Everyone’s going bananas over the Vogue cover with LeBron and Gisele and the King Kong image it conjures up. Those who take issue with it say that the cover perpetuates negative stereotypes of black men as aggressive and animalistic. Then there’s the complaint over the stereotype of successful black men’s preference for white women.
I get it and see all of this in the cover. As my boy said, it make me feel like, “Where’s the rope swinging from the tree?” I see how and why it matters, but in the end, for me it’s not worth our energy t0 fight over it (I’m praying we won’t see Shaprton, Jackson, and NAACP showings on this). [Read more →]
A frequent commenter on this site, JJ, recently wrote me asking if there was any data to show how much blacks agree with some of the frequently mentioned views of Reverend Wright. I thought it was a pretty interesting question given the back-and-forth in the press and blogosphere lately about how how common these views are in the black community. I figured I’d try seeing what some of the data had to say about what black folks believe regarding two of Wright’s expressions that have been given the most attention–that the government created HIV/AIDS and his anger expressed toward America.
Beliefs of HIV/AIDS being created by the government
The context: Wright once said, “The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color. The government lied.”
Some more context…On one of the cable news stations the other day, [Read more →]
Pat Buchanan has some issues with Obama’s race speech which he expresses in a piece titled, “A Brief for Whitey.” Apparently he feels like the discussion on race has been too one-sided and he wants black people to begin to listen to the white perspective (a group that he refers to as the “Silent Majority,” by the way). In the process of listening, he wants blacks to also acknowledge and be grateful for what white folks have done for them. His main points:
First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.
Halfway through, I already knew that this was the greatest speech on race that I had ever heard a politician deliver. Truly historic. The way he placed the issues in historical, individual, and universal contexts was really unprecedented in the world of politics. He used an issue which marred his reputation (his association with Reverend Wright) to make a grand statement about America’s entrenched racial problems while tying it to the complexity of the human condition. Amazing. [Read more →]
Bloggingheads.tv has a pretty interesting conversation on their site between Randall Kennedy and John McWhorter, two authors who have had some pretty strong disagreements in the past (well, at least one). It’s a great video to watch because of the format of discussion. It’s not set up as a debate for the two of them to fight out their differences like we tend to see on cable news shows. Rather, the video is really just a conversation between two scholars who both take an interest in black culture (and they actually agree on most points here).
The two discuss a few of the topics that have been discussed here at CC, namely, the use of the sellout term and defining black culture. I’d love to keep those conversations going, so please do offer any comments on anything that stood out for you in the conversation.
You can watch the whole video here or you can watch specific aspects of it by following the links below.
When Keith Olbermann is on point he offers some of the best commentary around. Last night, he nailed it with his comments on the pattern of the Clinton campaign to use subtle race and religious-based tactics to smear Obama. It’s 10 minutes long but worth watching in its entirety.
A black civil rights activist is fighting to close a store that sells KKK robes and T-shirts emblazoned with racial slurs. David Kennedy is confident he can make it happen. After all, he says he owns the building.Since 1996, the Redneck Shop has operated in an old movie theater that, according to court records, was transferred in 1997 to Kennedy and the Baptist church he leads.
“Our ownership puts an end to that history as far as violence and hatred, racism being practiced in that place and also the recruiting of the Klan,” Kennedy said. ” [Read more →]
Many people have commented over the past few days about Obama being darkened in Clinton’s ad. Although I do take strong objection to the other tactics by the Clinton campaign to “blacken” Obama and make him appear like an outsider, I don’t necessarily place this ad in the same category. As FactCheck concluded, the whole frame, not just Obama’s skin was darkened [Read more →]
Strength is a defining characteristic of black people and culture. Strength (along with hope/faith) is what has gotten us through hell to where we are today and it’s what keeps us moving forward. But as Terrie Williams points out in her new book, Black Pain: It Just Looks Like We’re Not Hurting, there is a significant cost to our unspoken cultural expectation to project strength 24/7.
Black men and women alike are most definitely engaged in this dynamic of strength-projection. It’s just as evident in the elderly dignified grandmother that’s the rock of the family as it is for the young thug with the cold grimace. One form may be more authentic than the other, but the investment in the portrayal of strength and poise is quite similar. I’m particularly struck by the dynamic among my black male peers. [Read more →]
*****
[Update: Much to my chagrin, the final episode will not be shown on OnDemand tonight. We'll all have to wait until Sunday. Insert Senator Clay Davis' tagline here____]
*****
The Wire, the greatest TV show ever, will be coming to an official end on Sunday. However, with OnDemand you can check it out today, which I will be doing. I hate that this moment must come. I wait all week for my fix and don’t quite know what I’ll do when I’m no longer able to get it.
I am praying that the ending will not be a disappointment like many viewed the ending of The Sopranos. I doubt it will be. It will surely be depressing, but I doubt a disappointment. I fully expect it to end with a strong declaration of how broken and backwards “the system” really is. [Read more →]
Everyone’s going bananas over the Vogue cover with LeBron and Gisele and the King Kong image it conjures up. Those who take issue with it say that the cover perpetuates negative stereotypes of black men as aggressive and animalistic. Then there’s the complaint over the stereotype of successful black men’s preference for white women.
