After letting the entire mess unravel over the past week, thought it was time to chime in. Not so much on the single issue of what to do about the situation itself, but the entire racial structure of our country and how it's being detoured by political conniving of the few with a few parting shots from free speech. I had no real idea who this yokel Don Imus was myself until this week. I've heard his likeness compared favorably to Chewbakka, which is about right. Imus' comment itself was ridiculous. Veiled or at least presented as a poor joke, it wasn't very amusing. Was it poor taste and a stupid, classless thing to say. Sure.
While there are those, like Big Al in Harlem, who would have us control what is said and shut down the 'hate speech' on our airwaves, this was not hate speech. Hate speech is somewhat like pornography in that it lacks a real legal definition. But to be most fair, I would have to say that hate speech incites action and demonstration in support and concurrence to its points. The upcoming KKK march in Cincinnati would be an true example of hate speech (if it happens, the city council shut it down so far). The broad brush with which this definition paints overlaps greatly with stereotypical views and ignorant statements, and is widely perverted (not quite as much as pornography can be). Besides, if we are talking and casting that wide a net on regulation of airwaves for 'hate speech', there's quite a few people who shouldn't be on who think that having such regulation is necessary. Big Al for one, something about 'diamond merchants' and 'white interlopers', thanks Al. While there may be something to be said at times for censorship (I don't have or want kids, so you'd have to ask someone else for that side of the argument), I've always felt the best kind of censorship is the remote control. It's very easy to just change the station. It's not difficult to have some idea of context and understand what we will see and hear on the airwaves when tuning in that day. My understanding is that Imus is something of a shock jock and will readily poke at any group or person in the news, although never quite stooping this low. Change the station if you don't want to hear it. If lots of people are doing this, the show will go away from the market speaking.
Secondly, it is also my understanding that the greater number of people are not offended when something the media thinks is shocking occurs. Disturbed and perhaps angry for a time, sure. But very few people are worked up enough about an event to want to legitimately complain about it, meaning they were personally offended. Something like 90% of the FCC complaints surrounding Nipplegate came from a handful of organizations. How many millions of people were watching that game? 200? 300?. And only a few thousand people thought to complain? From the coverage, we would have thought all of us were in an uproar, ready to have her head on a pike for the offensive breast on national TV. We did get several second delays on such broadcasts out of it. Whatever that's good for. Go overseas and I'd have to say we need to get our heads out of our posterior as far as anything relating to sex goes, but that's neither here nor there.
The same is true now. Like then, this is a stupid non-event. It's not our call if Imus was to be fired or not. CBS axed him over it and that's their call. I don't disagree or agree with it, actually I don't care at all what happens to him personally in this. What concerns me is not how he was treated but how the issue of state-control of airwaves is being pushing now tantalizingly close to stricter control and regulation over what is said and what is 'offensive'. Virtually anything can offend someone. Having strong opinions, particularly where it concerns core issues like children, religion or wars can offend others.
Even simpler things. For a crazy example. An omnivore myself, I could be offended by the notion that I should not and cannot eat meat because it's wrong or cruel to the animal or something. (I'm not personally offended, because I think this is an idiotic line of reasoning, but follow along). Likewise, the vegan would every right to think that my thinking they are being an idiot is offensive. The distinction here is that my behavior is not affecting them at all. And neither is theirs affecting me, until they want to enforce it upon me. I'm not forcing them to eat meat and they are not preventing me, we merely disagree in a semi-hostile fashion. Real offenses are not committed until people are truly damaged by the actions and words of others. Imus' words were insulting and perhaps damaging; to the Rutgers basketball team. But he apologized and we should be able to see his intent was not to be harmful or malicious, just stupid. We as a society should accept this at face value and move on. If someone was legitimately hurt, then they can hold whatever grudge they want. So far as I've seen, the women of Rutgers basketball have accepted and moved on. I guess the NJ Governor was seriously hurt in a car accident trying to get to the photo op to 'mediate' the meeting. As though a public official is necessary for people to reconcile differences, but hey, he can hold a grudge if he wants. (nice seat belt Governor)
Here's the kicker though. In the fallout of WW2, the Germans, seeking to put the Holocaust behind them and ashamed of the blight upon their national heritage, sought to expunge the Nazi political dogma and machinery from existence. Nazi ideology is fundamentally hate speech at its absolute. There isn't any way around it. So I'm not arguing that they should not try to suppress Nazism itself. But in banning the existence of the national socialist party and the swastika, etc, what happened was they restricted only the images, not the ideas. Neo-nazism is alive and well throughout Europe and America, winding itself around the restrictions with ease. Still prowling around and spreading its vitriolic messages of fear, paranoia and hate. Ideas cannot be suppressed by hiding them. They must be combated in the open with better ideas. An appeal to reason is usually hopeless in this quest in as far as a dialogue with such people. But there is the hope that presenting a clear and better path openly opposing such hopeless demonization of others will steer others clear of that dark path. I don't think every idea is worth consideration, but I do think that in order to defeat those that aren't, people have to be willing to take a stand against it. And that doesn't mean banning it to the seventh level of hell or some other such magical realm that we have not the power to do.
Which brings me to racism. It's an ugly place still in America. Race is still somehow or other a topic of interest beyond a check box on forms for financial aid or some other such wasteful nonsense. There are still real and painful divides in some parts. There are real and imagined difficulties to deal with. And there are real and pointless issues. The present situation underscores especially this last point. Words by themselves are not issues. Thus Imus' words, left alone with out the intention and purpose of harm, are not meaningful. We focus so much on the few words that we can never say, or that we shouldn't say. But I say almost any combination of words, used in the right manner or the right timing, can inflict gastly pain on the receipant. Conversely, exactly the same turn of phrase might create inspiration or hope, even evoke love or friendship. I believe that the words we use are by themselves, nothing. But the structured intention from the root of our character is what makes them relevant. Unfortunately, there are those who have a knack for being offended or pained by otherwise innocuous remarks. In the shadow of Black History Month, Martin Luther King, and the celebration of Jackie Robinson's breaking of the 'Gentleman's agreement' banning black players in baseball, it only serves to highlight that our racial relations in America are not improving. They have been going sideways for many years because the supposed civil rights leaders have not the wit to understand what they are struggling for anymore. They have the wit to offend, to impose and oppress those who are not like them, or are perceived as oppressions upon their people. But these are limited political messages that get themselves on TV and lack any power. Rarely motivating people to action.
What was civil rights really about? I believe at the heart of the issue is this line. "All men are created equal". Now, if you want to be a hardline feminist about it, we can change that to people for nowadays, but I believe the point is made. All human beings are inherently people. And deserve to be treated as such. We treat each other as people, as men, or as women if you like, first. Not black, not white, not Jewish, not Muslim. People. That's what the struggle is about, the idea of basic human decency. It was not about struggling for scraps and demanding more for "our" one particular group of such people. It was about being able to stand up for ourselves and say "I'm a man" and not being lynched or laughed at, then called to be called boy. No one deserves that. Somewhere along the line, this was hijacked. The rightwingers call these guys 'race warlords'. I'm not sure what libs call them, although they seem perfectly willing to accept the nonsense that comes about. Ebonics for example. Innumerable slights at Jews or Asians, the stereotypical market owners in traditionally black neighborhoods. Why is this tolerated? Because supposedly these are the leaders of the movement. Yet the predominate public figures supposedly represented by these mouthpieces do not move in support. Barack Obama was notably quiet, and very late to throw a few soundbytes in on the most recent flare. Going back further, you can hear comedians like Chappelle or Rock poking light of Jesse or Sharpton, and pondering the likely candidates to replace them as leaders (I alway liked the Pat Riley skit). The biggest problem with these two is that they do not seem to possess a vision that improves their community without pulling the "rest of us" down in exchange. That is not the means of improvement that the natural world seems to like. And that is why the civil rights movement has stalled and the word racial has spread and proliferated until it becomes necessary to fire radio talk show hosts for being idiots, when they do not appear to be anything approaching racist.
Posts
