Why the media should have given a sh*t about TMZ's "Sambo-Obama" slur (and why it didn't)

Over the weekend, we pointed out that the corporate porn-pushing gossip site TMZ.com ran a post headline that was even more disgusting than the usual fare like the coprophiliac ones squeezed out in recent hours (including You Too Can Buy Lou Pearlman’s Crap… Promoter Up Sh*t Creek Without Kelly Contract… and Zac Efron? Sounds Like Toilet Cleaner To Me):

"SNL" Creating Sambo-Obama?

The “Sambo-Obama” slur was a deliberate, irresponsible, dangerous move that minced far past the deviant celebutardcentric silly zone of the Time Warner-AOL cell. Though cloaked in a show business thong (the story, already a week old when it was slipped onto the TMZ site three days before the Texas and Ohio primaries, was ostensibly about a Saturday Night Live casting decision), moved slyly into the political arena and very well could have been planted with the approval of TMZ frontman Harvey Levin and his corporate overlords, just to keep the “Sambo-Obama” connection in the minds of voters.

We pointed it out over the weekend. Our staff sent out some alerts. And, to paraphrase TMZ:

Nobody gave a sh*t.

There were no links to our story; no follow-ups; no outrage over the powerful corporate porn-pushing gossips. What could it matter that a silly operation filled with pretty young boys and home video, out to embarrass whatever semicelebrity who ventures to the local Starbucks, used a racist term to describe an African American Presidential candidate—and used it in the wrong context?

Here’s why. Lazy entertainment bloggers (we’re looking at you, formerly-influential Defamer) link to TMZ videos and stories. And even lazier, fatter mainstream journalists-- the same ones who “got heavy” with Obama this week after they were lampooned on that very same Saturday Night Live show—use TMZ as a legitimate news source. Harvey Levin makes regular appearances on morning television in Los Angeles and elsewhere. Jon Klein at CNN even lets him sit in for Larry King. And when TMZ buys or hypes a story, the “mainstream news media” will often pick it up. And thanks to the powerful stewardship of AOL and Time Warner, TMZ stories are spread all over the Internet, picked up and copied automatically by hundreds of websites, blogs, slurpsites and search engines around the globe.

Proof? Google “Sambo-Obama”. Go ahead. Google it!

Notice there are “about 3,470” results.

Now remove the dash. Google "Sambo Obama":

About 273,000 results.

And it’s no credit to Harvey Levin and the crew. It's thanks to the power of the megamonolith behind them that “Sambo-Obama,” a crude, crass, demeaning, unclever headline from the lewd weekend crew, becomes part of the lexicon.

Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

Sambo-Obama??!!! TMZ.com crosses the line of decency-- but who will call them on the slur?

For an operation that built its following by paying for exclusive stories on Mel Gibson's anti-Semitism, Dog The Bounty Hunter's racial slurs and Michael Richards' racist meltdown at a comedy club, the folks who run corporate porn-pushing gossip site TMZ.com have managed to mask their own bigotry behind the dental dam of celebutard ass-licking.

But leave it to the weekend crew to expose TMZ's... ahem... black heart. Obviously comprised of the same breed of youthful amateurs and Santa Monica Boulevard pickups who are sent out to harass celebrities with home video and cellphone cameras, this group of Harvey Levin acolytes has historically been the weak link in the Time Warner-AOL tentacle’s defense of its slimy tactics and cultural debasement (they spread the Will Smith-Hitler-loving lie and called Chelsea Handler a bigot, among other big boners).

Today, however, they've clearly gone too far, with a story headlined:

"SNL" Creating Sambo-Obama?
Posted Mar 1st 2008 11:26AM by TMZ Staff
Either "SNL" came back from the writer's strike completely color blind or extremely one-sided. The show debuted their new Barack Obama character, which as a surprise to many -- is played by someone who isn't African-American…

Sambo-Obama? The (non) story, oddly, is cribbed from a post here on TabloidBaby.com, a week ago, on Sunday morning February 24th, when we mentioned that the night before, Saturday Night Live had decided to use castmember Fred Armisen, who is of Venezuelan- Japanese descent, to portray mixed-race presidential candidate Barack Obama, thereby sidestepping the “blackface” issue (we pointed out that the SNL’s sole African American player, Kenan Thompson, was too fat for the role-- as did TMZ today).

In the days to follow, lazy columnists, missing out on the past decade of multiculturalism, accused SNL producer Lorne Michaels of latent racism for using Armisen, but the case was easily deflected-— in part because Armisen could portray Obama credibly, without the use of burnt cork.

Today, however, for some reason, the TMZ weekend crew picked up on the story a week late-— mentioning our points that they read while on duty last Sunday-- and ignoring Lorne Michael’s well-publicized defense earlier in the week.

It seems obvious that the TMZ weekend crew, like the LA cops that TMZ pays off, is faced with a quota-- in their case, of story posts and outrageous headlines. It’s also apparent that the week-old Obama item was planted so the TMZ boys could high-five over the noxious and, in Harvey Levin’s world, “clever,” “Sambo-Obama” headline.

The pathetic ploy three days before what could be a decisive primary vote also reveals a lack of historical context and knowledge. TMZ's use of the word “Sambo” is apparently meant to refer to “The Story of Little Black Sambo,” the children's book from 1899 about a resourceful boy named Sambo who outwits a group of hungry tigers and returns safely home, where he eats 169 pancakes for his supper.

The story is set in India (there are no tigers in Africa), and Sambo is obviously Indian-- not African American or Negro. Although the word “Sambo” has become a derogatory racial term targeted at blacks, it most frequently refers specifically to illustrated racist caricatures and not blackface performance.

Forget Jon Stewart and Gaydolph Titler. Let's see who's brave enough to make an issue of a totally gratuitous “Sambo Obama” headline for a week-old story on a site that’s known for up-to-the minute reports of Britney Spears’ bowel movements. The mainstream media likes to complain about “The TMZ effect." Now they can investigate which presidential candidate Harvey Levin, his corporate overlords and his chiropractor sent their checks to.