I’m Black And I Don’t Like “The Boondocks” Like You Guys Do
By Tim Davis
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k2er_-Pe90&w=584&h=390]
The Boondocks. Everybody I know watches this damn show. Black people, white people, teenagers and even those over the hill. And they love it. I hate it.
I was first introduced to this show by a friend of mine who would not shut up about how funny the show was. This friend of mine always has something to say about how fucked up society is, what’s wrong with the world today and how to fix said problems. I figure if he thought it was funny then I could give it a try to see what was so great about it that it could add some humor to his pessimistic view on life.
I don’t remember the first episode that I watched, nor do I care to remember. To be honest my homeboy had the whole first season on DVD and I think we watched the whole thing. I laughed a few times and left that evening thing “Hey it wasn’t that bad”. The more I watched the show on my own time, the more I saw through the comedy of the show and the statements it making about society today in general. I stopped watching the show for its humor and more for the underlying message that is inevitable in every episode.
The episode that drew the line for me though was “The Nigga Moment”. I had seen it quite a few times but this was the first time I had watched it with my dad. For all you Boondocks fans, my dad would be the white guy from the same episode who says “Wait a minute, I’m white!” when confronted by a “nigga moment” (I’m adopted). After this episode ended he just looked at me and said, “Man, that was dumb. You know there’s a lot of stupid people who buy into those types of scenarios,” and then casually left the room and went to sleep because it was 11:30pm and he had church in the morning. He didn’t laugh once the entire episode. I knew he was right. I had seen it coming for a long time.
Everybody I know loves The Boondocks. The first time I watched the show with my Jewish friend, he said, “Man I’m glad I’m watching this with my only black friend, now I can laugh at the jokes without feeling bad.” My Facebook and Twitter are full of people who laugh and love the character of Uncle Ruckus. The person who introduced me to The Boondocks spent his freshman year in college threatening to throw chairs at people and hit people over the head with bottles of Hennessy and trying to prove how hard he is. Riley is the “realest nigga” on the show. Tom is an “Uncle Tom.” The Martin Luther King episode was boring. These are typical statements that are brought up whenever The Boondocks are brought up in the circle of people I know, and if I’m right, probably the same topics that are brought up when you, the reader, talks about this show.
I wonder where Aaron MacGruder stands on his show. Did he have a Dave Chappelle moment of truth which fueled his decision to no longer continue the animated series? Does it ever occur to you, that the very same things that you defend that are so funny about The Boondocks are the very same that offend you? Do you defend your blackness about while quoting Gangstalicious and Colonel Stinkmeaner, then have the nerve to wonder why folks react to you like Uncle Ruckus does to black folk? Think about it, you are perceived as the same thing you promote. I guess ya’ll are just too caught up in another “Nigga Moment”.
I only wrote this because Ghostface Killah’s astral body appeared to me and we discussed this thoroughly before he disappeared. R.I.P. Bushido Brown. Huey Freeman can see through the bullshit.