Imus firing should not end race debate: experts

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Public figures like influential broadcaster Don Imus increasingly pay a price for making racist remarks, but some experts say the focus on individual bigotry falls short of addressing deeper racial problems in the United States.

As a result, they say, the racism debate ignited by Imus's slur against a women's basketball team should not end with his removal from his radio and television shows this week.

Imus had a history of racist remarks on air and yet continued to draw support from broadcast networks, advertisers, journalists, politicians and others who lined up to be on his shows. The institutional causes that enabled him to flourish despite his record have yet to be addressed, experts say.

"Don Imus is just simply sort of the lightning rod, this moment's personification of something that's deep and systemic in the culture," said activist and author Jill Nelson.

"I think it's contempt for women, sexism, misogyny. I think it's racism, and I think that for those who are black or of color and female, we often are at the bottom and the brunt abuse. And I think we've got to talk about it," she said.

The Imus controversy offered a glimpse of how the 2008 presidential candidates would deal with race issues. Some, like Republicans John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, said Imus should be forgiven while others sought his ouster. Democrat Barack Obama, who is biracial, was criticized for being slow to condemn him.

The incident was one of a series in recent years in which public figures making bigoted or racially insensitive remarks have provoked an angry public backlash.

Actor Mel Gibson apologized for an anti-Semitic tirade against a police officer during a stop for drunken driving, and then-Sen. George Allen sparked a controversy when he using insulting language about a man of Indian descent.

Sen. Trent Lott, who had a history of opposing civil rights measures, lost his job as majority leader after remarking in 2002 that if the country had elected segregationist Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina when he ran for president in 1948, "We wouldn't have had all these problems over the years."

A LEGITIMATE REACTION

The use of a slur by Imus, who insulted the Rutgers women's basketball team after it nearly won the U.S. collegiate championship, provoked intense anger because people could make a clear connection between the injustice done and the person causing the harm, said American University law professor Darren Hutchinson.

"You have a person you can identify as someone who is creating racial harm and that's a legitimate reaction," Hutchinson said. "But I do believe that over time if that's the only thing that gets this intense reaction, then we're reinforcing this notion that that's all that racism is."

"We never get at ... broader inequality like poverty. Why is poverty racialized? Why are people of color in schools that are underfunded? We never tackle those bigger issues."

Hutchinson said Lott's removal as majority leader was a good example of how debate over an individual's remarks failed to get at the deeper institutional issues of racism.

"He was condemned as the racist du jour and the Republicans were able to distance themselves from him and portray themselves as antiracist moderates, but no one really made the argument ... that as the Senate leader he was advancing the legislative agenda of the Republican Party," Hutchinson said.

He said the reaction to Imus similarly appeared to fall short of addressing the wider issues, like why he remained on air for so long despite his record and why there continues to be a lack of diversity at large media institutions.

"Someone like Imus, because of this lack of diversity, they sort of have a license to go over the top," Hutchinson said. "The environment becomes permissive for him to say things like that."

Steve Rendall, of the media watchdog group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, said it was time to move beyond Imus and begin discussing those who supported him.

"It's not over. CBS and NBC need to explain why they aired Imus for years knowing his record and how that comported with their standards and practices. We are betting it didn't," said Rendall, whose group was involved in documenting Imus's record of on-air abuse.

"We've also got to call to account ... those prominent journalists who have lined up to get on the show and knew full well" about Imus's bigotry, he said.

He also said the incident also underscored the need for greater diversity at big media organizations. "In a more diverse atmosphere Imus and company wouldn't have been as comfortable expressing their bigotry and there would have been someone to challenge them when they did," Rendall said.