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I've said it once on TFP today (although not in this thread), so I'll say it again:
There's a fine line between clever and stupid.
In terms of this discussion, I mean that I agree with Shakran's arguement that everyone has the right to believe whatever it is they want to believe, but that doesn't mean that we have to listen to it.
That said, I think that the first Chris Rock special on HBO is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. The same with the first Eddie Murphy concert tape. Both of them are racially charged, but not as much as some of Richard Pryor's early work. All of them, at the time, were the heights of comedy for me. At that's where the Spinal Tap quote comes in - I honestly think that it's ok to say racist things if it's funny to the entire audience. There are two important caveats there - "funny" and "entire audience". If you don't meet both, you're just stupid. If you do, you might end up as Dr. Doolittle.
Honestly, if you're going to spout off about racial politics or cultural differences, you need to know your audience very well, which includes the folks that are going to see the tape of the event, should one exist. Imus should have known that. Stern is probably an even bigger on-air asshole than Imus aspires to be, but the former is smart enough to stay away from racial issues without having his producer Robin act as the voice of reason/tempering influence.
Now I'm going to go back to grumbling about the fact that everybody except Elphaba has missed the bigger problem here. I described as being like Imus blew up a truck bomb and you're all arguing about the color of the truck. This is much closer to Imus making fun of Little Leaguers for being funny looking than Michael Richards' "nigger" comments.
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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin
"There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush
"We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo
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