Radio Host Fired For Calling Rice A Racial Epithet
How can you get yourself fired from your new radio station job in two weeks? Here’s a textbook example, in case you’re interested:
A St. Louis radio station quickly fired a talk show host for uttering a racial epithet as he talked about Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on his morning show Wednesday.Dave Lenihan apologized on the air immediately after making what he said was a slip of the tongue. KTRS president and general manager Tim Dorsey agreed the remark was accidental but said it was nonetheless “unacceptable, reprehensible and unforgivable.”
Lenihan had been heaping praise on Rice, who has frequently said she aspires to run the NFL one day but has more recently ruled out seeking to replace retiring Commissioner Paul Tagliabue.
“She’s been chancellor of Stanford,” Lenihan said on the air. “She’s got the patent resume of somebody that has serious skill. She loves football. She’s African-American, which would kind of be a big coon. A big coon. Oh my God. I am totally, totally, totally, totally, totally sorry for that.”
He said he had meant to say “coup” instead of the racial slur.
There was, of course, the predictable and understandable political firestorm. And then things got even worse for Lenihan, who had been on the job for about two weeks. The AP reports:
Thursday didn’t get much better. He was awakened at 5:30 a.m. by shock jock Howard Stern, who informed him he was on the air.Stern wanted Lenihan to discuss his firing Wednesday for using a racial epithet in describing Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Lenihan had the morning show on St. Louis radio station KTRS.
“Howard Stern was most upset about it,” Lenihan said. “He told me to … sue these people. He said this is moronic.”
To top it off, Lenihan was suspended Thursday from his job at Logan College of Chiropractic, where he’s taught anatomy and neuroanatomy since September 2004.
Most of the day, Lenihan took calls from the media. A few white supremacists called him too.
Lenihan also got a call from associates of Larry Elder, a nationally syndicated, black conservative talk show host, who invited him for an interview.
Elder told The Associated Press that he suspects Lenihan morphed the words “coup” and “boon” to come up with “coon.” He said prominent blacks have made disparaging remarks about Rice and gotten away with it, and feels Lenihan’s firing was unfounded.
You can listen to the audio HERE and judge for yourself.
So it’s a slam/dunk case of bigotry, right?
That’s open to debate.
There was an infamous case a few years ago that raised a similar question. Some years ago Rep. Dick Armey called Rep. Barney Frank, who is gay, “Barney fag.” Armey insisted it was a mere slip of the tongue. Some believed him, others (let’s say “many”) did not. His case that it was strictly a mistake wasn’t helped by him having made jokes such as this:”Yes, I am Dick Armey. And if there is a ‘dick army,’ Barney Frank would want to join up.”
BUT the big difference here is: Army was clearly not a political friend of Frank’s. He clearly took some very pointed potshots at Frank. In this case, Lenihan was praising Rice when the no-no-word slipped out.
Does it strain credibility to think that he could have made a slip (even if some armchair psychiatrists will proclaim it Freudian)? Nope.
Yours truly had a situation in junior high school, although it was not catastrophic for my school career (my grades took care of that).
In the 8th grade my favorite Spanish teacher was telling the class about how he had gone to Europe and many other countries.
I wanted to ask him “Did you ever go to Spain?”
So I opened my mouth to ask him and it somehow came out: “Did you ever go to hell?”
There was an uneasy moment, but he let it (and me) pass. Many years later, when I had dinner with him and his wife (who was also a Spanish teacher of mine) at their house, we laughed about it. It was much funnier 20 years after the event than in the seconds that followed my comment.
So it can happen. And if it does, is it a Freudian slip? If so, does that automatically mean it should be a career (or in this case double career) hanging offense? Or have the penalties for political correctness become like the take-no-prisoners zero tolerance laws at some schools where a kid who brings an aspirin to school could be expelled?
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10 Responses to “Radio Host Fired For Calling Rice A Racial Epithet”
It seems to me that the man made a mistake. Should a person’s reputation and career be ruined or damaged severely over something like this? We have all at times said something we didn’t mean. Luckily, no one was recording it at the time. If you look at what he said and the context in which he said it, I’m inclined to believe his remarks were meant to be innocuous.
I find the fact Lenihan was praising Rice and had no animosity toward her or her race to be persuasive. The fact he immediately apologized also says something for him.
We humans make mistakes. When a surgeon amputates the wrong limb, an innocent man dies in a hail of bullets fired by frightened cops or a pilot risks landing in the middle of a violent storm with catastrophic consequences, you have irredeemable wrongs done. No apology can make these things right.
Words do matter. They have the power to insult, inflame and inflict pain. But context matters as well.
In Lenihan’s case, there was no intent to insult, inflame or cause pain. The context was as innocent as could be. In his case, a sincere and prompt apology should’ve sufficed.
His employer comes off looking feckless and foolish.
PC is just a form of bigotry. If something like this, looking at the text, does not prove that, nothing will.
Ha he called her a horrid person, a total incompetent whose incompetence let nearly 3k people die on 9/11, or an asskisser who wears kneepads, then he’d be safe, but he accidentally says something that morphs coup and boon into a minor league epithet? Jeez.
To me, this is another example of the double standard of conservative vs. liberal commentators. There is a presumption of bigotry if you are conservative.
So, the fact that you are in the midst of praising a successful black woman and have a slip of the toungue means you are unfit for the national airwaves, because all conservatives are bigots.
If this had been a liberal host talking about Larry Elder, while the blogosphere would have reacted, i would bet dimes to a dollar that they would still have their job. Their appology would be accpeted, they would be forgiven for a ‘himan’ moment, because of course being liberal means you have no prejedices.
I have to remember to spellcheck before I post.
I think it is reasonable to fire a radio person for that kind of slip. It is their job to say things properly. I don’t think he should have been suspended from his day job. I imagine if he would keep a low profile about it, he’d get that job back, but if the whole thing blows up into Some Big Incident (and I think by going on Hannity and other national shows he’s working that angle) then he likely won’t get his teaching job back. But, he won’t need it, he’ll be a conservative martyr (sp?) and get a job on someone’s campaign or something.
You’re going to have a hard time explaining my comment above, then.
I’m not a conservative. When I wrote the comment I had no idea if Lenihan was liberal, conservative or a holdover Whig. Nor do I care.
Fair and reasonable treatment is everyone’s due, regardless of political philosophy.
Since when should you only be fired if you meant to screw up? That was a mighty big mistake that Lenihan made. Do I think the guy’s gunning to be the next Grand Dragon? No, not really. But do I blame his boss for firing him? Hell no. He called the Secretary of State a coon on the air.
Also, that “foot in mouth” picture is still freaky and gross.
Okay, Okay, I admit, David Lenihan made quite a mistake with the racist slur. I guess Freud was working against him that time! “Since when should you only be fired if you meant to screw up?” … I think, as a rule of thumb, that something like this is absurd to be fired over. Lenihan proved that he is human and perhaps we should just fire anyone who is human.
Lenihan’s biggest mistake is opting not to use a standard seven-second delay which would have allowed him to delete the seven previous seconds and continue on air with no harm no foul. His appologies immediately afterward and on TV later that day were sincere.
I am against the fact that he got fired. He revealed his true nature and should keep his job,now that people know who he is.
You don’t say those kind of things in public, if you are not used to saying them in private.
No, I don’t think he should lose his jobs, but I do thing blacks should make lots of noise about it.
There are lots of racial slurs that are said when there are no blacks around. So when it slips out, the whole black community has to make huge noise. That’s their only opportunity to complain about all the other stuff they don’t hear.
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TITLE: Radio Host Fired For Calling Rice A Racial Epithet
BLOG NAME: Booker Rising
The Moderate Voice comments on Dave Lenihan, the St. Louis conservative talk-show host who claims that it was a slip of the tongue and he meant to say “coup”. He had been heaping praise on Secretary Condoleezza Rice, who has frequently said that she …