Byron Hurt has a new project examining black masculinity and the jump off point is a question about the connection between Barack Obama and Curtis Jackson (50 Cent). Trailer no. 2:
I am going to come back to this a bit later I think. But it’s interesting that he’s choosing 50 Cent, but the title is Barack and Curtis. Why does this distinction matter?
This is Curtis Jackson.
This is 50 Cent.
See the difference? Talk about performative blackness….
I was in Boston (and not blogging much) at our annual political science convention when they announced Palin as the pick. I was standing next to Wilbur Rich and my man Harwood. I laughed aloud. A brilliant pick. Young, charismatic, and committed to the particular brand of conservatism that catapulted Bush into the White House.
It was on.
But looking at her actual record of accomplishments combined with McCain’s what do we have? A couple of lowsmen. McCain was almost dead last in his class. Palin flunked out of three or four colleges. Cobb, writing about why conservatives vote the way they do, notes they do so because they want to be rich. And then backtracks, in large part because there are a large group of what I call broke conservatives who are voting for McCain and Palin not because of what they desire. There’s no way they’ll get rich unless they win the lotto. They won’t even be “well off.”
They vote the way they do out of a fierce desire to protect what they believe to be the national identity. And they also do so because they are vain enough to believe that people like them actually have the capacity to run one of the largest and most powerful institutions in the history of mankind. Finally they do so because they are resentful. Of blacks, of foreigners, of city folk.
I haven’t seen Good Will Hunting in more than a minute. But thinking about these issues and the types of choices we’re facing this is the scene I’m reminded of:
Thoughts?
The Emmy’s were on a couple of nights ago. I made a decision to boycott (yeah, like I watch it anyway) once I found out that in its last year the Wire only received one nomination. One of Ta-Nehisi’s readers thinks that the reason is because white viewers couldn’t sympathize with black characters. I do think this had something to do with it, but in the end I think it’s much simpler than that.
I don’t believe that those responsible for making the nominations felt that the show was well directed or “well acted” for one simple reason–they didn’t think anyone was acting. They felt that actors like Michael K. Williams (Omar) or Jamie Hector were those characters. They didn’t have to do any work to bring them to life because that’s who they are. And David Simon didn’t have to do much work bringing city life to the screen because his stories were pretty much “ripped from the headlines.”
First things first. After a few years of slogging I am ten days away from sending my book STARE IN THE DARKNESS: RAP, HIP-HOP, AND BLACK POLITICS to publishers. This is why I have blogged infrequently….
I’m on a black email list with a couple of conservatives. Now black folk are already a conservative bunch, but here I mean McCain supporting conservatives. In the wake of last week’s events I wrote this email to them, because we’ve had a couple of good conversations about ideas about the free market and wealth redistribution: (more…)
