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Back in April, Rehema Ellis was NBC's lead reporter in covering the misogynist insults that led to morning drivetime radio host Don Imus being fired. Since then her follow-ups here and here have concentrated on the use of that same vocabulary in hip-hop music. Ellis is so committed to the hip-hop angle that a symposium by the Rev Jesse Jackson's Rainbow-PUSH Coalition was given airtime. Her otherwise unremarkable report was notable only for one silly irony. Activists object to the slang form of the word "whore"--the one Imus used. When Ellis showed them picketing the MTV Store in New York City's Times Square, their chant was "Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Those dirty lyrics have got to go."
The problem has never been with the word "ho" but its casual use to demean a woman's autonomy and sexuality. This chant proves that "ho" can indeed be used in polite society.
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