[Update 2: I can't even muster the snark for it] (Updated with a very revealing Bob Herbert behind the wall quote) Quick: when I say "black man" what's the first thing to pop into your head?

So I'm going to tackle the misogyny issue in depth more later, but the race angle to this affair is one I can address in short form. Pam raises some good points about how sexist videos on BET don't let Imus off the hook for his words; two wrongs don't make a right and all that. But I'll add: not all Black people like hip hop and watch BET and use the word "Nigger" among themselves and their friends and families. The women Imus chose to mock are perfect examples of what I'm talking about; friends who watched their TV interview said they came across as classy, not angry, and incredibly astute about the entirety of the matter. Yes, folks- some black people are atheists, have naturally red hair and blue eyes, listen to classical music (Farrakhan and Condi come to mind), enjoy hockey and sci-fi, speak with completely whitebread middle American accents, and some are even multimillionaires who've never been on welfare or prostituted themselves.

This whole affair has reminded me that too many people still really do think that we are "all alike." Check your in'gance, whitefolk.

Wow. Clearly I'm underestimating the problem. From behind the wall, Herbert chimes in:

Signs of Infection

People in positions of great power are the ones who define those who
are relatively lacking in power. So when Don Imus, a very powerful
radio personality, dropped his disgusting verbal bomb on the members
of the Rutgers women's basketball team, he sent a powerful message
across the airwaves: that the young women on the team (the black ones,
at least) were crude, ugly and genetically inferior, and that all of
the women were whores.

That message, which Mr. Imus insisted was meant to be funny,
reinforced views already widely held in our society, which is why I
could get the following e-mail from a reader:

"Who woulda thunk that the Imus idiocy and the Duke Debacle would hit
home on the same day. Both stories bring to mind what my father told
me 60 years ago: Stay away from colored women."

The attention surrounding Mr. Imus's very public self-immolation is an
opportunity for Americans to acknowledge that we have a problem. Not
only is the society still permeated by racism and sexism and the
stereotypes they spawn, but we have allowed a debased and profoundly
immature culture to emerge in which the coarsest, most socially
destructive images and language are an integral part of the everyday
discourse.

Gangsta rappers trapped in the throes of the Stockholm syndrome have
spent years encouraging black people to see themselves as niggers and
all women as whores. Michael Savage, one of the most prominent figures
in talk radio, with an audience substantially larger than Don Imus's,
has called Diane Sawyer a "lying whore" and Barbara Walters a
"double-talking slut," according to Media Matters for America, a group
that monitors some of the excesses of talk radio.

The culture that has given us such wonders as jazz, blues, baseball,
Hollywood, the Broadway musical theater, rock 'n' roll, and on and on,
is now specializing in too many instances in language and
entertainment fit only for the gutter or a sewer.

Something has gone completely haywire when young American boys and
girls are listening to songs like "Can You Control Yo Hoe" and "Break
a Bitch Til I Die," by Snoop Dogg, formerly Snoop Doggy Dogg, formerly
Cordozar Calvin Broadus.

"It's gotten pretty savage out there," said Tom Brokaw of NBC News
during an on-air discussion of the Imus situation.

Mr. Brokaw, who believes that firing Mr. Imus was the right thing to
do, said: "There's been an absence of civility in public discourse for
some time now. The use of language across the racial spectrum, and
across the political spectrum, and across the cultural spectrum, has
been, in any way you want to describe it, debased to a certain degree.

"The words that you hear used commonly on the street, or on the air,
or on radio, or in rap lyrics, are words that in the worst days of
segregation in this country, in the worst segregated parts of this
country, you would not have heard on radio. Now you hear them
commonly."

The language, of course, is just a symptom. Mr. Brokaw went on to
mention, in a tone that sounded a bit sad and somewhat resigned, that
Americans had steadfastly refused to face the race issue honestly and
head-on. "I had hoped," he said, "I guess somewhat naïvely 20 years
ago, that we would be in a far different place than we are now."

We should also be in a better place in the way that women are viewed
and portrayed in the culture. And one of the first steps in a
conversation about how to honestly address these issues should be a
discussion of how to get more more blacks, other ethnic minorities and
women into positions of real authority in the major news and
entertainment outlets.

Another part of the conversation should deal with why the bullying and
degradation of other human beings is such a staple of popular
entertainment in this country. One of the Rutgers players expressed
astonishment Thursday night when Mr. Imus told her that making fun of
people was how he'd made his living for many years.

The people who fought back against the racism and misogyny of the
"Imus in the Morning" program need to keep the momentum going. Keep
the pressure on the companies that sponsor this garbage. Keep the
matter before the media.

Imus, Snoop Dogg, Michael Savage — it doesn't matter where the bigotry
is coming from. What's important is to find the integrity and the
strength to see it for what it is — a loathsome, soul-destroying
disease — and then to respond accordingly.

Sorry for the messy format, but gosh- "stay away from da coloreds?" America is so racist.

Imus is bad because he scares the darkies who work for us:

"A lot of us are enablers," said Republican consultant Torie Clarke on ABC's "This Week." Clarke admitted that while listening to Imus' show in the past, she had heard his racial remarks, "and I would run to turn it off because our African-American babysitter was there and I was horrified."

But not when the help isn't around, I'm sure.