April 11, 2007Imus: the Poster Boy of Media Slurs / New Articles
The news this week was filled with controversy around radio announcer Imus’ racial and sexist slur about the Rutgers woman’s basketball team. The news coverage even overtook the identification of the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s baby.
Imus’ remarks were far over the line of acceptability. Even so, I can understand why he was baffled by the intensity of the reaction. These types of slurs and worse usually go unchallenged. In fact, they are usually rewarded in ratings.
This experience exposed the prevalence and hurtfulness of toxic speach. Perhaps as a country, we are ready to stop looking the other way.
New Articles on the SpeakStrong Site: These days I’m focused on organizing my website in a way where people can access information by topic. That means I’ll be writing a lot of new articles and expanding on previous newsletter postings.
I have posted three new articles to start the process off.
Some Boats Need to Be Rocked
This article tells my personal tale of losing my voice and finding it again.
Speak to Create Anticipation: How Foreshadowing Can Hook Your Listeners and Even Get You a Job
This article explains how creating anticipation can be a powerful communication tool.
Don’t Be Seduced by a Shady Sales Rep: Six Indications You’re Talking to a Shark
An expansion on last week’s newsletter post about red flags that indicate you may not want to do business with someone.
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I am actually curious about another aspect of the whole Imus situation that I have not seen anyone address: Is grabbing the “hurt victim” card the best way to react to something like this?
Imus is probably an idiot, so why not treat him like one. Say “drop dead, you idiot!” and move on. To have this huge hue and cry and go on news and talk shows and moan and speechify about how hurt they are and how he “ruined” their accomplishments seems to give Imus far more power than he deserves. To respond by calling him an idiot and leaving it at that puts him in his place, makes their feelings known, and does not take away any of their power. If they had ignored him, would it have ruined their success?
There are real issues involved in what happened, including sexism, racism, freedom of speech, idiocy, etc, but is jumping at this event to use it as a bully pulpit for moral indignation really productive, or is it just part of the victim mentality that the media and public seem to have bought into as the most appropriate response for market share and attention? It does seem (to credit the players themselves), that their coach is playing the ringleader in this situation, and as such is coaching them (poorly methinks) in how to handle situations like this.
I just finished reading “Enough” by Juan Wiliams, and this response seems to fall into the black victimhood trap he argues so well against.
In a case like this, what really IS speaking strong, and how much does the strength of that speech have to do with how much power you hand over to those who insult you. Maybe part of it is not allowing yourself to be hurt so easily (or not framing it in those terms when you speak about it)?
Comment by charlie fuller — April 24, 2007 @ 2:01 pm
This is an excellent post and point, Charlie.
I see Speaking Strong as occurring in stages. The stages relate to when you speak up and to what you speak about.
When you’re downtrodden and silent, perhaps even to the point of believing the offense is appropriate, you are not Speaking Strong.
When you start to object to low-risk offenses you’re beginning to Speak Strong.
It’s another step when you speak up in higher-risk situations.
It’s yet another step when the risks are high. Those are the conversations with the most to gain - and the most to lose.
Then, there’s the issue of how strong your words are. If you’re downtrodden and you point the offense (or abuse out) out, it’s is a big first step.
Of course it’s a much bigger step to decide you’re not taking it anymore, and it’s a bigger step yet to be so empowered these things don’t affect you. But taking the first step is Speaking Strong.
Speaking Strong starts where you are. I spent years addressing the impact of the dysfunction of my parents on my psyche. (mine was relatively mild, but my mother was an alcoholic and my father was shut down.) Now that these issues have lost their hold on me, I no longer need to talk about it, and revisiting it would not be Speaking Strong.
However, I can imagine situations where it is necessary to educate those who offend, even when we are beyond being devastated by the remarks. In the case of Imus’ remarks, as a white woman, I was only half the target. I am generally beyond taking put downs of women (hos) personally, but it does affect the world I live in. I still find it appropriate to educate people on the impact (often subconscious) of language like that. If it did hit me personally, I would find it both appropriate and Speaking Strong to say so.
Personally, I thought Vivian Stringer did an excellent job of using the offense to educate people of what it must be like to excel in an area and be referred to in racially and “genderly” disparaging words.
Comment by merylrunion — April 26, 2007 @ 10:30 am