In terms of African American issues - who has the right to shape the debate?

[JustAnotherGen]

Thanks to noiretextatique.

Who shapes the debate - the dominant culture or African Americans?

Who determines what language is used during debate?

Who determines what tone is used?

Who determines when the arguments get to be infused with satire and humor or hell - even sarcasm?

[jaysunb]

1. When you're talking about me and mine

I determine all of the above, otherwise we're just game playing.

[kwassa]

2. White people have the right to shape everything, don't they?

I mean, if it doesn't fit within their personal life experience, it can't possibly be true or even exist.

It didn't happen to them, therefore it is impossible.

[Number23]

3. Exactly.

I mean, if it doesn't fit within their personal life experience, it can't possibly be true or even exist

I blame Hollywood. Damn near every single movie ever made about slavery, the Civil Rights Movement or the Native American holocaust was told from the white perspective. We forever exist as props in the "real" (white) story which is of course, the only story that matters.

(I'm being slightly sarcastic, of course. I blame much more than Hollywood)

[kwassa]

4. well, there are all those movies about the white crusader person saving the poor black folk

So, that must be true, too! Black people can't possibly save themselves. That is what the movies tell us.

It came from Hollywood, so it must be true.

[FreedRadical]

5. You know...

As I read that question what emerged for me was, apply this question to the Black; Brown Red Yellow shapes of "debate". I mean it seems to me I have been involved in these "debates" from a position that was not my own.