"If It Bleeds, It Leads"
What is likely to have had the greatest influence however, is the sensationalized reporting by the print and electronic media (which many see as true "reality" television) that invariably focus on a narrow sector of events within the African-American community.
It's probably unnecessary to point out that the media's for-profit status tends to elevate the goal of attracting advertisers (by way of high circulation/viewer/listener rates) above that of providing the balanced, measured and non-sensationalized coverage one might assume to be the industry's fundamental mission-statement responsibility. After all, blasé reporting, like prurient, but pointless punditry rarely, if ever, leads to lucrative Pulitzer Prize status. Hence, the media axiom, "if it bleeds, it leads."
A longstanding over-reliance by the media on this type of lazy coverage of the African-American community has obviously helped to sustain certain generalizations about African-Americans. For the most part, these generalizations remove any potential for a factual basis of support for statements made by some black conservative pundits, all of which seem to share a common theme: that as a general rule African-Americans are disinclined to work hard, avoid crime, stay drug free, and function as breadwinners.
It also helps support a perception that blacks are more likely to blame a lack of success in these areas solely on racism. Such narrowly focused coverage also fuels the misconception that when blacks demand equality and an end to social, political, educational and economic discrimination, they are in reality, issuing selfish pleas for "special treatment" or "coddling" of some sort.
But it also leads to wellsprings of support among some whites and others for any conservative pundit who regurgitates these generalizations -- a reality not lost on some minority conservative pundits.
Individuals like Elder, who somehow has figured out that "blacks are more racist than whites," Ken Hamblin, Bob Parks, Clarence Thomas, Armstrong Williams, Debra Dickerson, Michelle Malkin, and Alan Keyes -- all of whom realize in whose pockets the big dollars are found -- shrewdly promote themselves by promoting many factually and statistically non-sustainable (but neatly stereotype-fitting) points of view. In doing so they provide, through their black exterior, an acceptable veneer of authenticity for those who lack political or social sophistication, or for any number of reasons, are simply inclined to believe such generalizations.
Thus, when former Denver talk radio host Ken Hamblin, aka "The Black Avenger," delivers statements like the following: "... opportunists like Al Sharpton and Bill Clinton ... continue to spook and stampede a constituency into believing that all white men are inherently unfair and evil", he does so realizing the currency (no pun intended) such statements hold among the mostly white audiences who pay to attend his speeches, purchase his books, read his columns and otherwise flock to Hamblin and fellow reverse race-hustlers the way pigeons are attracted to the neighborhood "bread lady."
(Incidentally, it should be recognized that Hamblin made his "spook" statement during a congenial interview with, appropriately enough, Richard Barrett, founder and leader of the Nationalist Movement, a Mississippi-based white supremacist group. Strange bedfellows, indeed.)
In racially pandering to their supporters -- which include a fair number of African-Americans, many of whom are clearly at wits end over negative aspects of African-American culture -- the standard talking points pitched by reverse race-hustlers tend to consist of tired old generalizations in which black culture is blamed for everything from skyrocketing gasoline prices to Kevin Federline.
These talking points focus on the disproportionate rates of incarceration and out-of-wedlock births -- both legitimate areas of concern -- but posit that these problems are solely the function of a general lack of character among blacks, particularly those from the inner city, and that they occur within a race-neutral vacuum.
In their pursuit of collective condemnation, reverse race-hustlers tend to ignore studies which find that within any group, most crimes are committed --repeatedly -- by a tiny fraction of its general population, hence the phrase, "the usual suspects." Instead, they often strongly insinuate that the entire black community is complicit because as they insist, African-American culture embraces, accepts and condones criminal activity, drug use and other forms of anti-social behavior.
They typically rain condemnation over displays of inner-city gang violence depicted in films like Boyz In The Hood or New Jack City while at the same time shower plaudits on similarly violent gangster films like The Sopranos or The Godfather.
They demagogue against so-called "identity politics" -- defined as blacks voting for other black political candidates primarily on the basis of race -- as a hindrance to black progress. Meanwhile, they direct no similar criticism toward their white supporters when -- as indicated by the recent rash of deceptive exit poll results in political contests pitting white candidates against black -- they vote for candidates with whom they identify racially.
They also tend to self-righteously decry the so-called "stop snitching culture" within African-American communities, which they point out -- legitimately, I'd say -- is an important factor in its decay. But they also ignore the complaints of residents from those same communities about how the "blue wall of silence" -- present in virtually every police department in America -- often prohibits complete or adequate investigations of allegations of police brutality, misconduct or other criminal behavior by members of law enforcement."
"Black Trash" and "Brood Mares"
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