Don’t Be Fooled
Disclaimer: ‘You’ below refers to all of the old guard trying to run our media world and influence our thoughts.
I received a good amount of feedback (my sincerest thanks) to my post about the
happenings surrounding Don Imus and the Rutgers basketball team. Apparently, most people share the same view, which gives
me some hope for all of us.
Yesterday, I was able to "find" an email that was sent by Les
Moonves, CEO of CBS, to the company. In it, he basically said that:
…they decided to cancel Imus completely, that he has heard the many diverse
voices of the company, that this has weighed heavily on the minds of the
decision makers, that CBS is truly concerned about the minds of young people,
yada, yada, yada. TRANSLATION: WE WERE GOING TO LET THIS BLOW OVER, BUT
WE ARE GUTLESS AND OUR ADVERTISERS ARE SCARED, SO WE MUST FIRE DON IMUS.
Lesson #1: Outside of the executive level, CBS won’t fire anyone unless it’s
related to race or sexual harassment. Why? Because those things are
all threats to their share price.
Lesson #2: Those diverse voices were the decision makers they heard were that
of CBS’ board. Go see CBS at the SEC…it’s not too diverse. It’s a
bunch of multi-millionaires (and one billionaire (Redstone) that run the global
media landscape by creating problems, so they can make bills, bills, bills.
Lesson #3 (2nd MOST IMPORTANT): Don’t try to tell us (young people) what you Rutgers women’s team, could’ve cared less about Don Imus until last week
are trying to do for us. You have done absolutely nothing except CRIPPLE
us further. I guarantee you no one, including the
the only reason we care is because there is nothing else on TV, radio, podcast,
blogs, hell I can’t even watch ESPN without seeing this crap. Unlike the
bored CBS board, our younger generation has things to do like get an education,
listen and follow real leaders/mentors and work our way up to take your
position, so that we can make the future of this country bright again.
Lesson #3a: I mentioned hypocrisy in my last post through hip-hop and Imus’ comments.
Talk about hypocrisy from Moonves at CBS. CBS is technically split from
Viacom, but Sumner Redstone is still the chairman of both. Viacom owns
more youth influence properties than any other media outlet around the globe,
and they are constantly showing things that affect the youth of today. Am
I concerned? No in the least. Fortunately, my generation is much savvier
than the decision makers running both CBS and Viacom give us credit for.
Lesson #4 (THE MOST IMPORTANT FOR LAST): Video game violence is not killing
other people, hip-hip is not killing other people and Don Imus’s comments are
not fueling racism (or at least they weren’t until you made an issue out of it)…people
do these things. The bottom line is ACCOUNTABILITY. Each generation
is more savvy and fast-paced than the previous one, and this trend will
continue as long as time runs. My generation is beginning to make headway
into being the next leaders in this country. I want us to work towards
not "babying" the generations that follows us. We need to set a
path toward moving forward not living in the past. So many great things
have come out of the Baby Boomer generation. It’s unfortunate that they
are now disregarding everything they fought for 40 years ago. In general,
it was a fight for choices and equality, and we are better for it. Now,
they are trying to send us back, so they can have control! They are
trying to control the way we think. Let us be independent. We are
much more intelligent than you think. Give us some credit…let us fail,
so that we can learn. It’s ok. We’re not going to break. Let
us fight and earn our voice. Stop thinking that what has been best for
you is best for us. You grew up in a racist/sexist world…you help to
change it…we are evolving it. It all goes back to Politics, Silliness and Sex.
"Got some dirt on my shoulder, could you dust it off for me?" -Jay-Z
People that are in public broadcasting have to realize that comments they make cannot be considered as racist or sexist. No matter what you may think personally, there is a limit of what should be accepted over the airwaves of public hearing/viewing. Howard Stern gets away with what he says because he has subscribers to hear him…those people choose to listen to him, and know WTF he will be saying. It truly depends on what type of viewers/listeners you have to what is acceptable.
I personally don’t care what the reasons were that CBS fired him, as long as it was done. He violated his right to be heard. I’m sure it took CBS so long to fire him because they had to work out the legal reasons, etc… but you have to realize when you say BS like that, that these repercussions would happen. He could think all he wants, he could share in private conversations what he thinks of the Rutgers team, but he did cross a line with how he presented his thoughts on air.