Church Groups Protest Stereotyping of Blacks by Media

Chanting phrases such as “BET does not reflect me!” a group of protesters from local Baptist churches demonstrated outside of the home of Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman this Saturday afternoon, demanding an end to demeaning depictions of African Americans in the media.

The group represented the Enough is Enough campaign, a movement recently founded by Pastor Delman Coates of Mt. Ennon Baptist Church in Clinton, Maryland. “The purpose of the campaign is to fight for one standard in the public square,” Coates said. “We have been silent for a long time,” he added, “and we want to stand up and have our voices heard.”

In organizing the event, Coates was joined by campaign co-chairs Pastor Quincy Hentz of the Shiloh Baptist Church in New Rochelle and Pastor Roger Williams of the 1st Baptist Church of Glen Clove on Long Island. Local congregation members assembled at Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church, where the group reviewed protest guidelines before heading to 65th Street.

“It’s always been my thinking that there is so much that’s negative in the portrayal of young black men and women,” said protester Jackie Porter, who went on to refer to herself as an “intercessor for the youth.” While the group was predominantly older, some young people did participate. Jeremy Shaw, a teenager, said he was rallying to “let everybody know that the stereotypes portrayed don’t represent what I’m about or what my peers are about.”

A protest in front of BET President Debra Lee’s home in Washington D.C. went on simultaneously. Enough is Enough has held weekly demonstrations in the capital since Sept. 15, 2007, and plans to continue events in both cities indefinitely. “We’re planning to be there as long as it takes to bring change,” Hentz said.

Williams stressed that the campaign is not against particular artists or musical genres, but against “problematic lyrical content and video images.” According to Coates, the group will lobby Congress to create legislation permitting consumers more choice in cable channels “so you don’t have to subsidize content you find offensive to your community.” Furthermore, the group encourages the establishment of creative standards in media production, as well as corporate divestment from companies engaged in offensive practices.

Kelly McAndrew, a representative of Viacom, said that the company has been working with African-American organizations to address these issues. She emphasized that Viacom does not produce the videos, particularly music videos, which are a focus of the Enough is Enough campaign. The programming Viacom does produce, she went on to say, reflects the diversity of content desired by consumers. Furthermore, the Standards and Practices division of the corporation has already developed criteria by which it evaluates all content broadcast on Viacom channels, and the corporation refuses to air any programming that uses the words “nigger,” “bitch,” or “ho.”