Editor’s Note: This column includes profanity.
The staple of Black Entertainment Television for the past 15 years has been music videos preaching violence, female degradation and buying tricked-out Impalas sitting on spinning 24-inch rims. But an animated short called “Read a Book” is being ridiculously singled out as vulgar, ignorant and offensive.
The cartoon, set to a hip-hop remix of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and created by Bomani “D’Mite” Armah and Tyree Dillihay, is a parody of BET’s long-standing bread and butter of video girls in booty pants (spelling B-O-O-K across the behind), thugs with assault weapons (shooting copies of Zora Neale Hurston at unsuspecting foes) and profane lyrics, imploring people to “read a book, read a book, read a muh’fuckin book.” Armah and Dillihay contend that the cartoon is pure parody in principle, but not everyone sees it that way.
Most notable among the dissenters is the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who invited Armah to speak on his radio show, “Keep Hope Alive.” The reverend rails against Armah, comparing the music video to the racist rants of Michael Richards and Don Imus. But what he fails to realize, is the condition with which this video was made. Richards and Imus spoke in distaste, while Armah’s creation comically satirizes the sad state of rap music and exists as a launching pad for debate and discussion into our media and our parenting skills.
Jackson has done many important and incredible things on behalf of black people everywhere, but as Token astutely observed on “South Park,” “Jesse Jackson is not the emperor of black people.”
Dissent for this cartoon comes with the stench of “protecting our children” rhetoric. In an interview with CNN’s Tony Harris, or as I like to call him, “Black Bill O’Reilly,” Armah and Dillihay detect the false juxtaposition of “Read a Book” with traditional children’s programming like “Schoolhouse Rock” and “The Electric Company.” They argue their video parallels other music videos like “Ay Bay Bay” and “Bartender.” According to Denys Cowan, BET’s Senior Vice President of Animation, “The video was not part of any literacy campaign or “Schoolhouse Rock” alternative, but was intended for BET’s demographic of 18-34 year olds.”
But there is a fine line between genuine parody and sending a message, and anyone arguing this video is the sole purpose of controversy on BET is a hypocrite. On a network that regularly features rappers, saying “pour [shots] on the models, shut up bitch swallow. If you can’t swallow, shut up bitch gargle,” how is a cartoon encouraging good hygiene and drinking water at such a source of tension?
According to The New York Times, the video seems to flaunt every negative stereotype in the black community. Kam Williams of Newsblaze.com goes a step further, arguing the video flaunts women as a source of lust for impressionable young boys. She goes on to say that many black entertainers “declared war” on the dignity of the black female, rather than take a stand against grave injustices. She cited D.L. Hughley’s response to Imus on “The Tonight Show,” saying, “There were some nappy-headed women on that team. You know it’s true. They were some of the ugliest women I’ve seen in my whole life.”
This double standard will continue to exist for some time. People get so worried about what they say, and in an increasingly globalized world where one’s speeches and quotes can be uploaded online mere minutes after they are said, we are moving closer and closer to a massive, user-controlled big brother society. Just because the NAACP held a public burial for the N-word in the wake of the Imus scandal, it doesn’t mean rappers and racists alike won’t continue to use the word. Freedom of speech comes with an implied responsibility, and it’s up to us to ensure that what we say does not come off a certain way.
There is nothing wrong with words; rather, the problem exists with the context in which we use them. In this day and age, racially motivated humor, just as any other humor, is becoming more risqué and more sensitive. We need thicker skin, but we also need to be responsible for the words that we use. I will not begin to assign a list of words for each race and gender based on how each demographic may feel about a certain word. My job is to spread my opinion to a college campus, and I believe anyone should say anything they want because they know better if they say otherwise. This country is long overdue for a conscientious (and real) dialogue on protecting our children, being smart when we speak and giving arguments based on logic and common sense.
The best way to protect our children is simple. Turn off the TV, disconnect the cable and tell your kids to “read a muh’fuckin’ book.” They might actually learn something.
—–Contact Eric Freeman at [email protected]