While most outlets of mainstream entertainment have pushed the limits of reality in their quest to toe the politically correct line (if television is any indication, one in three doctors are black) the WWE [World Wrestling Entertainment] has remained unapologetically racist. It is racist not because Chairman Vince McMahon secretly attends Klan meetings under the cloak of night—though the country clubs he is sure to frequent are not far off—but rather, because his staff is lazy and lacks any semblance of creativity or imagination. {snip}
{snip} Wrestling harkens to simpler times when women were big breasted, docile, with a nary a thought in their heads; men were ripped, glistening and vengeful; and coloreds were little more than a collection of the broadest available stereotypes. Perhaps this simplistic appeal to our base desires is what makes wrestling so alluring, drawing millions of viewers each week despite its meager offerings. {snip} The downside to such a formulaic, reductionist approach is that certain demographics are bound to be stung by their unfair, simple portrayal.
Which is why, several weeks ago during Smackdown, I was not surprised that my friends were filled with a white hot rage when they laid their eyes upon Cryme Tyme. I admitted Cryme Tyme were the most embarrassing black act to ever grace a WWE ring, including Mark Henry banging an 80-year-old woman, yet I didn’t share their anger. Granted, only a wrestling show could escape criticism at scripting two black men to steal, speak in the incomprehensible gibberish that passes as English to the ignorant black set, and hold impromptu booty contests with (surprise surprise) the other ethnic girls on the roster. {snip}
Kofi Kingston fares little better. Though he is thin (comparatively) on stereotype Kingston (a Ghanian billed from Jamaica as Creative thinks the viewers too stupid to connect a black man from any other country) is also accepted by the audience, though on different terms. Kofi is wide-eyed, vacant, all claps, shuck and smiles; for if there is one thing we know, once a black man stops smiling he is but mere moments from bludgeoning and raping the nearest white woman. His smile assures us he is one of the safe “ones”; safe meaning a Negro you’d set a place for on Thanksgiving but start polishing the .45 if he made eyes at your sister. Yes, it’s a borderline racist gimmick but I don’t feel compelled to break out the camo gear and bowie knife each time he shambles down to the ring.
{snip}
As long as blacks are willing to send the entire race down the river for a few scraps of money and attention, I can’t get angry at the companies for exploiting them. Yes, there is something horribly wrong with black culture, and it is in poor taste to use it for profit, but should we black people not hold our own to the same standard? Why is it honorable for 50 Cent (Gucci pellet guns tucked beneath his Fendi bulletproof vest) to brag, from the confines of his Massachusetts mansion of course, about drugs sold and souls hastened into the afterlife, but once a Disk Jockey besmirches a woman’s basketball team, the gates of hell must open and swallow him whole? Why can blacks tap their foot to the latest rap video, champagne cascading down the ass crack of a well-built gutter rat, $60,000 chains and $100,000 watches winking under the stage lights (while a number of fellow black people toil like rats in the inner city) but are blind with rage the moment the puppeteer of this masquerade is revealed?
As a black man, I am not entitled to outrage each time Mami (Mama Benjamin) and Uncle Tom (Virgil, Kofi) are paraded before me, but as a wrestling fan I sure as s*** am. I’ve had enough of the one-dimensional characters, scripted distractedly by a Hollywood hack while his Blackberry eagerly awaits a callback from According to Jim. I refuse to watch Shad and JTG saunter around the ring with a thug act that wouldn’t pass muster in Killa Season or Baller Blockin’, not because they are disgraceful (which they are) but because I have no reason to care whether they win, lose or die. Why should I? One reason Stone Cold Steve Austin succeeded was because he was a three-dimensional character. {snip} Yet when creative is faced with creating a black character, they fall far short, settling on oversexed, violent, semi-retarded thieves.
No, Vince McMahon doesn’t hate black people. He’s just too lazy to show any different.
