A press conference will be held today at 2:30 outside of the offices of Fox News in New York. The purpose of the gathering is to deliver a petition with over 600,000 names to network executives calling for an end to the racist attacks against black Americans including Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle. The petition is the work of Color of Change and MoveOn and asks Fox News CEO Roger Ailes to respond to the allegation that…
“Fox has developed a pattern of airing racially offensive attacks, then apologizing only after controversy erupts. Forced, half-hearted apologies do not demonstrate good faith when the larger pattern of offensive rhetoric continues.”
Examples of Fox’s intolerance abound, but for a brief recap of a few that occurred just this year:
- Obama’s Baby Mama
- Terrorist Fist Jab
- Knock Off Osama …uh… Obama … Well, Both If We could
- Lynching Party Against Michelle Obama
The coalition delivering the petition will include rapper, Nas, who has had his own problems with Fox News. Last August, Nas was scheduled to appear at a memorial concert for the victims of the Virginia Tech shootings. Bill O’Reilly condemned the booking as an atrocity. Nas responded by saying that…
“Everybody has a marketing plan; his marketing plan is racism […] I wouldn’t honor anything Bill O’Reilly has to say. It just shows you what bloodsuckers do: They abuse something like the Virginia Tech [tragedy] for show ratings.”
Well said. But he’s not done. His new album “Untitled” (which just hit #1) features a track dedicated to Fox News called “Sly Fox,” that begins, “The Sly Fox, Cyclops, We locked in the idiot box,” and continues, “Watch what you watchin’, Fox keeps feeding us toxins, Stop sleeping, Start thinking, Outside of the box.” Here’s the whole thing on video:
Update: Fox News did not accept the petitions but made a statement in response that trivializes the 600,000 signers while taking a slap at Nas:
“Fox News believes in all protesters exercising their right to free speech including Nas who has an album to promote.”
Nas had his own statement:
“Fox poisons this country every time they air racist propaganda and try to call it news. This should outrage every American that Fox uses hateful language to talk about the person that may be the first black president.”
After Fox refused to take the petitions, Nas took them to Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report. Once again, Comedy Central proves to be a better practitioner of Journalism than Fox News.
Link to Colbert Report’s Color of Change Segment
Link to Colbert’s interview of Nas
Link to Nas performance on the Colbert Report
