Black Jesus, White Atheist

Hi. I'm a white atheist and I'm here to talk about Black Jesus.

Let's clear up a few things first though. There's a lot of misconceptions about atheists, some of which are warranted by the behavior of some very vocal, very annoying atheists. I try not to be that way. I will give my opinion on the existence of God (or lack thereof) but I won't judge you for your own opinion on the subject. I don't think all religion is stupid. I don't think life is meaningless. As an atheist, I still see beauty in life even though I don't think there is any benevolent creator and we don't have an overall purpose. Some people look at me strangely when I tell them, and a lot of kids I have worked with see "atheist" as a bad word, but I don't feel persecuted for being an atheist. The only people in this country persecuted for their religious beliefs are Muslims (and possibly Sikhs, because Americans think they're Muslims).

I was raised Catholic and went through Confirmation, but I started doubting my faith a few years before that. I would mostly fall asleep in church, or pray to God to finally touch a girl's breasts, piously. When I got my driver's license and my mom let me go to church by myself, I would sleep in my car in the church's parking lot. Soon after that I stopped going, and believing, altogether.

If you're a very traditional, conservative Christian type, the show Black Jesus on Adult Swim (and probably this post) is not for you. If you're more open-minded about your religion, which requires having a sense of humor, the show is worth checking out. I won't get into criticism of whether or not its racist or disparaging; I don't think it's my place to call a piece of entertainment created by black people disparaging towards black people. Unless it's Lottery Ticket. I'm still convinced everyone that had anything to do with that film despises black people.

I'll skip that debate and jump right into another extremely sensitive subject: religion! After watching the first 7 episodes of Black Jesus, I can''t see how it's blasphemous or disrespectful in any way to Christianity. Then again, I'm an atheist, so maybe I'm not the one who should be deciding that.

Yet here we are.

The show starts off in Compton following a crew of guys including a tall man in a robe and sandals named Jesus. Nobody questions his authenticity as Christ, except Charlie Murphy, and there's no real explanation of what the heaven is going on. The show simply demands us to accept the reality that Jesus has returned as a black man in South Central LA in 2014. He has all the memories of Jesus from the Bible, he calls God "pops," and says things like "what the heaven."

There are many running jokes like that littered throughout the show. Many of the gags are just throwaway jokes, like calling the one girl in his crew Maggie and his best friend Fish, but many of the gags serve as major plot points. It really tries to be true to the character of the lord and savior Jesus Christ from the Bible, while placing him in an inner city in modern day America. So he rides around in his friends' hooptie and swears occasionally, but it's all interspersed within Christ-like maxims. When a cop is messing with his friend, he tells his friend to relax because the cop, "know not what the fuck he do, man."

He is a modern day, American messiah. He preaches constantly to everyone he interacts with, tells them how much he loves them, and, like a true religious leader, has no real job. The show is at its best when it illustrates what it would really be like to have a messiah for a friend. He is horrible with money because there is no inherent value and he thinks everything will always work out if they just believe strongly enough. The constant reminders to have faith in him and "pops" annoy his crew after a while and  they desert him. It's what real friends would probably do after a while, but it's also a reference to Peter turning his back on Jesus in the bible.

Things end up working out, though,of course, because Jesus remains pure and good. It helps that he really can perform miracles. He is the son of God. And he is God himself right? That's how the Holy Trinity thing works? 10 years of catechism and that shit never made sense.

Black Jesus can perform miracles, he just doesn't overdo it because, "pops will get mad." Wait, so Jesus is not God? Whatever.

He only uses his power when completely necessary, he doesn't simply grant wishes. When the neighborhood drunk Lloyd (the always awesome John Witherspoon) asks him for a winning lottery ticket, Jesus asks why he doesn't ask for peace on Earth or the end of world hunger instead of being so selfish.

This is the type of God I wish there was, and this is the type of savior that the bible actually describes. He accepts everybody for who they are but tells them they can always do better for themselves. He heals people trying to hurt him ("I love you by default!"). He loves everybody, and as a way to bond with others, he enjoys, "smokin, drinkin and chillin."  It makes sense; Jesus was all about drinking wine and eating with his homies. He may be omnipotent and have eternal life, but he's still human.

And his human feelings are hurt at one point when it becomes apparent that his friends are only hanging out for the drinking and smoking. The problem is they can't bear to be around his constant preaching because they don't see the point if he can't help them pay rent.

If Jesus was real and did come back, this is exactly how he would be treated.

"I know you're the son of God and all, but what can you do for me now Jesus?"

Overall, the show has a positive view of Jesus and faith. Everything works out for those who believe in him. He can perform miracles. He spreads love. However, the show is not afraid to question faith, either. Jesus's friend Boonie is always getting the shit end of every situation, and he lets everyone know how much it sucks to be Jesus's friend. Jesus gets all the praise and love but does no actual work. Everybody gives Jesus all the credit but Boonie and Fish and the rest of the crew are the ones doing all the work for him, like pushing his raggedy old van to the other side of the street to avoid parking tickets.

The show isn't always great, many of the plots fall into typical sitcom tropes, but the potential greatness of the show is apparent in the subtle condemnations of religious faith in its best scenes. The show illustrates a notion I came to terms with long ago, when I still had some faith: praying to God is cool and all, but when it comes down to it, you have to act in order to get what you want out of life. You can't expect Jesus to do the work for you. He's always got your back and he'll pick you up when you're feeling down, but he's not going to pick up that shovel and help you plant the vegetables for the community garden. You have to do that yourself. And Jesus will be there with a 40 and a blunt cheering you on and explaining how this is all for the betterment of mankind.

It's a heartwarming thought, and it makes for a great show.

I Love You All (I'm Like Jesus in a Sense)...Class Dismissed.

Hoodies, Hunger, and Intuitive Racism

For the last couple weeks, the news has been dominated by 2 stories, and depending on who you ask, one just as important as the other: Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, and The Hunger Games came out in theaters nationwide. At first glance, these stories don't seem to have much to do with one another. In fact, they don't really. Or, they didn't, until people's reactions to the stories became the news.

The reactions to the Trayvon story quickly took a predictable turn to arguments primarily about race, with people choosing sides based on the perceived racism involved in the killing. It could have been (and may still prove to be) the start of an important discussion on gun laws in this country, but we decided to focus solely on the racial aspect, which proves to me that we have a long way to go in this country on racial issues. My conviction was further solidified when race became a major factor in the coverage of the release of this year's biggest movie, The Hunger Games. Racist reactions to the movie's casting became a headline news story, not to mention a pretty funny (and sad at the same time) Tumblr blog.

The movie has already made over 200 million dollars, and any movie with that type of success and popularity will have its share of controversy. This particular controversy is very interesting though, because most of the negative reaction came from young people, and the racist tweets say as much about their awful personalities and outlook on life as they say about this generation's horrible reading comprehension skills.

Apparently, some of the characters in the movie were portrayed by *gasp* black actors and actresses. In particular, the character Rue, was portrayed by a young black actress, Amadla Stenberg. Apparently, many people missed the section of the book where she is described as having dark hair and dark skin. (Readers should have at least realized she was supposed to be black when characters from her "district" were whipped, and later they rioted, the two accepted actions of black characters in American pop culture.)  One movie-goer said, "why does rue have to be black not gonna lie kinda ruined the movie." Another said, "Awkward moment when you find out that Rue is black and not the innocent little blonde girl you pictured."

The face of evil.

I'm not surprised by these reactions, I know there are people out there who still harbor these negative thoughts; however, with forums like Twitter and Facebook and comment sections on news stories, these ideas are posted for all to see, and the prevalence of these thoughts is alarming. Go to any news story about Trayvon, and at least 10% are just blatantly racist and hateful. The one saving grace in all this is that at least there's a large backlash against these types of comments...most of the time.

The Hunger Games comments became a huge news story because they not only show how hateful people can be, but they show how ignorance feeds the hatred and negativity. It is pretty obvious that the characters who were played by black actors were black in the book, yet these people claim to be huge fans of the book. Most of them claim that it's not about racism, they were simply upset that the movie didn't follow the book exactly; except that it did. Any time somebody says, "I'm not racist, but..." you know some racist shit is gonna come out of their mouths. It's similar to the defense, "I have a lot of black friends." These are classic racism deflectors, and they are as see-through as saran wrap. In 2012, everybody is aware that racism is not acceptable, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist; racist people have simply modified their language in order to hide their true feelings. As Bill Maher said, denying racism is the new racism.

The scary part is that a lot of these people truly don't realize that they have these negative thoughts and feelings; or they don't recognize these thoughts as being racist. They think that racism is only when you call a black person nigger (which some commenters did, of course). Their views that only a white actress can portray the "innocent" character isn't racist to them because it's so engrained in our society that white = good and black = bad that we don't even recognize it as an issue. Why are we surprised that kids equate innocence with white skin and blonde hair? Have you seen a picture of Jesus?

 Looks like every Middle Easterner I know...

We are taught (implicitly and explicitly) from an early age that white is good, black is bad. The villains wear black; good guys wear white. White is innocent, pure. Black is evil, dangerous. Daylight is happiness and sunshine, nighttime is dark and scary. A white pigeon (dove) represents peace and love. A black cat represents bad luck. Black licorice tastes like shit.

This goes back thousands of years. More recently, though, it has been pervasive in cinema. In silent movies, you couldn't identify the bad guy through his words, so the easy solution was putting him in black clothes. Instant villain! And that trend continues to this day. 

Many people believe this tendency to associate good with white and bad with black has been the cause of negative race relations throughout modern history. The pervasiveness of cultural representations of the association between black and evil has led to an intuitive prejudice that works on an unconscious level, and it can happen even in people who are not consciously prejudiced. This idea is discussed much more thoroughly (and brilliantly) by Malcolm Gladwell in Blink. He claims it is the reason for such tragedies as the killing of Amadou Diallo, an innocent, unarmed man shot 47 times by the NYPD.

Therefore, laws such as the Stand Your Ground Law are especially scary because they allow people to use deadly force whenever they feel threatened. Oftentimes, all it takes is the wrong skin color, or the wrong hand gesture, or the wrong piece of clothing to be perceived as a threat. Twenty four states now have such Stand Your Ground laws. Nowadays, any mention of even the smallest restrictions on gun ownership is shouted down with claims about the liberal agenda to "take away our guns!", and now the extraordinarily powerful gun lobby has helped push through legislation that further empowers gun owners to use deadly force at their own discretion. According to the Wall Street Journal, "justifiable homicide" has nearly doubled since the laws have taken effect. The laws basically encourage people to shoot first, and it makes it difficult for law enforcement to prosecute shooters (which, unfortunately, will probably happen in the Trayvon Martin case). The laws are particularly scary for people with a skin tone that has been culturally predetermined as a threat.

As sad as these stories are, they have highlighted some of the issues we face as a nation, and if the discussions we are now having don't lead to any changes in the gun laws, maybe they will at least help us confront our racial biases; and if we confront our biases now, maybe in the future, the young man who thinks a characters's death "isn't as sad" when it's a black person, or the 15 year old who thinks a black girl can't be innocent looking, will recognize their prejudices and be able to overcome them.

Otherwise, we will have a lot more tragedies like that of Trayvon Martin.

I Love You All (Black, White, Yellow, Red, Green--I see you Martians)...Class Dismissed.