Jack & Jill Politics

Watching the Deval Patrick v. Kerry “You Know You Want to Rape Me” Healey race in Massachusetts got me thinking about Boston. Many black friends have told me that that city is among the most racist in America. Having a bit of a thing for alternative weeklies, I decided to check out Boston’s publication, The Weekly Dig, and see how they covered our people.

Expecting zero coverage. imagine my surprise…

… when I came across a glowing review of the movie American Blackout published the same day Jill mentioned it:

I just involuntarily got up on my desk and shouted, in a voice about 500 percent more churchworthy than mine, “What would happen to American politics if every black vote simply got counted?” Damn—it sounded like Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA). Using the swiftboating of McKinney as a backdrop, Blackout documents the ways in which black voters got shut out of the polls in the last two national elections, with a depth and resonance rarely achieved by the media coverage at the time.

But wait. There’s more! I also found this long-ish story on the efforts of Ed Bullins to continue the overtly political theatre of the Black Arts Movement by starting a theatre company in the Roxbury neighborhood:

Bringing hot-button art to the public has never been easy. And if that art’s got a political message, well, then you’re really screwed. Odds are damned high that someone in power is going to have a serious problem with it.

Ed Bullins is all too familiar with this phenomenon. The acclaimed playwright has been having a whole lot of trouble getting his new theatre company, Roxbury Crossroads Theatre, off the ground. Now in its second year, the company is only just mounting its first full production, A Black Arts Drama Showcase

So much for blanket stereotypes about cities. Perhaps this will inspire a regular “virtual tour of local media coverage by and about blacks and politics.” If you have any leads, do pass them on to your man Jack Turner.

Oh and bigup to Afro-Netizen and blackprof for their coverage of Brown University’s report on reparations. I was planning my own post on the subject, but they did such a solid job, I’ll just pass on the link love. Once I’ve had a chance to read the full report, I may offer my own take on the report and implications for a broader, nationwide discussion of reparations beyond, “I’m rich beyotch!”