NPR : Poll: Education, Income Segregates Blacks: One of the most damaging forces tearing at young black people in America today is the popular culture's pernicious image of what an 'authentic' black person is supposed to look like and how that person is supposed to act.
For example, VH-1's highly rated Flavor of Love show features a black man in a clownish hat, a big clock hanging around his neck, spewing the N-word while demeaning black women. And hip-hop music videos celebrate the 'Thug Life' and 'gansta' attitude for any young black person seeking strong racial identity.
But a critic who points out that this so-called culture is defeatist and damaging — because it leads to high drop-out rates, record black-on-black murder statistics and a record number of out-of-wedlock births — is dismissed as a prude and a censor. Anyone questioning lyrics that glorify violence and make it cool to treat women as sex toys is told that the words reflect the reality of black life, and that they are 'acting white.'
Well, today there is new fuel for the debate.
