Letter to Huffington Post.

Your running line of commentary on Sherri Shepherd (Sherri Shepherd Moment Of The Day) suggesting she is ignorant and unintelligent is racist and you should stop. You have no appreciation for Black humor or a Black world view so you are not in a position to judge her intelligence. I assure you that Black women do not achieve their positions by accident or some fortunate twist of fate. It takes a certain amount of intelligence for any Black woman to navigate her way to success in white corporate America (which our media is a product of), and to endure racist and sexists stereotyping that you have stooped to. So I assure you she is not stupid. She’s a comedian, she’s a real person (and funny as hell, when you getting your sitcom girl?). This running joke about Sherri is insulting and should stop.

Wild Roots

Any Sista who has worked long enough in corporate America knows what I’m talkin bout too. Wish politicians,  or anyone in the corporate media for that matter, had the guts to be themselves on TV everyday the way Sherri does.  Maybe we’d start to see some real changes. (Not calling no names).

They haven’t responded to their email yet, but in my experience, calling the Huffingtonpost, so-called “progressive media” out on their bullshit gets no more response than mainstream corporate media.

Feel free to copy and paste and edit into your own email. info@huffingtonpost.com  (There’s no email on their site to contact the editors.  Get it together HuffPo.)

 I’ve seen it all now.  Black folks talking about the state of the Black nation in the Corporate media.  If I hear “personal responsibility” one more time I’m liable to go postal on that ass.  So when predatory lenders go after Black first time homeowners trying to grab their little piece of the American pie, who will call out mortgage bankers on their personal responsibility, i.e. stop being so damn greedy.  Every facet of American life is still stained with racism, from inconsistent health care, disproportionate incarceration rates, failing public schools, etc.  Oh but “Black folks, look within and stop whining and walk in the light of the American Dream,” is all we seem to be hearing these days.  I’m all for self reflection, but CNN is not forum for that.  If CNN can call us out on our lack of personal responsibility, then they should equally call white folks out on their white priviledge and ingrained racism.  Couple of ideas for CNN’s next forum:

 1.  Hold a forum for the financial community and ask them how they, in their professional opinions, contributed to the economy to going down the drain because of subprime loans that unfairly targeted Black home buyers and home owners.

2. Hold a forum for healthcare professionals to explain the article that came out recently that reveals the disparity in deaths from cancer between Black and whites in the same urban centers.

3.  Hold a forum for the education and law enforcement communities discussing an end to the Cradle to Prision pipeline.  How about that?

But that would be too much like right.  Didn’t Dr. King say racism is a disease that afflicts us all?  Black folks for a false sense of inferiority and white folks for a false sense of superiority.  There always comes a time when white folks in the media think they know us and racism seems like a distant memory (usually after a creative breakthrough on our part, like jazz, Motown or this time, hip hop).  They think they get us now and it’s all good.  The last time I remember it was just before the Rodney King verdict and the Rebellion that followed.  Didn’t hear a peep about racism in the media until Chuck D and KRS and NWA strong armed the mic.  (Note to self:  Re-read James Baldwin “The Fire Next Time”)  And I just love the promos, “after watching this America will know what it’s like to be Black in America.”  We will explain 400 years of Black suffering and struggling and overcoming in two hours.

And what happened to Umoja?  Essence, if you are going to bring advertising dollars to a network so that white America can try and fill in the blanks that hip-hop left, at least do it on BET.  Essence and the Black thinkers that contributed their time to the program, I ain’t mad at you.  You tried to bring light to our issues, and add a nice little entry to your personal bios and resumes, and clock dollars at the same time.  But we are in a precarious time right now y’all.  We’re being told that racism is all in the past and if we talk about it we’re living in the past.  Eight years of Bush did shift the boogyman focus from us to the “terrorists.”  But all that shit can shift right back on a dime.

Trust.