It's Time To get Sirius....

I don't want to give the reader the impression that I have become a shill for Sirius Satellite radio but....I think it might be the next best thing since sliced (corn)bread. I purchased stock in the company a few weeks before Howard Stern announced his move from terrestrial to extra-terrestrial airwaves, so suffice it to say, I became a fan before I went out and copped a unit. It is an initially expensive endeavor(as I purchased a lifetime subscription) but the variety of music and programming blows away the competition on FM. I have also taken it upon myself to draft a letter to Sirius imploring them to consider a Black alternative music selection where artists that have notoriously been unable to fit with what is the expected music format(r & B, hip-hop) can be heard. Where else can Fishbone, Bad Brains, 24-7 Spyz, Prince, The Roots, Vernon Reid gain an audience? No one else believes that Black culture is a diversified entity. Sirius does have classic hiphop as well as several Jazz channels(which is sorely needed on FM) but there is still room for improvement. Perhaps there is hope for Black music yet...time to get sirius.

Survivor as a social experiment......please

I'm not going to commit too much time to this subject as it is pretty self explanatory in it's stupidity. CBS in a desperate effort to boost sagging Survivor ratings has submitted what they are calling a social experiment by pitting teams against each other based on race. Talk about a novel idea....really. God forbid they came up with a urban Survivor in which players attempt to survive in a Katrina/New Orleans environment. That would be a true social experiment and perhaps give some of the proceeds to the Katrina victims. I guess that would require too much thought on the part of CBS executives. Is this really 2006? Your guess is as good as mine. Check out Stanley Crouch's take on the Survivor story:

Give CBS black eye for 'Survivor' segregation

Time for an Adult Swim

I just wanted to provide a quick mention of one of my favorite pastimes, viewing Adult Swim programming. Take a look at a Scooby-Doo redux (above)featuring David Cross and Gary Coleman. And another show that I have taken a shine to is The Venture Bros.,(below) a show that is comedic spin on The Jonny Quest show from the 60s. Sit back enjoy and prepare to laugh.

Just a Quick Mention

In my previous entry highlighting Joseph C, Phillips' book, He Talk Like a White Boy, I also mentioned another literary effort entitled, Enough, written by Fox news correspondent, Juan Williams. Just my luck that Mr. Williams was recently interviewed by Dr. Michael Eric Dyson on CSPAN's BookTV program. It was a pretty intense exchange betweeen these two gentlemen who many would assume possess diametrically opposing viewpoints. Click on the link below (scroll down to the August 12th section after you click) to check out the interview. Perhaps in an upcoming entry I will discuss Enough(when I purchase it) as well as my thoughts regarding Dyson (not quite a fan..but I will be fair).

Juan Williams
interviewed by Eric Michael Dyson

P.S.

I just found more Williams' clips as well as Cosby excerpts....great stuff...definitely nourishment for the soul:

Juan Williams on African-American 'Victimhood'

Black Comic Alert....

I just wanted to write a quick blurb on a forthcoming comic that was conceived, co-written and stars famed actress, Rosario Dawson. First, it's real cool that women...especially women of color, are showing interest (and are characters) in comic books. And secondly, Dawson's book is proof positive that Hollywood is bereft of original ideas and must go to the comic shop in order to continue doing business. More on Dawson's book below:

Rosario Dawson Occult Crimes Taskforce Video Interview

Guess Who's Baaaaaack........

Well it looks like Troi "Star" Torain (who some have referred to as The Black Howard Stern) is at it again and attempting to resurface and salvage his career. I must admit that I was an avid listener to the Star and Bucwild Show simply because he was one of the few radio personalities that was highly critical of the current state of hip hop music. Unfortunately, it appears that he got caught up in the same petty gangsta muck that he was so critical of-the war of words with a radio rival. I'm not going to go into the reason why Star was fired by Clear Channel, suffice it to say that threatening a rival's child (verbal fantasy or not) is unconscionable. Check out the above O'Reilly Factor clip and see how Star's answers are no different than the rappers he had previously critiqued. Oh how the might have fallen.

Looks Like Cosby's Son-In-Law Also Has Something to Say

Finally we are starting to see the inkling of a in-house/internal movement...perhaps. The reasoning behind my initial statement is that I am starting to see more books, Juan Williams' Enough comes to mind, that speaks of Black pathologies from a non-victim, self-critical methodology. One book that I have just read, He Talk Like A White Boy, written by Joseph C. Phillips, is also thematically in the same vein as the Williams' piece. You may remember Phillips as the actor that portrayed Lisa Bonet's military husband (Lt. Martin Kendall) on the Cosby Show for four seasons. Reading White Boy was basically a hard copy version of my blog.

Phillips' notes that his book's title is derived from a real life school experience in which a fellow African-American student exclaimed "he talk like a White boy" when he attempted to answer a question in a classroom situation. That incident stuck with Phillips and has been a barometer for additional experiences throughout his life. I do not agree with everything that Phillips has written-i.e being a supporter and some would say an apologist for the Bush administration, but his dead-on analysis of some of the self-perpetuating conditions running rampant in the Black community can not be ignored.

I believe in a Black conservative movement, I just don't believe the neo-cons running this current administration are upholding the true tenets of conservatism. Phillips also manages to fit in his personal tragedies(mother's suicide, sibling drug addiction and father's death) as well as his trials, tribulations and triumph pertaining to his marriage and fatherhood. I would definitely suggest that if you can't wait for my blog to be published, check out He Talk Like a White Boy for the next best thing.

Whatever Happened to Black Pride?(or an addendum to the last post)

Excuse me while I rant. Perhaps this blog is one big rant but I do try to inform in between diatribes. As the title of this entry suggests, this is actually an addendum to the previous post. After looking at Kiri Davis' A Girl Like Me, I was more angry than actually saddened. It appears that 60 years after the infamous doll test, our collective Black pride has gone by the wasteside. I see glimpses of our lack of Black pride daily....whether it's snide remarks, do-rags or n-word expletives, we are under seige by terrorists....intra-racial terrorists. How is it that we still have young Black women(actually sisters of varying ages, truth be told) showcasing their inadequacies to the world. Davis' video showed that many women of color abhor themselves with comparisons to their White counterparts. Who were these young girls parents? It is one's job as a parent to instill cultural pride in his/her child.

Perhaps we are losing our pride to the constant barrage of minstrelsy, especially if it involves local news media, MTV or BET. And yet our so-called leaders do nothing. Folks, this is a root problem that must be addressed. It borders on a type of psychosis, when you have a people with great potential but can not thoroughly "see" their own beauty. Let's stop the embracing of negativity, whether it's obesity, bad language, poor diets or obsession with (fake) hair. It's time to move on and up. There are a great many beautiful Black women waiting to emerge but let's stop high fiving obesity and hair weaves and try being our true healthy and natural selves....I suspect that our beauty and intelligence would go unrivaled....but until then, try reading our history. That always works for me.

P.S. Try this book on for size:

Naked: Black Women Bare All About Their Skin, Hair, Hips, Lips, and Other Parts

Next up, a review of a new book by my cousin(in spirit), Joseph C. Phillips(yeah Dr. Huxtable's son-in-law wrote a book...be very afraid).

The Heatwave Broke So Back to Business..........

Well it's back to business after a week of sweltering 98 degree plus weather. I wanted to shed some additional light on a young lady's enlightening cinematic effort that has been getting some notoriety of late. The young lady in question, Kiri Davis(pictured above) put together a film short entitled, A Girl Like Me, which deals with how Eurocentric imagery affects the development of African-American youth, females in particular. Davis revisits the infamous "doll test" that was implemented by famed psychologist, Dr. Kenneth Clark in the 1940s. For those unfamiliar with Clark's test, it was a controlled study that dealt with identical Black and White dolls and having Black children evaluate which dolls were "bad" or "attractive". The majority of the kids invariably picked the white dolls as possessing positive attributes. Davis' test, 60 years later, leads to similar results. Take a look at the Davis' film short below as well as a synopsis of how Dr. Clark's test eventually lead to the deconstruction of America's system of segregation:

A Girl Like Me

"With an Even Hand-Brown Vs. Board of Education"