As a person of color and a queer man, I'm often asked what I am outraged with more, slurs directed at the queer comunity or slurs directed at people of color communities. To be honest, I don't need to choose, they both are equally distressing to me and both equally outrageous. Unfortunately- in a society that freely and often uses racial and homophobic slurs- there seems more tolerance for homophobic slurs than racial slurs in the eyes of our media.
Don Imus' recent firing came after his racially inflammatory comment directed at the Rutgers Womens' Basketball Team. It took this racial slur to take down Imus, even after years of homophobic slurs, sexist slurs and yes even more racial slurs. Was this quote more offensive because it dealt with race? Why did the media choose to heap attention on Don Imus's bigoted history now? It took them a decade to get to this point of criticism of Don Imus.
I can't help but wonder how the media chooses to report on what's "offensive" and what's an "unfortunate remark". Am I any less offended by being called a "raghead" as Don Imus has used to attack Muslims as I am "faggot" or "cocksucker"? Absolutely not.
More evidence of a double standard of what is deemed "offensive" comes out of a recent story from New York City, where two radio jocks were just suspended for making racially insensitive remarks about the Asian-American community (article here):
A New York radio station that ignored criticism after two of his morning show stars called a musician a "fag" on air has suspended the shock jocks following prank phone call to a local Chinese restaurant that was filled with ethnic slurs.
The call was made by "JV" and "Elvis" on WFNY the day after WFAN's Don Imus made his comments about the Rutgers women’s basketball team and was replayed a week after Imus was fired.
Ironically, "VJ", whose real name is Jeff Vandergrift, and "Elivs", Dan Lay, were suspended the day that a spokesperson from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation was to have gone on the show for an apology for homophobic remarks that the station laughed off earlier this month.
GLAAD Sr. Director of Media Programs, Rashad Robinson, said he learned of the show would not be on only hours before he was scheduled to appear.
Robinson told 365Gay.com that the station is exhibiting a double standard when it comes to slurs against gays, and said the duo should have been suspended following the homophobic attack earlier.
"Of course it's a double standard," Robinson said. "The station and the producers ignored the anti-gay slurs that were put on air."
"CBS as a corporation must made a decision on whether they are comfortable with gay slurs being used on their brand," Robinson said.
Now I must remind readers that I am NOT putting either homophobia OR racism up as the absolute world evil, but rather stating that both are equal evils in our nation that go hand in hand.
As a person affected by both homophobia and racism, I do not feel comfortable having the mainstream media put one of those as more of a concern than the other. Even worse, the media does not even consistantly pay attention to these issues; homophobia and racism only make headlines when it's somehow sensationalized. Even then, the incident at hand is rarely ever reported with insightfulness.
That's it for today. Ciao Ya'll
Update: If people do not want to employ critical reading instead of sensational reading, then they are no better than our sensational media who for the sake of our nation need to be a critical media.
Author's Note: My name is Kevin Ballie, a student at American University (AU). My area of activism centers particularly around LGBT activism. My goal is to write diaries on DailyKos as a regular update concerning issues facing the GLBT community. I sincerely hope to gain a readership base of committed GLBT activists and our supporters. Such a base will only enhance DailyKos and provoke greater thought. Just as a note, I may use terms like gay,lesbian,bisexual transgender (GLBT) or queer (a substitute for GLBT).