Let’s face it; advertising is the only reason Don Imus has ever had a job on radio. Because without sponsors paying to reach listeners, there’s no show.
Now, comes this story from Bloomberg:
Staples Inc. and Bigelow Tea stopped advertising on radio host Don Imus’s morning show to protest his racially charged remarks about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team.
Staples, the world’s largest office-products retailer, ran its last ad on Imus’s MSNBC simulcast yesterday, spokesman Paul Capelli said. Bigelow Tea, the closely held maker of specialty teas, suspended its advertising and future sponsorship is “in jeopardy,” said Cindi Bigelow, co-president of the company.
Imus probably drives about $12.7 million of revenue to New York radio station WFAN, or 25 percent of its sales, said Mark Fratrik, vice president of BIA Financial Network, a consultant to the broadcasting industry based in Chantilly, Virginia.
“It would be very disruptive if WFAN didn’t have Imus in the morning,” he said.
Stay tuned to that. Meanwhile, Hadji Williams does a great job putting the whole thing in perspective (click on the link for his complete blog entry):
But should Imus be fired for calling the black women of Rutger’s “a bunch of rough lookin’ ho’s”?
no.
Why? So many of us say similar mess all the time. Why get after some irrelevant has-been like Imus? We hail the likes of Stern as a genius because he has a black female side-kick for doing the same thing. We give all manner of folks passes for similar language whenever it suits our odd peculiars, particulars and assorted pecadillos.
the idea that black women are so second class that they can be insulted at the drop of a hat in word, in song, in image by any and all comers for profit or whim and actually be blamed for it themselves is offensive enough; it’s more offensive that black women are so disposable and so replacable that acknowledging their disappearances, abuse, death, represents little more than a slow news day or “proof” of white liberal inclusiveness.
