Tuesday, April 10, 2007

 

DEAR DON IMUS,

I have ranted long and loud about my intolerance for voluntary ignorance--one indicator of which is the entire rap/hip-hop culture and all that it entails--including "urban" (read: Black) idiomatic language. You, Mr. Imus, will for the next several weeks be paraded around the media to make public apologies for your statements, which will be characterized as "racist", "sexist" and "hateful".

In NONE of the hyperbole will there be ANY reference to the likely number of times the Rutgers players have called each other "nappy-headed hos" in times of anger, spirited conversation, or during lapses of supervision. And you can rest assured that most of them listen to and embrace "music" that pours out racist and sexist language that makes "nappy-headed hos" sound like a cuddle-time remark from your grandma. But, in a social culture in which such things as conversatons of "the N-word" regularly contain such rhetoric as, "there is no word in any language that carries the emotional weight of that word", a truthful account of the Rutgers players' language styles and habits will never be offered.

Your crime, Don, is not "racism", "sexism" or any other "ism". Your crime is allowing yourself to be suckered into wallowing in the urban black language that you can be sure is regularly used by the majority of the supposed "victims" of your comments.

Your crime is sinking to their level.

posted by huggy 3:11 PM