In this program, Renee welcomes Lexington urban music station program director and disc jockey Jay Alexander of 107.9 The Beat and Courier-Journal columnist Betty Baye . The two discuss rap lyrics, focusing on how they shape attitudes toward women and create a double standard by using racially charged terms in some songs.

Baye talks about the "lazy Rolodex syndrome" of some journalists; when the Imus scandal broke, the media immediately turned to Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson for responses. "Are black women wearing burkas?" Baye asks. "Are black women so invisible that reaction from them is not sought after in a matter that directly affects them and how they're portrayed?"

While rap music frequently degrades women, this isn't representative of the entire African-American culture, Alexander and Baye say -- black musicians have created various music styles, but it's typically the most vulgar that are most heavily promote d. The panelists blame music industry executives, who profit from the over-glorification of sex, money and violence by artists on their labels.

Renee and the panelists also debate censoring shock jocks, and ask who should be able to say what, even in mixed company. The conversation also broadens to the impact vulgar lyrics and the videos with scantily clad women have on impressionable young girls -- and the signals it sends to young African-American men regarding how to treat black women.

Connections with Renee Shaw is a KET production, produced by Renee Shaw and Carolyn Gwinn.