Chasing The Cool- Black Men, CNN’s Black in America, and Hip-Hop Culture

Written by Michael Partis

For the brother who:

• remembers being a “Black Boy.”
• wanted to be “The Bad Nigga” like Jack Johnson
• feels like he’s America’s “Native Son.”
• is constantly reminded he is an “Invisible Man.”
• lived by B.I.G.’s “Ten Crack Commandments”
• “seen Hoop Dreams deflat like a true fiend’s weight”
• is “Black on Both Sides”
• wanted to be “the coolest nigga”

CNN talked about us, now it’s our turn.

The depiction of Black men in America can be as varied as their life experiences are. While many Black men have formed solidarity, brotherhood, and fraternity as a coping mechanism to fight America’s persistent stereotyping, prejudice, and racism towards them, there are differences in attitude, political thought, and world-view that rigidly and bitterly separate the group just the same (if not more).

CNN’s Black in America documentary did an excellent job of showing the complexity and diversity of the lives and experiences of Blacks in America. Journalist Soledad O’Brien brought out stories of triumphant, failure, joy, and pain. For Blacks in America, the stories of pain and struggle form a thread that we can find in some part of our lives; but for many it makes up the entire of their lives. CNN failed to explain: how we got to this point, why we are at this point, and where do we go from here.

For Black men in America, this is an especially daunting challenge. We as a group have not responded to the challenge of being Black in America as well as Black women have.

Hip-Hop culture and Rap music are not the reason for this. Ludacris, Jim Jones, Young Jeezy, or any other rapper is not the person to blame. However, it is time for us as a community to look at how Black males shape their masculinity.

Popular media has accomplished a quite amazing feat in their chronicles and portrayals of Black men: they have managed to consistently feature him as the most desired, while at the same time as the most feared. He can be the sagging pants, tattooed “thug” the greater public fears; the hyper-athletic, physically imposing “natural” athlete advertisers clamor for; the smooth talking, sharply dressed, handsome “playa;” or eroticized as a “god” because of perfect bone structure, a muscular physique, and a “perfect smile.”

Whether loved or hated, all these qualities translate to one thing: being cool. And in America, a cool Black man is marketable; and mostly importantly, PAID.

Tupac, Jack Johnson, Joe Louis, Mike Tyson, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, Billy Dee Williams, Will Smith, Tyson Beckford (and the list could go on and on.) All were/are PAID.

However it is Hip-Hop culture, and the life associated with it, that has unquestionably become the most cool. The most important point is that it is seen as cool by young Black men not just because of the lifestyle or the material gains, but because it births economic opportunity. That is the part of the equation so often missed.

And for poor, young Black boys throughout the United States there is no more important objective then making money. So you can move your moms out the hood; so you can take care of your little brother with really bad asthma; so you can get the big house, with the big chain, and the fly car.

Indeed Black men in the 21st century are not just a “Black Boy,” a “Native Son,” an “Invisible Man,” a “brother,” or a “nigga.” These young Black men are trying to become cool. In fact, they are trying to become the coolest.

Thus many Black men in America spend their life chasing The Cool. It is an idea that rapper Lupe Fiasco has brilliantly tackled within his first two albums (through the song, “The Cool” on his 1st album, and by expanding his analyze on his second album entitled Lupe Fiasco’s The Cool). While creating a metaphorical, fictional story, Lupe does speak about a young person striving for a cultural aesthetic that brings fame, acceptance, material wealth, and recognition. In his story, chasing The Cool is apart of contemporary Black urban reality.

And so the question becomes how do we change what The Cool is, and how do we bring new examples of The Cool into the everyday life of Black males?

The beauty of the Black in America documentary is that we saw examples of Black men who are living up to their responsibilities. They are The Cool.

There was Mr. Kennedy (a single father struggling to find employment and housing in Brooklyn, NY), along with several other men from all over the country; ranging from men who were newlyweds, to those who were part of professionally success, middle and upper class Black families.

We need responsible Black men teaching elementary school, as social workers in our community, and as part of the married Black couple that lives in your building and saying “Good Morning” to you on his way to work in the morning.

We need them to be present in Compton and South Central, LA. To be in Brooklyn, NY like Mr. Kennedy. We need these responsible Black role models to be present in inner-city Baltimore, in East St. Louis, in Detroit, in Atlanta; in Liberty City, FL; in Philadelphia, in south-side Chicago, and in New Orleans.

We need Black male role models in our urban Black communities that are filled with high concentrations of Blacks living at or below the poverty live; with schools that are ill-equipped to educate our young people, and filled with administrators that frequently mismanages our school systems; places where jobs that pay a livable wage were hard to come by way before our country’s current economic hardships.

We need those brothers to be on Ebony’s 25 Coolest Black Men of All Time list.

We all as a community need to come together and find ways to make those brothers to become the coolest.

Learning Curve - Lupe on "Black in America"

By Ingrid

I have been really excited about Soledad O’Brien’s series Black in America (shown on CNN 7/23 and 7/24 @ 9pm EST). I am curious to see how many on her panel and interviewees share my view of the state of Black America. I have also been watching some of the interviews she conducted of various media personalities on CNN on demand in anticipation of the actual airing of this series.

My focus is on her interview with rapper Lupe Fiasco. I am a fan of Lupe. I think his rhymes are not only intelligent and (as The Child puts it) “hot”, but he also has a creativity I find lacking in 95% of today’s rap artists. Lupe is the definition of real Hip Hop in my book.

What struck me about this interview was his awareness of the history and the community that formed us as a people. At one point in the interview he explained (and I am paraphrasing) that people regardless of their race have an innate ability to think, nurture and care for themselves. There is an innate drive and ambition that causes human beings to strive for a better existence and not just float around haphazardly waiting for permission to do well. He goes on to explain that African Americans were systematically stripped of this innate ability. Whether it was through the actual act of slavery (which he states didn’t really end until the 40’s or the 50’s and I agree) or through the systematic refusal of equal rights up and through the 60’s and 70’s. He said then, once that shadow was lifted we were supposed to forget those centuries of conditioning. Lupe went even further to say that because of all those years of conditioning African American people are playing catch up and one cannot expect a level playing field after only 40 or 50 years of true freedom. He took pains to explain that the black experience is unique from other races who suffered degradation at the hands of America.

Unlike the other ethnic groups who fell prey to the US, Black people had no homeland to turn to, we had been sold into bondage by our own people and had any real connection to the African homeland beaten then bred out of us. We are uniquely American. We will never be African. We were neither emigrants nor willing participants in our captivity. We were stuck in a purgatory that offered little protection and even less comfort, but because things have changed we are now expected to move forward at the same speed and level as everyone else.

I sat back and thought about that sentiment. Was that just another excuse as to why black people don’t do better? Was it a cop out to point the finger at slavery and Jim Crow as the reason we as a people are not further ahead? Is it our fault or “theirs” that playing field is not level? Personal responsibility is a hot catch phrase right not and it is receiving applause and boos across the gamut of the Black spectrum. I am on the fence. In one hand I understand that every morning you wake up there is a choice you make. You decided whether you are going to do what’s right or what’s easy. We all do. For some of us; however, that choice is a choice of life or death. I am not sure I fall lock stock and barrel in with Lupe’s assessment of Black America, but am positive that all he has said holds an undeniable truth.

My take is this, while condition plays a role in everything we are today so does personal responsibility and parenting. You cannot know what you are not being taught. Often times we will remove ourselves from “the hood.” This is where positive role models and examples of people living well AND legal are most needed. In turn moving into “safe” suburban areas where our tax dollars go to better educate an already wealthy white population. I understand all the reason we move. Better schools, less crime, better shopping, safer parks, better houses, etc… I get all that, but what about those left behind?

We are no longer our brother’s keeper. This is the price of assimilation and desegregation. We don’t look out for each other the way we should. I am by no means suggesting that we have to live in an environment that is unfit to raise children in order to remain “down”. What I am suggesting; however, is that as we move up and move away we remember the community we left behind. Many of our brother’s and sister’s “make it” and never take a second glance back. They raise children who have no identity with the black community and are essentially white kids with tans. I am not discussing proper English or style of dress. I am talking about a real honest working knowledge of the history of black folks and a sense of community, service, and stewardship to the community that fostered their roots. How can you bitch and moan about the terrible state of Black America, its ghettos, and the ghetto mentality of some of its residents if you are a black person who refuses to put your hands in the fight?

If your success is not followed up by the mentoring of at least one person who is embroiled in the situations that make us cringe, then your blessing is wasted. If in your family you have young men and women who are struggling to cast aside the ghetto mentality but you chose to step on their necks rather than show them how to “be better” then your blessing is wasted.

This is my problem with those of us who will move as far away as possible to cast aside who we are that we forget that progress come with a price. You either pay it willing with service to the community that raised you or you pay it unwilling with a community of people who don’t know any better embarrassing you in front of the white folks. Just think if we all took the time to recreate the village that raised us maybe we wouldn’t have to hang out heads in shame every time we scroll past BET.

Lupe Fiasco said one more thing in this interview that I would like to share. When asked about his choice to do intelligent Hip Hop versus gangsta rap he said that his conscious wouldn’t allow him to do gangsta rap. He said that somewhere, some child is listening and emulating everything he does or says, and he knows that if that one child went wrong because he didn’t care enough to set a better example his conscious couldn’t handle that. Hmmm… Rapper or not, maybe we would all do good to take that into consideration.

Mentoring is sometimes just as simple as setting a better example and showing a people a different road. It’s saying to that young mother, you know children do better in school if we read to them; I have books left over from when my child was a baby. I’d like to give them to you but you need to promise me you’ll read them. It’s asking that young brother, when was the last time you hung out with your kids and saying to him me and my son play basketball on Saturdays why don’t I swing through and pick up you and your kids and we can shoot hoops together. Its as easy as seeing a little child misbehaving and saying no, sweet pea (or little man or whatever), we don’t do that AND be bold and firm enough to say it in front of the young black parent who doesn’t know better either. If you can do these things from a sincere heart rather than a judgmental one it will make a difference. God honors that effort. And if you don’t believe in God believe that your effort does make a difference.