The Entertainment Drug of Rappers and Athletes Destroying the Black Community
by Sabrina Dawkins
The bright lights blind him. Showtime. His afro looks like it will swallow his face. He wears it proud, like a Black Panther. His brown skin is abused by permanent black ink almost completely covering his arms. His head is slightly tilted back. Draft night is coming up. He’s confident. He wants to be the best basketball player ever. He wants to surpass Mike, not be like him. There’s only one spot at the top. His role models are the current fad rappers. He has memorized many of their lyrics but doesn’t know for sure one Malcolm X quote.
But he wants to become an amalgamation of Jay-Z and Malcolm X—the most financially successful living black rapper and the most well-known and respected black revolutionary. Somewhere deep down, he knows that Malcolm X is and will always be the more respected of the two, but more than anything, he wants the money, the flattery, and the fame while he lives—he doesn’t want to have to die to get it. Death can be painful, and without faith, there’s no hope after it. But money and adulation, he can enjoy for the rest of his life on earth if he can achieve Jay-Z and Michael Jordan success. They have become the new television heroes and role models for the black race. People swarm them for autographs. They see white teeth and vigorously nodding heads everywhere they go as the youth, and even adults, worship at their feet.
As the Bibles collect layer upon layer of dust on a bottom shelf in the basement, the latest freak-of-nature giant jumpers and dunkers are mounted high on television screens at popular restaurants, sweating and grunting up and down the court. As Malcolm X fades into the background, Kanye West rappers all over America, sycophants, are begging for Jay-Z’s attention, who has a song titled “Lucifer,” so that they can share in his success and fame.
Our newest NBA recruit envisions buildings and streets named after him. He wants to go down in history as the best NBA player who has ever lived. In this generation of reality TV and instant fame, it’s become relatively easy to become a celebrity. But the substance inside that is deserving of fame has been forgotten along the way. Head tilted back, the young baller is wise in his own eyes. He’s made it. And now the only thing left to do is to make sure long after he’s gone, his name will be remembered. But what will he be remembered for, dunking a ball, running fast down a court, a quick no-look pass? Can skillful dribbling redeem the soul? Can it turn a boy into a man? Can it compel a superstar athlete not to cheat on his wife or abandon his kids?
The drug of entertainment was first consumed by the entertainers themselves who just wanted fame, the empty high of being seen by a lot of people, people unconverted, dazzled by the false light of an empty image. The thought of Malcolm X damaging his eyesight straining to continue reading books as he sat on that prison cell floor by the corridor glow long after “lights out” wasn’t appealing to them. The thought of Malcolm killed for telling them the truth wasn’t appealing to them. They wanted the instant fame or the false success for putting a ball in a hoop or rhyming with curse words. And if they couldn’t attain it themselves, they wanted to live vicariously through the latest fad entertainer.