The images of black women being put in their place are widespread and have been exploited in literature, art and song since the first slave ships traversed the Middle Passage...
The fact is that black women at the apex of power have struggled long and hard for respect. The struggle still continues. This is why in this context, references to black women as brown sugar are not funny. It reminds us of the historical exploitation of black women in America. It reminds us that there are those who believe that no matter how accomplished we may become, no matter how educated we are, and no matter how many books we read, black women should remain in "their place," figuratively or literally. This place is one that is out of public view.
I can't condone Imus's comment, but that is because I've thought his stuff was offensive from the get-go. But it's clear that for liberals, the only reason it is offensive is because Imus said it. If the same derogatory remark comes from a source they like or at least don't mind and is made about a minority they despise, the comment gets a free pass.
In other words, this isn't about Imus's shameful comment. It's about the fact he picked the wrong target.
UPDATE: True to form, moonbats explain why some racism is ok.
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