- Mar 11, 2015
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I have just re-read a book called “The Assassination of the Black Male Image,” by Earl Ofari Hutchinson, Ph.D. I would like to share some excerpts:
From the overview: The image of the malevolent black male is based on a durable and time-resistant bedrock of myths, half truths and lies. The image was created during the European conquest of Africa, nurtured during slavery, artfully refined during the nadir of segregation, and revived during the Ronald Reagan-George Bush years.
To maintain power and control, the plantation masters said that black men were savage and hyper-sexual. To strengthen racial control, late nineteenth and early twentieth century scientists and academics concocted pseudo-theories that said black men were criminal and mentally defective. To justify lynching and political domination, the politicians and business leaders of the era said that black men were rapists and brutes. To roll back civil rights and slash social programs, Reagan-Rush Limbaugh type conservatives say black men are derelict and lazy.
To secure big Hollywood contracts and media stardom, the young black filmmakers say the “boyz in the hood” are gangbangers, drive-by shooters and dope dealers. To hustle mega record deals and concert bookings, the rappers and comedians say black men are “*******” and more incredibly, “bitches.”
The corporate controlled media defiantly drops the words “racism” and “economic injustice” from its vocabulary. It pounds, twists and slants all of these stereotypes into sensational headlines and sound bites, and dumps them back on the public as fact.
From Chapter 2: Over time, the ancient racial stereotypes have been confirmed, validated and deepened until they have taken on a life of their own. If editors constantly feature young black males as gang members or drug dealers and not Merit Achievement Scholars or National Science Foundation scholarship winners because they don’t believe they exist or that young black males are capable of achieving those distinctions, then the news becomes a grim self-fulfilling prophecy.
This is an amazing book, and if you dare to open your ears to hear something contradictory to all you have seen and heard, please read it.
It may be self-fulfilling. My wife and I were in Vegas a couple of weeks ago. A large 30ish black man walked up beside my wife, he tried to engage her in conversation, I couldn't hear what he was saying, but she turned around and pointed at me and said "my husband is right there". He tried to engage me as well. He pointed to his t-shirt where he had written "your wife wants BBC and I can help". I told him to keep walking, he tried to fist pump with me, but I just shook my head and said walk.
I don't know what would compel a grow man to behave that way, but as he walked off I wondered what was missing in his life.
White men do the same thing.