'IDOL' HATE STUNS STAR (Racist "American Idol" fans?)

New York Post ^ | May 29, 2003 | MICHAEL STARR

[Michael2001]

'THE View" co-host Star Jones says she's received hundreds of hateful e-mails for her on-air support of "American Idol 2" winner Ruben Studdard. "I have to tell you, being on this show six years, I have never received such vicious e-mails . . . 'Take Ruben and go back to Africa,' vicious things," Jones said on "The View" yesterday to gasps from the audience.

[Michael2001]

This just proves my theory: American Idol fans are stupid.

[Michael2001]

You might find this interesting.

[DoughtyOne]

Nah, don't attribute this to AI fans. A certain segment of society is woefully ignorant. Today they focus on AI, tomorrow it will be something else. You simply have to write those comments and the idiots who made them off. Both Stoddard and Aikens are good Christian men. Those who trash Stoddard based on race don't realize how much that lofts him over their sorry asses. This is one time when I think the American public got it just right. And that reveals that the fans aren't just idiots. Many of them are hard working level headed people. Both men were worthy of winning and both had enough character to win or lose with grace. To bad some viewers don't share that ability.

[Timesink]

Go check out the FR threads from that night. You'll find many posts not too far off from what Star Jones was getting.

[mhking]

Not a surprise to me - unfortunately. There's a certain segment of society who would rather that anyone black disappear...period.

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[sauropod]

This bugs me.

As a Christian man, I feel for both Star Jones and Reuben.

Now if we could do something about her politics...

[Katya]

Let's segment this down further.....The Left Wing View audience obviously harbors latent racist tendencies. This is not the first time Star Jones has reported receiving racist email.

[HennepinPrisoner]

If you read the American Idol boards (at Bolt) when the Clay/Ruben contest was heating up, you will see hateful comments about white people from black posters. The racism was a two-way street.

There's a certain segment of society that wants whites to disappear off the face of the earth as well.

[Tijeras_Slim]

This just proves my theory: American Idol fans are stupid.

At least the ones that also watch The View are!

[kittymyrib]

How do we know she's not making those many false reports that we read about on college campuses etc.? She made these statements and it made her the center of attention on the show, didn't it? That's the standard operating procedure for these folks.

[Libloather]

This just proves my theory: American Idol fans are stupid.

Ruh, roh...

[NittanyLion]

How do we know she's not making those many false reports that we read about on college campuses etc.? She made these statements and it made her the center of attention on the show, didn't it? That's the standard operating procedure for these folks.

Because many folks on here posted the exact same sentiments.

[NittanyLion]

How do we know she's not making those many false reports that we read about on college campuses etc.? She made these statements and it made her the center of attention on the show, didn't it? That's the standard operating procedure for these folks.

Because many folks on here posted the exact same sentiments.

[AppyPappy]

There is a certain segment of the population who will bravely hide behind a keyboard and wish EVERYONE ELSE would diappear. These rarely just hate blacks. They hate everyone.

[Cagey]

Well, there is one bright spot in that it was only 10% of her emails. I've always been cynical enough to believe that at least 20% of people out there are idiots. Maybe the other 10% don't know how to send an email.

[caspera]

The fan base of American Idol can't really be a hotbed of racists, because after all Reuben won by audience vote. 24,000,000 people voted and a black man won, and he was overweight to boot. Actually, a man won and he just happened to be black. Such a success story is obviously evidence that America has mostly moved past its racial hang-ups, so it has to be tempered with some racialist hand-wringing somehow, and this article is it.

If 24,000,000 people watch the show and 0.01% of them are racists, that's 2,400 racists a few of whom might write in. A vanishingly small percentage, yet still a substantial group. So the media wrings its hands about the 0.01%.

This is not to say that there aren't racists out there. It is to say that Idol was getting to be too positive a story about race relations, but leave it to our press to ferret out the bad by focusing on crank letters written not to Reuben himself, but to somebody else about Reuben.

[jonalvy44]

I believe Star Jones has mis-represented this entirely for political purposes...I think she should be made to present proof of these hate-filled emails. Notice how she also referrenced how similar this case is to when she came out in support for Gore? In essence, she is linking racist hate mail with Republicans. I think she needs to be called on this. she is abusing her position in order to play politics. Otherwise, why the 2000 election referrence?

[CaptSkip]

..."you will see hateful comments about white people from black posters. The racism was a two-way street.

After the OJ travisty, I'll alaways know that many in the black community are SO ready to move any and all issues to racism. Don't forget the video of the all-black college students errupting into cheers at the moment OJ was found "not gulity". It was no longer a double-murder case, it was blacks in victory over the "man".

The fact that Rubin is black AND morbidly obese overshawdows his talent, a "handicap" if you will as in golf?...or at least two big "affirmative action/PC" "extra-credit-points" that have to be given to him before considering his voice vs. Clay's voice.

Can anyone that voted for Clay NOT be considered a "fatty hating racist" by many in the black world?

The best thing about AI is that a couple of generations of young people are learning that SINGING, not hate-filled rap, IS music.

Al Green and Barry Mannilow...cool.