(NAME-MCE) PEDDLING PATHOLOGY IN THE MEDIA: SELLING DREAM, DRAMA AND DREAD

[Aukram Burton]

PEDDLING PATHOLOGY IN THE MEDIA: SELLING DREAM, DRAMA AND DREAD

Los Angeles Sentinel, 07-24-08, p. A-7

DR. MAULANA KARENGA

Whatever benefits one believes will result from the extended  
dissection and discussion of Black pathology in the TV "docu-drama",  
"Black in America" and whatever its producers promised and pretend to  
accomplish, increased public insight, community initiative and  
"patient" involvement are not among these. Indeed, it is difficult to  
imagine that after so many years of pretentions and failed practice  
that even the media could be so submerged in self-delusion that they  
would believe that they are doing anything but repeating and   
reinforcing a racial catechism of pathology, impotence and  
impossibility. Even with its marketable sub themes about "remembering  
and retaining the dream", offered as a hook of hope for Blacks seeking  
eventual "acceptance", it is still  little more than an old and  
outdated product in a new and updated technological package.

Thus, within the glass-house media-crafted mix of thinly-layered  
dream, thickly-sensed dread and therapeutic tell-all drama, there it  
all was again: the absence of things hoped for; the presence of things  
expected; and the evidence of things seen and supposed to be clear and  
compelling proof of the pathology and pathetic character of a people  
decidedly against itself. Again, there was the reality-constructing  
Black slice-of-life line-up of: religious leaders; concerned  
academics; committed activists; probing professionals; weary workers  
in the vineyard of trouble times; girls and women tragically  
interrupted; boys and men pathetic victims and predator-prone  
victimizers; the music, movie and money makers, and a local-color  
sample and assembly of everyday people waiting for a sign and  
wondering with Alfie and other Whites "what's it all about?"

Some will say "we need to get the message out there". But what  
message, where and to whom? Will it be a message of hope or one of  
horror; evidence of possibility or pathology; highlighting people  
doing wrong or those doing right; reinforcing stereotypes or raising  
up models of human excellence and achievement against all personal and  
social obstacles and odds? And even if we need to talk about  
pathology, where and to whom do we do it-to a cold and uncaring   
camera, to White people and 1.2 billion TV watching people in the  
world who see nothing but negatives by which to judge or engage us? Or  
should we speak truth and possibility to those who are dealing with  
these problems everyday and need more data, resources and support in  
their daily work and to the people who must be engaged and aided in  
their own uplift and liberation? And what if, instead of this  
perpetual media parade of evidence of pathology, there were media  
conversations about community projects, programs and people that do  
the hard, heroic and difficult daily work of stemming and  turning  
back the tide, that serve with impressive competence and commitment  
and are  really and self-consciously committed to leave no child,  
women or man behind?

Also, what if attached to these media conversations were fundraising  
efforts to provide increased resources to these programs and projects  
and aid them in building on their best ideas and practices in  
assisting our people in their own efforts to transform weaknesses into  
strengths, clear free space in community and society, live good and  
meaningful lives and leave a meaningful measure of gain and good for  
their children?

It is said also that showing the negative side of Black life is  
"keeping it real". But that's a deficient, degraded and degrading  
concept of reality in which the lowest level of Black life is posed as  
the model and an elevated and achieving life is viewed with disbelief  
and disdain. In such a context of conceptual confusion, self- 
destruction and distortion, thuggin and thinking low-life are posed as  
real, and loving each other, commitment to learning and living a good  
and meaningful life are seen as unreal and perhaps unreachable. The  
established order feeds on and funds such a conception; producing,  
promoting and profiting from images, music and conversations of self- 
condemnation, self-degradation and self-mutilation in old and new ways  
they're still working on. It is said there is a need for a paradigm  
shift from talk of "victimization" to opportunity, given the Obama  
prospect which it is rumored will eliminate all problems and claims of  
racial justice. But conditions create consciousness and the call for a  
new way of thinking, requires a parallel and simultaneous call and  
action to alter and end the situation that cultivates and even compels  
that thinking. Aware of its role as victimizer, the established order  
does not want us to talk about victims, damage done and justice due.  
Thus, it tries to redefine our rightful social justice conversation as  
victim hood conversation.

But social justice is at the heart of a good society and is not wished  
or waved away. Black people, as poll after poll shows, are aware that  
they are not being treated justly, but the issue is always, what is to  
be done?

Surely, it involves more than the magnified and manipulated hope that

the" ascension" or election of one person will miraculously empower a  
whole people, lift them up beyond the raw and subtle racism which  
appears in both ragged and rich disguises. Indeed, as we've always  
said, there is no remedy except thru resistance, no real strategy that  
does not require struggle and no way to repair injuries and injustices  
that afflict our lives, except by repairing the world in the process.

For we are our own liberators and a people that can not save itself is  
doomed to eke out its life in the marginal and minor spaces of   
others' lives. Thus, there is no alternative to taking responsibility  
for our own lives. Yes, the oppressor is responsible for our  
oppression, but we are responsible for our own liberation. And part of  
our being responsible is to hold the oppressor responsible for the  
wrong done and the justice due.

As we've argued before, we are injured physicians who must and can  
only heal, repair and transform themselves by healing, repairing and  
transforming society and the world. And given the radical nature of  
this awesome effort, our oppressor cannot be our teacher, will not  
televise our work or welcome us in Washington to salvage his image and  
give the system a new lease on its problematic life.

As Fanon says, it is a question of our engaging "on a vast scale in  
enlightened and fruitful work", as men and women conscious of our  
tasks, committed to our struggle and confident every dawning day will  
"find us firm, prudent . . . resolute" and relentless in the pursuit  
and expansion of African and human good in and for the world.

Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor of African American Studies, California  
State University-Long Beach, Chair of The Organization US, Creator of  
Kwanzaa, and author of Kawaida and Questions of Life and Struggle:  
African American, Pan-African and Global Issues, [www.Us-Organization.org 
  and www.OfficialKwanzaaWebsite.org].