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opinionAlso in this section:
Endara, An unworthy public safety law Birns and Sánchez, Who rules Mexico: the government or the drug lords? Leis, Sex education in the Panamanian schools Jackson, If the PRD is a political patronage machine... Gutman, Imus: obnoxious racist banter and political correctness
Don Imus: political correctness one; freedom of speech zero by W. E. Gutman I’ve never been a fan of Don Imus, not even when he was drunk or snorting cocaine which, some people say, sharpened an otherwise dubious sense of humor. Back on the wagon, the would-be humorist morphed into an irascible, mean-spirited old man who got paid royally for pouring vitriol on virtually everything. Worse, sacrificing wit, he took arrogance and crudity to an all-time low. Barbs, unless delivered with the sham peevishness of a Don Rickles, are not funny. Acrimony and malice have zero artistic worth. Imus added insult to injury when he defended his bigotry and mysogynous characterization of the Rutgers University basketball team, claiming that blacks freely use the same racist epithets. Given his propensity for intolerance (Imus has called African-Americans "monkeys," Asians "gooks," Arabs "ragheads" and “sand-niggers,” and, on more than one occasion, has affirmed that a "Jewish crook is redundant") even his belated apology rang hollow. Yes, Imus is a supercilious, toffee-nosed, captious vulgarian. But did he deserve to be fired? Did the punishment really fit the crime, or was the fury of the moment swiftly exploited by professional grandstanders showboating for political hay? His chief accuser, the Reverend Al Sharpton, has himself bad-mouthed people he didn’t like, mostly whites, mostly Jews. He is best remembered for creating a media sensation when, in 1987, he championed the fictional claims of one Tawana Brawley, a 15-year-old African-American girl who alleged that she had been kidnapped and raped by six white men, some of them police officers, in a Public response to Brawley's story was at first mostly sympathetic. Articles about Brawley captured headlines across the United States. Public rallies were held denouncing the incident. But racial tensions also soared, and when up-and-coming civil rights activist Sharpton, seconded by attorneys Alton H. Maddox and C. Vernon Mason, began handling Brawley's publicity, the case quickly took on explosive dimensions. There were no indictments in an investigation conducted by a grand jury in 1988, which cited a lack of evidence, including a forensic rape test that proved negative, and concluding that Brawley’s story had been a complete fabrication. Testimony from her schoolmates indicated that she had attended a party during the time of her supposed abduction. A total of 180 witnesses were called during the hearings. Brawley and her mother were issued subpoenas to testify in front of the grand jury. They refused. Instead the family promptly absconded to Virginia, taking with them a "defense fund" of $300,000. There is still an outstanding warrant in New York against the two for ignoring the subpoena. Under the able orchestration of Sharpton, Maddox and Mason, a media rumpus erupted. The trio claimed that the case was a conspiracy going all the way up to the state government. They called New York prosecutor Steven Pagones a racist and a rapist, among other choice words. The case still hangs over Sharpton not merely because he defended Brawley's story well after its veracity came into question but for the unfounded accusations he leveled, and, according to some of his critics, his "playing the race card." Maddox was later disbarred after failing to appear before a disciplinary hearing to answer allegations regarding his conduct in the Brawley case. Sharpton has never apologized to Pagones. Sharpton’s mentor and comrade-in-arms, the Reverend Jesse Jackson, has a long and florid history of racist remarks. He has referred to Jews as "Hymies" and to New York City as "Hymietown." A storm of protest erupted, and Jackson at first denied the remarks. He then accused Jews of conspiring to defeat him. The Nation of Islam's radical leader Louis Farrakhan, an aggressive anti-Semite and old Jackson ally, made a difficult situation worse by threatening black Washington Post reporter, Milton Coleman. Coleman had recorded Jackson’s words and passed them on to another Post reporter who later quoted them in his column. Farrakhan then issued a public warning to Jews, made in Jackson's presence: "If you harm this brother [Jackson], it will be the last one you harm." Jackson eventually doused the fires with an emotional speech admitting guilt and seeking atonement before national Jewish leaders in a Manchester, New Hampshire synagogue. Yet Jackson refused to denounce Farrakhan, and lingering, deeply rooted suspicions have led to an enduring split between Jackson and America’s Jews. The frenzy also heightened tensions between Jackson and the mostly white establishment press. For years, Wilbert Tatum, the former editor/publisher of The New York Amsterdam News, circulated a litany of anti-white and anti-Semitic tracts. The paper, a mouthpiece for the African-American community of New York City, has not entirely cleaned up its act. Its coverage of the Imus flap, predictably, has reached a degree of ferocity well out of proportion with Imus’ regrettable slur. As a Jew and a Holocaust survivor who lost nine tenths of my family to Hitler's gas chambers, I find any word, epithet or expression honed to wound, humiliate, demean and degrade a human being, group or race despicable. Alas, you can no more abolish the "N" word or "nappy-headed hos" than you can eradicate the hatred that spawned these ugly words. Both, once out their stinking cocoons, take on an imperishable life of their own. You can kill an ideologue but you can't kill an idea. I personally find it repugnant in the extreme that the words are common currency among many African Americans, some of them noted entertainers. They should know better. Ethnic masochism has no place among the persecuted. I fear this sordid affair will have a chilling effect on free speech, often the sacrificial lamb slaughtered at the altar of political correctness.
Also in this section:
Endara, An unworthy public safety law Birns and Sánchez, Who rules Mexico: the government or the drug lords? Leis, Sex education in the Panamanian schools Jackson, If the PRD is a political patronage machine... Gutman, Imus: obnoxious racist banter and political correctness
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