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Cannick, who worked with Washington on the Pan African Arts Festival, said she's infuriated ABC booted Washington from the show's upcoming fourth season for calling Knight a "faggot" during a scuffle on the set and believes it smacks of racism. So she's launched a petition - which had 1,233 signatures as of last night - to get the actor his job back.
The petition says Washington's firing "further adds to a disturbing new trend at ABC wherein minority actors have been dismissed at an alarming rate over the past two years. Blacks, including . . . Star Jones ('The View'), Harold Perrineau ('Lost'), Alfre Woodard, Mehcad Brooks and Page Kennedy ('Desperate Housewives') have been let go . . . One must ask themselves, what is going on? . . .
The network could of course argue that failure to renew a contract is common TV practice among actors of every race, and that the few times disciplinary action was required--in response to, say, Washington's on-camera epithets or Page "The Guy Under The Mysterious Black Neighbors Stairs" Kennedy allegedly exposing himself to a [I]Desperate Housewives[/I] crew member--the network was prudently exercising their protective legal rights. Still, they might have a harder time justifying their messy, public dismissal of perennial audience favorite Star Jones, heartlessly tossed to the streets to make way for the ratings-friendly lily-white lesbianism of her replacement, Rosie O'Donnell.- GAYS WANT AXED ISAIAH BACK [NY Post]
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