Charles Ramsey, Sweet Brown, Antoine Dodson: The new puppets of social media

It seems lately that there has been a trend of news clips on the internet of news reporters interviewing black “ghetto” individuals and making it a source of entertainment for everyone.

Antoine Dodson was upset that an unknown man came into his sister’s room and tried to rape her. When being interviewed he vocally expressed how felt but in an instant his infamous “hide your wife, hide your kids……we gonna find you” became a YouTube viral vid.

Sweet Brown was surprised to see there was a fire in her complex so she got scared and left her house.  After stating that “ain’t nobody got time for dat”  again she became an instant internet “star” with memes and YouTube vids being remixed of her quote.

And now we have Charles Ramsey who really should be praised for saving Amanda Berry and the other women who were held captivity in a Cleveland home.  Again right after being interviewed, a YouTube video remix was made when he said the lines “when I saw a pretty white girl run into the arms of a black man…..DEAD GIVEAWAY.”

 

(Charles Ramsey)

 

(Antoine Dodson)

 

(Sweet Brown)

      Now many of you probably think that this is just for fun and we all should lighten up. Yes it is funny, but it also in a way mocks black individuals and creates nothing but further stereotypes that black people are ghetto and have ghetto attitudes.  Furthermore it seems like the news media are cashing on this and using these individuals to gain more viewership and audience which in other cases would not have been shown or just simply edited.  Take example the now latest viral vid of Melinda Brown Duncan of Detroit.  Interviewed by a Fox news reporter (that alone says it all) Melinda goes off on a justified tyrant on how the local Detroit government simply do not care about citizens and only care for themselves and their income.  For a minute, Melinda goes off in her “ghetto way” and swears a number of times expressing her anger and even says at the end that local government can go kiss her black ass (which is also censored.)  Any other news station would have either a) used only a 10 second clip of this interview or perhaps b) not even showed it all, but in this case Fox decided to air the entire interview simply on the fact that Melinda’s “ghetto” attitude and persona  was a source entertainment and ratings.   Another example was Michelle Clarke, a black woman who was interviewed months ago regarding a hail storm to which she described the sounds hitting against the glass window as “KAPOOYA!”  Again normally a TV station would have only shown a 10 second clip but this interview was a minute and half long again showing the mockery of this woman (many who thought she was trying to be a next “Sweet Brown” but failed at it. )  Again within days a YouTube autotune remix was done on her.

Some have argued that these individuals are to blame because they act ghetto and have no education.   No, these individuals are not to blame at all, it is simply the social media. Antoine, Sweet nor Charles did not expect to receive any internet fame after being interviewed for something that tragically happened to him.  Charles Ramsey should be praised as a hero but instead he is being mocked.  Antoine should have been praised as a  hero for saving his sister but instead was being mocked.   These individuals are products of the society and what the government has done to affect them.  They are simply normally individuals who live normal lives the way they know it but because a minute of their life or how they express themselves is posted on the internet, this immediately becomes the stereotype and the assumption of how blacks might live.   To some this might be a far fetch assumption but unfortunately this is true.   Asking the social media to put an end to this would be quite useless and impossible.  The only thing one can hope is that people would soon realize these stereotypes are false and that not everyone black person acts this way….but again that might be far from impossible.

 

Medsoulbrother.