Introduction

If you grew up Black, then you’ve probably heard it said, “If time travel is ever invented, no Black person will ever go back beyond the mid ‘60s because of racism. While funny, this anecdote holds much truth as prior to the Civil Rights Movement Black and brown people had to deal with Jim Crow, lynchings, homes and churches being fire-bombed, and in general being treated like crap. And before that they had to endure the horrors of slavery.

While Chinese, German, Irish, and Eastern European immigrants and indigenous peoples have suffered racism and discrimination in America, none of them suffered and continue to suffer being dehumanized to the degree Blacks are.

Yet despite this, Black folks have persevered, creating a culture uniquely ours and making significant political and economic gains in a system that would rather see their trauma and pain then view them as humans.

Why is this?

Put simply, white America doesn’t want to acknowledge the racist reality. They’d rather cling to the fantasy of the American Dream, which says if you work hard and follow the rules, you’ll get ahead. They ignore or try to explain away the hypocrisy of the Declaration of Independence’s “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equally…” when Africans were enslaved by the same people who wrote those words.

So then is it any wonder that as Black, brown, and other people of color are making strives,  we’re seeing a backlash?

TV Rewind

In recent years there has been a concerted effort to diversify media, and the response from the mainstream media had been either to add token minority characters or to do period pieces and use that as an excuse not to have them at all. Black Monday, The Goldbergs, Ms. America, Thatcher: A Very British Revolution, and Stranger Things are all set in the ‘80s, yet feature few if any Black or brown characters.

Likewise, in period dramas like Mad Men, Vikings, Outlander, and Black Sails the cast is predominately white. The problem with such casting is Black and other marginalized people have always existed, so to not have them even in these period dramas is not just morally wrong but historically inaccurate.

You had the Moors of African and Middle Eastern descent who fought in the Punic Wars and the countless Blacks in America who fought in nearly every war since the Revolutionary War, in which Crispus Attucks, a Black and Native American man, was the first casualty. And the only reason we haven’t fought in every war is because the military was segregated for years.

These time periods are used as an excuse for showrunners and writers not to have a diverse cast, which in turn creates safe spaces for bigots.

 It plays into the notions that racism wasn’t such a big deal and that modern issues like the women’s rights, gay rights, a voting rights and the movement for Black lives  invented causes by the alt left to destroy traditional American values  This also paints the picture that things were fine back then, creating nostalgia for a past that never was. The truth is if you were anyone other than a rich allo, cis, het, white man in America, then you had it rough.  

This isn’t to say period pieces don’t have their place, but there’s no reason not to include black and brown people in them. Take shows like Pose, Everyone Hates Chris, Hip-Hop Evolution, and The Get Down. They’re all set in the recent past yet feature a predominantly Black and brown cast. That there aren’t more shows like these is a reflection of the mainstream media’s reluctance to take an honest objective look at themselves and the past. Because if they did, then they’d have to address this country’s racism problem and their white privilege.

Moving Forward

While history can inform the present, we shouldn’t be slave to it. The fact is Black history covers more than slavery and the Civil Rights Movement; we were kings and queens, pharos, mathematicians, engineers,scietists, soldiers, doctors and more. Without us there would be no soul, jazz, blues, gospel, or rock ‘n roll. No flavor.  It’s time showrunners and writers give us our due.

 Stop making us the bbf of the white main characters, the sidekicks, passive love interests, or victims to be saved by the white protagonists. Give us the leading role of shows that don’t focus solely on “the struggle.” Give us roles where we’re more than out pain/trauma and are depicted as full human beings and not the other. Stop centering whiteness as universal and Black stories as parochial and not profitable, when evidence shows otherwise.

And if you’re not willing to do this, then we’ll do it ourselves, like we’ve been doing.  

Conclusion

While we can put pressure on the mainstream media to change, ultimately it is up to us to be the change we want to see. If just a few of us pooled our talents and resources, we could make media for us by us. This way we’d be in control of our narratives and reap all the rewards from our work with none of the executive meddling or white washing. We don’t need permission, just a will to start and we can learn as we go.

Well, what do you Think? I’d love to hear your comments below.