Tiffany B. Brown

a mish-mosh of stuff

Satire & Stereotypes: Baracka Flocka Flame

WARNING: The videos below contain a lot of profanity.

It seems the Baracka Flocka Flames controversy has heated up since the October 26 publication of Prez N the Hood: A Hip-Hop Parody Stirs Up Issues in the New York Times (video below; article requires log-in).

America’s foremost old cranky black man, Stanley Crouch, had nothing nice to say about Baracka Flocka Flames in his recent column for TheRoot.com. He dismissed the video as ‘minstrelsy.’

That shouldn’t surprise you, of course. According to Crouch, anything hip-hop — even if it’s satirical or in parody form — is What’s Wrong With Negroes. Rather than rebut Crouch myself, I will point you to Bomani Jones’ post Stanley Crouch, I think I’m on to you….

Now I am one who thinks Baracka Flocka Flames’ “Head of the State,” is f#cking hilarious, bordering on brilliant. Part of the humor for me is that I imagine the Obamas are Grade-A sh#t-talkers behind closed doors. You see glimpses of this sense of humor when President Obama speaks. You saw it when Michelle Obama was cracking on her husband’s dirty sock habits. So I can totally see Barack Obama making off color jokes along these lines for sheer sh#ts and giggles.* Plus, James Davis does a killer job of imitating Obama’s diction, making every utterance of “nigga,” downright funny. But that’s not the only humor I see inreason I love this piece.

“Head of the State,” for those who don’t closely follow hip-hop, is based on Waka Flocka Flame‘s “Hard in the Paint.”

Yeah.

Let’s just say that if Stanley Crouch titled his next column “Waka Flocka Flame is What’s Wrong With Negroes,” I will heartily co-sign. Waka Flocka Flame not only has a stupid-a## name, but he has also said he’s in it for the money, not the craft. And if we’re talking about topical content, <ebonics>this n*gga just stay ig’nant</ebonics>. This video, as Jones points out, fits much more closely with Crouch’s idea of minstrelsy, or the performance of stereotype for commercial gain.

“Head of the State” plays off the imagery and lyrics of “Hard in the Paint,” and by doing so, I think it becomes a multi-layered, satirical critique of class and race stereotypes and hip-hop video tropes.

Let’s think about this: Barack Obama was largely raised in Kansas. He not only attended college, but has degrees from Columbia University and Harvard Law — two Ivy League universities. Michelle Obama is similarly educated. So the idea of BHO unironically thug posing and rapping about his “main bitch,” and having his “own SK” is absurd. It is completely, utterly, and absolutely absurd.

And that absurdity makes “Head of the State” uncomfortable for the thinking viewer.

My second and third reactions were “Wow, this is rife with stereotypes, innit?” and “Sh*t, the tea baggers will have a field day with this.” And I suspect much of the criticism of “Head of the State,” from Crouch and others is related to W.W.W.P.T. — “What Will White People Think?” As Jones wrote, the truth is that, for better or worse, the mass media is America’s only introduction to black people.

But if you believe it’s plausible that a middle-class raised, currently upper-class, highly-educated black man, particularly the president of the United States would be chilling on the front steps of an abandoned house in a dangerous neighborhood, smoking Newports and dancing with a bottle of Smirnoff while surrounded by persons of questionable repute, I must ask who clings more tightly to the black-man-as-thug stereotype — you or Baracka Flocka?

And that’s why I love this “Head of the State,” video. It sticks a finger square in the eye of fake thug rappers who pimp gangster imagery for profit. And it sticks a finger in the eye of those who see Ivy League educated black people in the White House and manage to reduce them — and by extension all of us — to a narrow, negative stereotype.

Related:

Jay Smooth’s Raw Footage “I Forgot He Was Black.”

*Okay, raise your hand if an inappropriate HNIC joke has crossed your mind January 20, 2009.

  • Anonymous

    Great post; it made me think about the video differently. I wasn’t enraged by it, but I wasn’t really entertained by it, either. But then again, I wasn’t familiar with the Waka Flocka Flame song. The only correction I have: President Obama was not raised in Kansas, but in Hawaii (and Indonesia).

  • Anonymous

    Yes, Presient Obama spent his early childhood in Hawaii and Indonesia. But
    if I recall correctly, he pre-teen and teen years were sent in Kansas with
    his grandparents.

  • Critical Eye

    Here’s the problem I have with this video: it is NOT CLEAR exactly what is being parodied or satirized. By definition, satire is when you use scathing irony, derision, and wit to ridicule human vice or folly. By looking at this video, I’m seems like the film-maker is not clear of the definition himself: is he satirizing Barack Obama or satirizing Waka Flocka Flame???? If , as the article says, the video, “sticks a finger square in the eye of fake thug rappers who pimp gangster imagery for profit”, then WHY WASN’T THE RAPPER MADE UP TO LOOK LIKE WAKA FLOCKA FLAME???? And then the article claims that it satirizes those who reduce Obama to a hoodrat. If that is the case, then WHY DIDN’T WE SEE THE PEOPLE WHO REDUCE OBAMA TO THAT NARROW STEREOTYPE, i.e., racist white politicians, Tea Party Members???? You can’t call something a parody or a satire if you don’t see THE GUILTY ONES (those who are guilty of the human vice or folly) also being satirized. Therefore, since this video does not show that, it is half-stepping. Learn what satire and parody is before attempting another one.  Films like, “Bamboozled”, “Network”, “CB4″ and, “Fear of a Black Hat”, are great examples of satire because not only do they show the problem, they show WHO EXACTLY IS COMPLICIT and GUILTY of committing said vice or folly. For someone to claim that he was inspired by those, you may want to go back to the woodshed and study again. 

    -Critical Eye-

  • Anonymous

    “By definition, satire is when you use scathing irony, derision, and wit to ridicule human vice or folly.”

    Call me crazy, but I think this is entirely ironic and downright witty, again, because it is absurd. It challenges the vice and folly of anti-black racism because it’s incongruous that an Ivy-league educated son of highly-educated parents raised on the not-exactly-mean streets of suburban Kansas would be a thug or a gangster rapper.

    Satire doesn’t ridicule with name-calling or simple mockery. It ridicules by making people uncomfortable and going just beyond the pale of what is acceptable as a way of holding up a mirror to the viewer or reader. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satire and Stephen Colbert’s entire career. Juxtaposition and exaggeration are both present and counted-for in this video. Kurt Vonnegut is considered one of American literature’s best satirists, and he typically *does not* explicitly point fingers at “who is to blame.”