The Revenge of The “Good” Blacks: John Ridley, Eugene Robinson, Juan Williams

Robinson argues that recent racial slights by White media figures, such as Don Imus and Bill O’Reilly, stem from the fact that America doesn’t understand that there is a “different” Black America, unrelated to all the “thug life” depicted on television and in music videos. However, Robinson fails to address why it is the obligation of African Americans to have to prove their dignity and integrity to the same media that enjoys defiling the Black image and trafficking racial buffoonery as normal African American behavior.

Tacitly, Robinson assumes that African American culture is a culture of poverty that will be shattered as more Blacks enter the middle class. Robinson’s position belies the long tradition of Black upper middle class social organizations and institutions that did not separate their politics from the Black poor, but sought to create a unified political front with the Black poor, in order to fight oppression.