Color Wheel

I was watching this show on the TVOne Network yesterday, and it was a group of people discussing the placement of blacks on TV. More specifically, what blacks should watch on TV and why they should be watching what these people say. For those who do not know TVOne is a TV network geared to blacks.

This panel of “experts” was discussing shows and how great the UPN network was because they featured mostly black programming during primetime hours. The panel urged black views to spend most of there viewing hours watching this network more than the others because it was “black friendly.” They were discrediting the other networks because the black to white ratio was not 50:50 or greater. Then they said that most black show do not have a TV life of anything greater than 6 years. I guess there is a show called Sister that is going on its 7th year and that is a huge deal? But there are plenty of other shows on other networks that do not make it to 5 years, hell ask Chris O’Donnell about his new show. Oh, wait you can’t because it never made it past 5 episodes.

It seems this panel was trying to use the race card to discredit all other show and only say the shows that were all black inspired were worth watching. If the cast was not all black, then the creator had to be black for this panel to give it an OK. Grey’s anatomy was the only show I heard them give a nod to because the creator was black. Being that the creator was black; the characters of the hospital chief, one of the chief residents and the lady in charge of the interns are all black. They said these characters are black because they creator was black and that is the only reason blacks had such an important role in that hospital. Now is am not going to run down shows where blacks played characters in high ranking positions, but Dr. Benton (played by a black man) on ER was not only a Resident, but he was a key player on the show. These characters they are talking about on Grey’s Anatomy, however important in a real hospital, are only second players on the show. The real characters are the interns, which non are black, even though the creator is.

After watching this show I began to think, and think, and think. Do people really watch show because of the characters and plots and story lines, or it is just the people who are displayed on our sets. Are we that superficial that we have to watch a show based on how many Caucasians, blacks, Asians, etc are on a show? I know when I watch a show it is because I am interested in what I am seeing and not who is playing the character or who created the program. If that were the case, then I doubt I would watch TV at all. I mean, how many shows do you see with Italians on them. Hmmm…I guess I could watch the Soprano’s, but I think I would get sick of watching gangster movies, since that is all we Italians get cast for. Just a thought about what and how we watch TV. Some people study the shows, other of us just watch for enjoyment, who are you?

Peace,
DeMo