AJ Johnson on Media

AH: Earlier in the conversation you mentioned that there was this image of, the Black male image that is portrayed in the media by stereotypes, have you, so obviously by being in college you defy one of the stereotypes of Black males, do you see yourself as always being an advocate for another idea of being what a Black male is?

AJ: Absolutely, I am a communications major and I am really happy with my major finally, and in doing so, I have come to understand the power of words and symbols in media and I feel like in media, I mean media is owned by a certain type of person, like media is owned by White men often Jewish who are in charge of all the media and these men may well not have been immersed in any Black culture at all, so what they see they are going to allow to be portrayed on television whether it is good or bad for our culture or not because we do not have anyone up there in power seats in media to be able to say that this is right or this wrong for the Black culture, this is good for us and I have a different understanding of what culture means than you, whereas all White men have an understanding of culture, but they don’t have our understanding of the culture and they cannot possibly that understanding of the culture, so that they are going to continue to portray these negative stereotypes not so much to hurt us, but because they do not know any better they haven’t had to grow up with it. So I will forever be advocating that we need men and especially minorities to be able to get these power positions to be able to fight against this same ignorance in culture or in media in general because that is the only way it is going to get any better because the way it is nothing is going to change, not at all, and only by I guess speaking out these truths and hoping and well, speaking out for understanding and trying to raise the consciousness of the people, it may not stick at first, it probably won’t stick at first, but if I reach one person, if I am able to tip that one person off to think critically about the world around them. That is one step closer to building the world that we need to live in as opposed to the world that we currently live in.