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3-6-Sanitized
Article by:
Harold M. Clemens
 So ummm…3-6 Mafia won an Oscar the last week (please forgive me, if I don’t give a f*ck.) and the decent, sanitized darkies have their bloomers all in a bunch about it. Some of their critiques of 3-6’s victory are right,
E.g.: The Academy does have a penchant for rewarding us only for stereotypical and/or disturbing roles: Halle for playing a promiscuous, irresponsible single mom that finds an abusive hillbilly so irresistible that she has just has to let him hit that ass doggystyle hours after her son dies (“Please make me feel good!” *Moan*); Denzel for playing a crooked, vigilante cop with an angelic whiteboy partner (How likely a story is that?!); Whoopi for playing a jive psychic/magical Negro; Cuba for playing a narcissistic, selfish, buffoon athlete; and Jamie for playing a drug addict, womanizing, yet brilliant musician.
Also, if we uncritically lauded the group’s victory or their music without discussing their substance, we’d be turning a blind eye to the misogyny that stains so much of hip-hop and pop culture; something we do regularly in slight of our sistahs.
The good, decent black folk win points for both those irrefutable observations. However they put their foot in their mouths, when they disclose, sometimes humorously, that they were “nervous” when 3-6 performed and again when they mounted the stage to accept their YT award *pardon* Oscar.
It seems the good Negroes were anxious that 3-6 Mafia would embarrass the race on national television, at one of the most prestigious awards shows on the planet, in rich, pretentious, vanilla company. They held their asses tight and prayed the group would get off stage, before they shat their pants in embarrassment, or worse, before Memphis’ Most Known Unknowns ruined it for all of us. Since Sunday night, on listservers, on message boards, in chatrooms, etc. countless black folks have admitted they breathed a sigh of relief after 3-6 exited the stage without event. People have praised the group for behaving appropriately in such refined company as though they were referring to incontinent toddlers instead of grown men; or as though the company was really that refined and Hollywood stars don’t indulge in promiscuous sex, drug use, and chimerical violence just like 3-6 Mafia does. The latter, fallacious assumption by the sanitized black folks alludes to a larger irony in their sentiments, which ultimately undermines their otherwise worthwhile critiques of 3-6 winning an Oscar. If the good, upstanding darkies can readily perceive that liberal Hollywood adores characters and images easily digestible for pale folks, yet problematic for us, why do they give a funk how the Academy receives Blacks? Why are they preoccupied with what the same mainstream they’ve indicted thinks of us?
3-6 Mafia’s “acceptable” performance has done nothing to change how the mainstream perceives us, or, more specifically, what depictions Hollywood will acknowledge us for in the future. Black folks have “behaved” themselves on film and at award ceremonies for decades and it has changed our lot little. Even if 3-6 Mafia’s performance had been exactly what the worst racist had expected, it still would have had a negligible effect on how Blacks are perceived generally and rewarded in film specifically. Racist mythology, now more than four centuries old, existed eons before the rap group and shall continue perhaps eons after them. Suggesting the rap group would have contributed to harmful racist stereotypes had they acted inappropriately is like suggesting adding a cup of water to the ocean would cause the Earth to flood.
The sanitized Blacks are so preoccupied with what white people think of us that they miss this point, mitigating some of their cogent observations. Their admitted fear of embarrassment by and condescension toward the Memphis rappers taints their calls for an end to misogyny, for better distribution of rewards from media bodies to black artists, and for the cessation of racist opportunism. One wonders if their stubborn refusal to accept “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” was indeed the best, most apropos song in a movie last year is rooted in a genuine dislike for controversial lyrics about black women, or if it’s more rooted in a foolish wish for whites not to stereotype and/or ridicule us. The former invites necessary debate about our art. The latter invites the manipulation and suppression of it.
In the immediate case, a good song about a repulsive topic, which should have opened up discourse about how to make honest music without it being used opportunistically by media, amongst other issues, has instead sadly revealed we are ashamed of ourselves for exactly the wrong reasons.
Harold M. Clemens is a freelance writer from Roxbury. His website is Ghetto Uprising
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