By Jonathan Moore
A common criticism of black youth is that we contribute to the negative stereotypes that surround us. Rather than believing that our ranks are filled with future world leaders and game changers, we succumb to the idea that many of our friends and most young, black people are incorrigible and incapable of making something great of our lives. We resign to the belief that we’ll grow up to be baby mamas and do-nothing dads, wasting away child support money on a rap career going nowhere or hatching crackpot Ponzi schemes.
If you think I sound disdainful, answer me this: When was the last time that you stood by as a young black man or woman beat someone senseless, arms flaying and hair disheveled, all to be caught on tape and uploaded to the internet?
If you need proof of the degradation in the young black community, look no further than Worldstarhiphop.com, the internet’s online mecca for everything under the sun that is relatively “ghetto,” from street fights and people having sex in public to little boys cursing at the camera and little girls “twerking” at the age of 12.
The site, dominated by rap videos and viewer-submitted material from black teens – mostly street violence and female fights – receives more than 1 million hits daily. School fights and bathroom brawls have been propelled to online fame through WorldStar, but rarely do we think about the lives of the people being “exposed” and exploited in the videos, often still in high school.
If we believe that there is humor in violence and dangerous sexual activities being perpetrated against young Black men and women, then we are the very source of the misinterpretation of the young black community. We are as guilty as every person fighting in a video and every amateur Tarantino recording the insanity playing out.
The civil rights movement has come to the point where high-powered water hoses have been replaced with high-deinition camera phones. Maybe there is something exciting about young black teens with their blood-speckled fists raised high in the air. But it could be your sister being “exposed” or beaten to death. While WorldStar wins, we still lose.
Jonathan Moore is the managing editor of The Southfield Jay.