So I was watching this insane video of Christopher Hitchens and Salman Rushdie discussing the War on Terrorism with Mos Def. And it’s amusing to laugh at the utterly hapless ignorance of "Mr. Def," as he is repeatedly called—until you stop and wonder. Why is the black community not outraged by this? Bill Maher hosts a talk show to discuss the threat of Islamic terrorism and the Middle East, and he invites two world-renowned white male intellectuals and Mos Def? If this show had been choreographed by the Ku Klux Klan it could not have been more infuriating. Did Maher not have the phone number of a black intellectual? Were Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, Orlando Patterson, Julian Bond, Walter Williams, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, John McWhorter all busy? How about Desiree Pedescleaux, president of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists? What about Professor Jeffrey Ogbar at the University of Connecticut, a scholar of the Nation of Islam and other radical movements in the United States? I have no idea if any of these people would have something to say on this subject, but I sure as hell know they would be more interesting than Mos Def, and more fairly put on a panel with Hitchens and Rushdie.
If television producers should be ashamed of putting minorities only in criminal roles when making police dramas, should they not be more ashamed of putting a deeply ignorant black "musician" on a show to make a fool of himself with two widely respected white experts—and ignoring serious black intellectuals?
And aren’t Christians deeply offended by Sarah Palin saying that she didn’t want to pray with members of the McCain campaign? Shame on her! What a profoundly un-Christian thing to say. I may not be much of a Christian myself, but even I know that we are all supposed to be equal in the eyes of God and that Christians owe fellowship to one another. I know she intended it as a joke, but...it is not funny. What an odd thing to say. For sincere Christians, this isn’t something like choosing whom to invite to your birthday party.
What is it with people?
Update: Outside the Beltway demurs, pointing out that the premise of Bill Maher's show is to pair intellectuals with pop culture figures, so one should not be offended by the grouping of Mos Def with Salman Rushdie and Christopher Hitchens. Of course I know that, but it still seems wrong to me to present a group like this. The other groups OTB lists don't have two respectable black intellectuals up against an ignorant white guy. (I would kill to see Marcus Cole and Thomas Sowell go after Alec Baldwin or something.) Of course I don't think that Mr. Maher had any racist intent; just tone-deafness. It strikes me as really inappropriate and embarrassing that serious black intellectuals are so frequently overshadowed in the media either by flim-flam artists like Cornel West or by ignorant media "stars" like Mr. Def, and the fact that this embarrassment is aided and abetted by Hollywood is something I don't understand. Of course, I've never much appreciated the so-called "sense of humor," let alone the so-called "intellect" of Bill Maher (whose kookiness ranges from conspiracy theories to denial of the germ theory of disease; see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here,) so it's probably not worth pursuing.
