Why do we need a
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With hundreds of mainstream
newspapers on the presses
many people wonder if the
"black press" is really necessary.
m
They feel that news is news,
regardless of whose mouth it
pours from. However, today's
news is
tomor
row's
history,
and our
elementary and high school his
tory texts have already shown
Harlem Renaissance and the
Chicago Defender, mainstream
media victimized black
Americans. They were poorly
represented and inaccurately
depicted. Even today, news
tends to portray the same
"types" of
images. We
turn on the
news and
see the black woman wearing a
mismatched outfit with curlers
in her hair using incorrect
English while
she gives her
eyewitness
account of
some recent
r
the respectable, capable and
intelligent people that we are.
There are publications that
focus on a more accurate depic
tion of women than those found
magazines like Cosmo,
m
SSENC
event.
While mainstream media may
not pur
posefully
seek out
the worst
Mademoiselle and Seventeen.
Ads in those magazines never
phase me because 9 out of 10 of
those emaciated models are
white, something I can never be
or strive for. I cannot see myself
in the face of one of those small
Calvin Klein models in Vogue,
but when I open up Essence,
that is beauty that I can identify
represen
tation of
us that if we don't get it right our people, they are obviously
today, our children and grand- not concerned enough about
children may not get the true our portrayal to recognize the
story tomorrow. problem. However, the "black
Charlotte
Back when the "black press" press" has been instrumental in
was just a dream, before the depicting African-Americans as
with.
If you don't think black media
is necessary, watch a couple
episodes of ABC Nightly News,
and compare representation of
blacks in relation to those on
"BET News with Tavis Smiley."
The makers of FUBU got it right
when they created their motto: a
little something "for us, by us."
By Akilah Imani Nelson
babyblu27@hotmail.com
March 2001
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