I hope there were a few people watching the Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim programming tonight. Rather than the normal line-up of various programs, each night this week the entire time slots are dedicated to just one program. Yesterday it was the Venture Bros. marathon, tonight it was the Boondocks.
Many should be aware of the Boondocks cartoon, based on a comic strip of the same name that has national syndication. This show is political and Afrocentric and filled with biting sarcasm that hits the mark each time. This one program is probably the best item on television to highlight some of the absurdities that is the Black culture in America today. Had I children I’d tape every episode and make them watch each one at least monthly. Yes, I feel that it makes that much of an impact. No, this isn’t the first time I’ve discussed the program in this blog.
But perhaps the one thing I wish young African Americans (and almost as importantly older Blacks) could see is the episode about Dr. Martin Luther King. It was an episode based on a dream that Dr. King lived (though in a coma for 30 years). Through out the episode Dr. King is just trying to adjust to the world and yet still carry the beliefs he had in the 60’s. But this is not a world based on the efforts of the Civil Rights Movement, or the sacrifices of Dr. King, Mr. Malcolm X and thousands if not millions of others.
The most telling part of this episode is when Dr. King finally loses his patience. He rightly addresses a large crowd of Black African Americans, and television media, and says what is really happening. He admonishes the Black culture for the failures that are glorified today, and the common usage of a term that “is the ugliest word in the English language.” He addresses the lunacy of black-oriented television (as it exists on a particular cable network) and so much more.
And amazingly the African Americans of this dream episode reacted, positively. Finally there was unified action. Education became important, athletes lived up to the role-model status they have, laws changed and the revolution that was demanded in the 1960’s finally happened (without bloodshed).
The potential that so many sacrificed for, that so many more waste today, became a reality. It was a dream of course. Even in the cartoon it was acknowledged that this isn’t close to reality in any form. But it’s quite a dream, one worth having or at the least seeing. Just as the Black men and women of the cartoon’s world opened their eyes, so must we all. I think one line from this television program summed it all up in a neatness that is eloquent – The people are waiting for Dr. Martin Luther King to come back, but it’s not going to happen.
Maybe 2007 will be the year this sinks in. Maybe the culture will understand that there is no such thing as “ghettofabulous” and that denigrating friends and family with a hateful and derogatory term is vicious and not loving. Perhaps the youth will understand that without an education there is no foundation to build a better life on. In 2007 we may finally get to see the Black community band together and use the most valuable asset we have that no one can take, but that we can destroy ourselves, our minds.
Maybe I’m dreaming of a 2007 that won’t happen, but it can. And that’s what dreams are for, right?
This is what I think, what do you think?
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