This is a short post. McDonald’s has a habit of featuring Black Americans in its commercials. A loong time ago they even had an ad proclaiming how they were uplifting the Black community with its employment opportunities (Dave Chappelle has an excellent spoof of this in a Season 1 sketch; if anyone can find the actual original commercial, let me know).
Now things have gotten a bit out of hand. McDonald’s straight up has an R&B artist crooning for mcnuggets. And no, it’s not coincidence that the word crooning is just one letter off from cooning.
I’ve heard the idea tossed around that Black people are actually just oversensitive when it comes to Black people portrayed in the media. Possibly. But you know… when you’ve been burned so many times and made into a blackface mammy and/or pickinini time and time again (or a friggin California Raisin!!), you kinda want to make sure that you stop getting the shaft in 2008. I don’t think McDonald’s got the memo. Enjoy:
McDonald’s, in all its urban-marketed splendor, can hold my pocket.
I love cartoons. My tv is set to international news and cartoons. Anything else makes me uneasy (except for 30 Rock.. that show is on fire). But I digress. Cartoons are not only entertainment; they are a window into various cultures. You can literally gauge where a society is at by it’s cartoons. For instance, Black cartoon characters have more or less come a long way from the blackface Elmer Fudd to the socially enlightening Little Bill (though we occasionally get a PJ’s thrown in there once in a while). Black cartoon characters more or less are stepping their game up all over, except for with Disney.
Dammit Disney, you just don’t get it. First off, go to Disneyworld. I want you to head to the Magical Kingdom (where Epcot Center is) and go around the world. For those that haven’t gone to Disney, the Magical Kingdom is one of the major sites (along with MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, etc etc). The site features various countries, marked by large Embassy-looking buildings. So you can walk around the park and learn about countries ranging from Canada to China to England to Japan to Mexico, etc etc. FIND AN AFRICAN COUNTRY. I went around the Magical Kingdom twice only to find two small huts selling wooden giraffes and the shopkeeper telling me it was an outpost not a country. That’s just an example.
Disney is now working on it’s latest production: The Princess and the Frog, originally titled The Frog Princess. This movie will be Disney’s first feature-length animated film featuring a Black woman as the starring princess (those unfamiliar with Disney should know that it markets itself on its Princesses… Jasmine from Aladdin, Ariel from Little Mermaid, Mulan from Mulan, etc etc). And in true Disney fashion, the movie shall be a step backwards in every way fashionable.
The movie is set in New Orleans and features a Black chambermaid named Maddy. Let that sink in for a minute. A chamber maid named Maddy. Almost like a housemaid named Mammy.
How many Disney princesses have been maids? Let’s see…. nope. They’ve all been damn princesses. (Side note: due to impending controversy, Disney has now made Maddy “a heroine in the great tradition of Disney’s rich animated fairy tale legacy, and all other characters and aspects of the story will be treated with the greatest respect and sensitivity” according to spokeswoman Heidi Trotta. Along those veins they’ve also changed her name from Maddy to Tiana.
I also want to point out that this film is animated. What’s the last animated film you remember watching in the theatres? The answer is probably Treasure Planet, though most people didn’t see it. It came out around the same time as Shrek, when CGI (computer generated images) was already killing. The hot news topic at the time was “the death of animation.” So why the hell is the Black princess movie animated? Disney could break ground and not only do the first Black princess who was long overdue but also make her the first princess to be done in CGI. But the status quo is so easy to maintain. Sigh…
But let’s say Disney wanted to go with the classic animated look. Okay, I can see that. Now look at the image at the top of the post… are you serious? Another Quincy Jones frog? Didn’t WB have a dancing/singing frog for YEARS to introduce its Black shows? Oh yea…
And here we are again… another big-lipped frog ready to perform along side Black characters. But maybe… MAYBE i’m just paranoid, conspiracy theorist, reverse racist, blah blah. Let’s take another expert’s opinion. Let’s see what Senior Black Correspondent Larry Wilmore has to say about it.
Damn. Pretty much everyone has avoided the point of the previous post and stuck to the basics of the fact that the “Obama A Millie” Remix is not by Lil Wayne. As I told the cats on facebook, the track could have been done by Obama’s nephew but the point remains the same. If you’re lost then reread the article.
Let’s be real once again. This song is hot. Oh, so you thought I was finna instantly jump in and talk about the ridiculous nature that is this song. Well, you’re wrong. And probably boujie (it’s ok, happens to us all). Real talk, this song is ridiculously hot. For those that haven’t heard it:
(there’s no official video for it; this is just the first one I found… on a side note: good look to everyone that let me know how to embed youtube videos… it’s HELLA easy and I feel HELLA non-internet savvy now. thanks guys. hold my pocket)
Alright, enough with the intro. Summary: the song is hot. At the same time, i hate it. I love it, I hate it. To clarify, Lil Wayne makes any track hot. That doesn’t mean I want him rapping about my President. Well, the problem is a bit deeper than that. I also have a problem with people wearing Obama paraphernalia while getting drunk and/or wiling out at the club. This is a two way street. On the one hand, it’s the hip hop/ young and professional/ grown & sexy/ swagger generation in part that put in the intense groundwork to register people to vote and get young folks out to the polls. At the same time, a Black President doesn’t justify rocking his image while twerking at your local night spot (similarly, stop wearing Malcolm X while getting your back blown out on the dance floor).
But really, the problem persay isn’t the odd paraphanalia/club scene mixture. It’s the idea (I’m finna make an assumption here) that it’s okay to be hyphy for your newfound Black President and still be kinda wack personally. That part is the assumption, the personal wackness. We all make that mistake. Let me give you an example.
I’m Greek. Part of a Black Greek Letter Organization to be specific. One thing we stress is to not show up late to class wearing your greek letters. The same goes for drinking, smoking, or any other blatantly scandalous behavior. If you’re going to not be on par, do it as an individual and not as a representation of a larger entity.
The problem is, as Black people we are always representative of being Black (no matter how hard some of us try to scrub the Blackness off). As a result, anything we do is instantly a representation of the race, blah blah (most of us have heard this already). When it comes to representing the Black President, the last thing we want is a youtube video of a group of Black teenagers twerking while rocking Obama t-shirts and singing the Lil Wayne ‘Barack Obama’ remix. That last statement is a cold stereotype of a video I hope never to see. But dammit I’m all about precautions.
So if you’re gonna rock Obama in the club, that’s fine. Do what ya do. But also rock him while you’re showing up early to the job. Rock him while you’re putting in extra work as a mentor or tutor. Rock him while helping elderly women across the street. Rock him in the front row of your chemistry class (be it AP, remedial, or regular). Rock him while being tight. Plain and simple.
And if you’re not tight and you are rocking Obama, well, just hold a pocket.
Finally! Capital Hill grew a pair of mangoes and told the auto industry “you must be joking.“ After three chief executives stepped onto the runways off their private jets and sauntered into Congress begging for $25 billion, I feared the worst for common sense and sanity. But Congress, out of left field almost, stood their ground and said enough is enough.
What I want people to take away from this is that Black people are definitively not the cause of your financial woes. I know that comment is a bit random, but let’s be honest. I’m from the South and it seems DAILY somebody is blaming “Shaniqua and her four kids all on welfare” as the reason their taxes are so high. Are you joking?!?! Aside from the fact that white college students are the biggest beneficiaries of welfare, is no one focusing on the $700 billion that pretty much went missing after “poor financial institutions” needed a bailout/welfare check? Then they go off driving in their Bentleys and have Caribbean massage parties (technically I don’t know if the massages took place in the Caribbean, but dammit if they didn’t take place). And you (you being the general person who tends to blame all woes on Black people) are dead set on Black people as being the biggest suck on financial resources. Wow.
So you know, I’m friggin glad Congress finally told these folks NO. Not just because the auto industry is being ridonkulous in its requests. But because I want America to see who the real financial drains are. When you cut 35,000 jobs from hard-working Americans and have the GALL to show up in private jets on your way to beg for $25 million and don’t even have a strategy to keep the working man’s job secure… you’re not just outrageous, you’re disgusting. And THAT’S what’s draining American resources, not this phantom “Shaniqua” that keeps getting thrown about. Geez, get a life guys. You’re all about to be “Shaniquas” in a few months if these job cuts keep up.
But I digress. Disgusting. That’s what the auto industry is. Disgusting, money-grubbing pocket holders.
For those of you who have not been fired for reading my blog at work, you will certainly find yourself in the unemployment line soon for looking at those damned internet puppies. If you’re like me and were unaware of America’s new obsession, the link is here:
Now that you’ve watched the video for half an hour (let’s be real, you were watching it just now for at least half an hour), this blog is just to make sure you’ve been thoroughly chastised and/or fired for wasting time on the job.
I would insert the regularly scheduled “America, are you serious?!?!” right about now, but at this point, this is what I expect from the mass populace. You’ve got a massive bailout in progress, 700 billion dollars missing, three auto companies teabagging Congress for some more billions, tens of thousands of jobs being cut like carbs from an Atkins diet, and in the middle of it all puppies. Cute, cuddly, mind-numbing puppies.
And while you’re watching these puppies for hours at a time, half a dozen guys in your company’s Finance Office are writing company checks to their off-shore bank accounts. Next thing you know your company’s President is sitting in front of Congress on some “we need more money!! PLEASE BELIEVE ME!! I’ll do ANYTHING!!” Two months later, we see another classic government scandal of bathrooms, sex favors, and millions of dollars missing. Happens every time.
Don’t believe me? Keep watching those puppies. And in your off time, open a new browser tab and hold my pocket on the live upstream.
While on vacation I sometimes browse through conservative and conspiracy blogsites and news reports. Today: jackpot. Alan Keyes is suing the state of California to withhold its electoral votes until Obama proves he is a U.S. citizen. There are so many problems with Keyes I don’t know where to begin. But begin we shall.
First off, the obvious. Is there a single white American that believes a Black person could possibly become President WITHOUT being thoroughly scrutinized by “the powers that be.” And you can call those powers whatever you want: FBI, CIA, Skull & Bones, Masons, the aliens that built the pyramids, whatever suits your fancy. But the same “powers” that created the Roswell conspiracy, the JFK assassination conspiracy, and whatever other conspiracy you want, pretty much made sure Obama is a U.S. citizen.
Or we could look at it actually in a logical sense. To run for the U.S. Presidency you need two things: to be a U.S. citizen and to be at least 35 years old. So when Obama handed over his documents, do you think everything was tossed in a pile and they said “egh, we’ll look at this later.”
But apparently some people do believe this. I stumbled across a petition 85,000 signatures strong to force Obama to prove he is a citizen. When that fails I’m sure those same 85,000 will try a new petition to have Obama prove he is actually part Kenyan, with the hopes of catching him in a Presidential lie and then petitioning to have him impeached.
And for those of us who are learning about this in utter shock and disgust, I’m still waiting for someone to start a petition to make Alan Keyes prove he is not Jim Crow, Jr. running around in blackface. And until that petition makes its way through the Supreme Court, Alan Keyes will hold my pocket. The petition’s already signed for that one.
You’ve got to be kidding me. One of the things I enjoy about being overseas is the comprehensive news coverage from international news outlets. I’m getting Al-Jazeera (both English and Arabic), BBC World News, CNN International, and a couple other stations I never heard of all on the same cable network. I come back to the states and, well let’s face it, we get nothing.
CNN, MSNBC, and the almight Fox News are the plain yogurt of news. True, we get the vicious right leaning viewpoint from Fox News and the mushy leftwing point of view from MSNBC, but COME ON!!!! They’re all a joke. Let me give you some examples:
Al-Jazeera recently broadcasted a comprehensive news segment on the Maldives and its first democratic election after 30 years of dictatorial rule. They interviewed both the current president (dictator) and the forerunner among the opposition, and the interviewer GRILLED them, pulling no punches.
CNN did a comprehensive news piece on “that guy” Oprah was leaning on at Obama’s election night acceptance speech. At the end of the news piece they concluded that “that guy” was literally “some guy.”
Here’s another example.
CNN International was BEAMING cats in live during the 2008 Presidential Election. This was straight out of some Star Trek type technology. Meanwhile…
CNN recently convened the Situation Room to determine the psychological impact of Obama not having a Blackberry while in office…. ARE YOU SERIOUS?! It’s a damn blackberry. This is one of those passing bylines on BBC World News at BEST.
Then of course there is the near absolute lack of international media coverage by CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News. We are all familiar with the Africa soundbyte, which currently consists of Somali pirates. Then there is a bit on England, something about Chavez, aaaaand we’re done.
Let me just make this one short. CNN and it’s top-notch Situation Room, hold my pocket. It’ll be Breaking News on your channel.
Woooow. For centuries (slight exaggeration) we’ve lived under the guise that California sets the pace for liberal behavior in the United States. In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past decade, this is actually as much of a misnomer as Sarah Palin’s foreign policy experience. California is not liberal. If you live in California, you are no stranger to the college-campus rallies, chants, and protests that take place regularly from the good-hearted liberal populace base. You also know that Barack Obama won California by an overwhelming margin. You are also aware that California has virtually banned smoking from earth and looks at you funny if you try to order a steak (animal cruelty).
But what the friggin hell man?! CA had a chance to actually prove its forward thinking mentality and instead sunk further into the religious conservatism that has plagued America since 9/11. For those wondering why California is particularly in the pocket, they didn’t just ban gay marriages… they eliminated it from the state constitution. That means no rights for same-sex couples. No tax benefits, no recognition, no nothing. I’m not here to debate the rights of homosexuals in America (although let’s be honest; there’s no real constitutional or legal reason to bar gays and lesbians from having the same legal/constitutional rights as heterosexual couples), but I do want to point out that California is not the bastion of liberal behavior that everyone proclaims it to be.
First, the state votes Schwarzenegger as governor, and they LOVE the guy. Then they bar affirmative action in college admissions (or maybe they did this first and THEN voted for the governor… I forget the timeline). And now the people of California take several more steps back by isolating homosexuals.
The state of California is about as maverick in its liberal behavior as John McCain is in his conservative behavior. It’s easy to protect the interests of trees, chickens, and upper-class white college applicants. But when it comes down to the difficult choices, the choices that really define progressive behavior and slumping in your chair at the last minute so you don’t rock the boat, California disappoints… and it seems to do so every time.
California, until you find the testicular fortitude to go against the grain and be a state that is liberal in more than name and presidential candidate only, hold my pocket.
“This election is a victory not just for Americans, but for the world…”
- anonymous Eritrean-American.
The quote above more or less sums up how the world feels about the 2008 Obama victory. It’s not just about Obama winning, it’s about the world winning. The everyday person. The person who never felt they could be anything. But more than anything, it’s about you winning. Obama could not have won if it wasn’t for the one-time dedicated effort of you. The campaigning, the rallying, the voter registration, even keeping up with the news and current events. These were all small steps to Obama’s victory. And now we have at least 4 years of upward momentum.
The commentary thus far has been a mixture of “Obama’s work is just beginning” as well as “have Black Americans really overcome?” All this has been couched in the context of A Dream Fulfilled. Well, it’s not. It’s a dream unfulfilled not because Black Americans all over are still subject to racism and bigotry (although I FULLY agree with Obama that it is possibile to overcome that as a Black American… it just requires insane amounts of work, dedication, and some luck), nonetheless the dream is unfulfilled because there is a lot of work to be done on the part of Black America now.
I came back from overseas on November 6th. And while I was greeted by a general euphoria at Obama’s victory, I didn’t see much change. Now, don’t read into that sentence the way a disgruntled conservative would. By change, I mean in the general populace. We are all ready for marvelous changes to take place in the way America operates as a nation. Even more so, we need to be ready to make drastic changes in the way we operate as individuals.
It is one thing to be able to finally tell your children with confidence “you can be anything you want,” but if you are still not giving your children the resources they need, then their dreams are in vain. And for those on the other end of the equation, if you are not reaching harder than ever to get those resources to families who are seeking something better, then you’re wasting Obama’s time.
My point is simple. Obama needs individuals across the nation who will continue to reach above and beyond what has been expected of them and into heights unknown. If the strategy is to watch CNN and cheer everytime Obama does something fantastic, then your life will change but a smidgen. If you really want to see the power of an Obama administration, though, then get up and stay active with the presidency.
Until that time, the dream is absolutely unfulfilled, and will without a doubt hold my pocket.
