WASHINGTON

IN 2007, radio host Don Imus ingloriously exited talk radio after referring to the Rutgers women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos.” But Imus is by no means alone on our nation’s airwaves in making what he described as “thoughtless and stupid” comments. Equally shocking and offensive is some of the rhetoric heard on other regional and syndicated talk radio. Barack Obama’s candidacy alone precipitated an explosion of noxious rhetoric about him and his supporters across the radio dial, and not just from big names like Rush Limbaugh.

Across America, local radio hosts are broadcasting incendiary commentary and fear-driven propaganda to millions of listeners daily. For example, last October, Bill Cunningham, a radio host in Cincinnati, said that Obama’s father was “a typical black father who, right after the birth, left the baby. That’s what black fathers do. They simply leave.”

What’s worse is that much of this vitriol is not reserved for public figures and politicians. It’s indiscriminate hatred, and no group is off-limits, be they African-Americans, women, the poor, the sick, immigrants, or even autistic children. Michael Savage, a particularly venomous radio host, with a national audience of more than 8 million listeners a week, asserted that autism was a “fraud” and that “[i]n 99 percent of cases, it’s a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out.” And if that wasn’t bad enough, just before Election Day, Savage asserted that while Obama “benefited from affirmative action, stepping over more qualified white men, I actually lost as a result of affirmative action, many times in my life.” He later added: “[W]e have America’s first affirmative-action candidate about to become president.”

The examples are endless. Last October, Minneapolis radio host Chris Baker made his views known when he exclaimed, “I don’t think homeless people should vote,” adding, “I’m not that excited about women voting, to be honest.” Or how about syndicated Pittsburgh host Jim Quinn, a longtime radio personality and serial offender who has repeatedly called the National Organization for Women “the National Organization for Whores” and has argued that “[t]hey should charge homosexuals more for their health insurance than they charge the rest of us”?

While some may find these shows to be entertaining, they are dangerous because they normalize hate speech and poison our national dialogue. Indeed, some national media figures refer to Sen. Hillary Clinton as “bitchy” without batting an eye.

This type of commentary is not just a breeding ground for hatred. It is also driven by dubious reporting and outright falsehoods. Throughout the presidential campaign, many of these shock jocks made considerable efforts to scare voters away from Obama. Reports that Obama was not a U.S. citizen or that he was educated in a madrassa were reported with conviction on talk radio and repeated without substantiated evidence until it was engrained into our collective subconscious.

These dubious stories, repeated over and over, come to be accepted as fact. Talk radio serves as an effective echo chamber, reinforcing conservative talking points, rumors, half-truths, and innuendo. Even after a story is debunked, the damage is often already done; the conservative narrative becomes embedded in media storylines and is accepted as conventional wisdom. Remember how Al Gore was lampooned for claiming he invented the Internet? Even after it was shown that Gore never actually claimed he invented the Internet, the story had been repeated so frequently it almost seemed indisputable. Now ask anyone, “Who invented the Internet?” and chances are the response will be, seriously or sarcastically: “Al Gore.”

When called out on their hate and lies, these hosts often claim they’re just exercising free speech. But that’s no justification for lying and inciting hatred. Hate speech is abhorrent in newspapers and on TV, and it should be considered no less abhorrent on talk radio.

Some perspective: In 2003, Michael Savage was given a television show on MSNBC but was quickly fired after referring to a caller as a “sodomite” and telling him to “get AIDS and die.” Savage, however, maintains his long-standing radio program. Similarly, after Imus’s highly publicized comments, he lost his television program on MSNBC, but after only a brief hiatus, returned to talk radio on WABC.

Calling for people to speak out against the hate speech and falsehoods pushed on talk radio is not an endorsement of censorship; rather, it is important that people who care about the media and public discourse become civically engaged and make their voices heard. Talk-radio hosts can say what they want, but the public has the right to demand better and should be aware of the smears and lies being advanced on the airwaves.

Ben Fishel ( bfishel@mediamatters.org) hosts The Media Matters Minute, a national radio segment produced by Media Matters for America.