MORE IMUS FALLOUT
If you thought that the furor that erupted over Don Imus’ demeaning remarks used to describe the Rutgers University’s women’s basketball team is over—-think again.
Yesterday, more than 400 people attended a discussion titled “Does Hip-Hop Hate Women?” at the University of Chicago. (Imus had attempted to keep his radio-job earlier this month by claiming that rappers routinely “defame and demean black women” and call them “worse names than I ever did.”)
Of those who participated in the discussion, some criticized music executives (who met earlier this month in New York) for failing to use their collective voices to make “a strong statement against violent and demeaning language in mainstream rap music.” Others at the event said hip-hop shouldn’t “be made a scapegoat for what’s wrong in America.”
The event’s emcee Amina Norman-Hawkins, the director of the Chicago Hip-Hop Initiative blamed parents.
“As a community, we aren’t responsible for our children. So we don’t teach our little boys how to grow up to be men and respect women. We allow them to learn from the street what’s acceptable,” she said.
She also called on black men to do more to speak up for black women.
SCOTTY SOARS INTO OUTERSPACE
It’s done. He’s where he wanted to be. The cremated remains of actor James Doohan, who appeared as engineer “Scotty” on TV’s “Star Trek,” soared into suborbital space Saturday aboard a rocket.
In a previous blog I mentioned it was Doohan’s final wish to have his ashes placed on the rocket. Yesterday, the actor’s dream became reality when his wife fired the rocket carrying a small amount of his ashes into orbit. Since it was a suborbital flight, the rocket soon parachuted back to Earth. More than 200 family members paid $495 each to place a few grams of their relatives’ ashes on the rocket.
MARK BURNETT’S NEW PROJECT
In a previous blog I mentioned that reality TV producer Mark Burnett was working on a new political project. This week, he finally revealed what the project entails.
According to news reports, Burnett is teaming up with the online social networking site MySpace to launch the search for an independent presidential candidate.
In what is being called the first ever “political reality show” the winner will earn a $1 million cash prize. But, there’s a catch—he or she can’t keep the money. The prize has to either be used to finance a run for the White House or be given to a political action committee or political cause.
The show’s working title is “Independent,” but the show has yet to be picked up by a TV network.
If you are interested in becoming a contender, you can audition for the show by submitting a video. Once the contestants are chosen, they will set up MySpace profiles to serve as their campaign headquarters.
Burnett says his hope is that the show, with its Internet component, “will engage younger voters in the political process.”
We’ll see.