To: Jamie Foster Brown, Publisher of Sister 2 Sister
From: Eddie Griffin
RE: S2S Publisher Interview With DL Hughley
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Since the Fort Worth Bass Hall protest, D. L. Hughley has continually made reference to my booing him while he was here on stage. I have become the butt of his most recent fresh jokes. This I don’t mind. The more he degrades me, the less he degrades our women. I would rather the joke be on me.
But may I beg your pardon, Ms. Brown, one of your readers wrote that essentially you “cheesed it” with Hughley in the August 2007 edition of your magazine. As I re-read the interview, I read these statements:
First:
Jamie: You said those were some of the ugliest girls you've ever seen?
D.L.: Right, that's what I said as a joke, period, because I watched the game. I didn't watch the press conference; I watched the game. So it was a joke. So now, three months later, people are picking up on it and I kinda refuse to apologize for telling a joke. I guess people want a level of controversy.
Tell me, Ms. Brown: How do you “kinda refuse to apologize”?
Second:
D.L.: I guess, Jamie, all I can say is this: When I grew up, everything that a comedian-and I can only speak for myself-almost everything we talk about is painful. And the reason I do comedy now is from pain.
Jamie: All comedians say that; that it's from pain.
D.L.: When I deal with something, even as painful as it is, my mother used to tell me you have to laugh to keep from crying. I was the ugly, nappy-headed Black boy in the neighborhood, I was the dumb dude. So I learned all of that stuff.
Ms. Brown, This is not a comedian. This is a psychosis. Note he admitted: “I was the ugly, nappy-headed Black boy… the dumb dude.”... [Note also his similar reference to the Rutgers female basketball team players]. His comedy seems to be a mask of revenge for a miserable childhood, most vehemently against women.
He says of us religious leaders (whom he called "clowns") should be helping teach some kid to read, or helping someone innocent person get out of jail, and on and on... as if he doesn’t realize that he is one of the distractions from our regular work in the field. Why does an elder have to take timeout and chasten a child?
I do not want my grandson to grow up and be like D. L. Hughley. At 5-years old, he already uses the b-word. Tomorrow, he’ll be sagging, if I let him.
No, Mr. Hughley is not to be honored and respected as a role model. And, wherever he performs should be rated XXX outside the door, in order that the public be forewarned of the type of content to expect.
I'll tell my grandson, if grandpa had his way, he would stamp 666 on the forehead of everybody that like Mr. Hughley’s kind of filth.
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DL should continue to be boycotted, since he kinda refused to apologize. When will black folk get it, and stop cooning and rewarding poor behavior? We owe better to our children than to accept such poor mentality and shallow standards of our self. I was made aware that DL had a new show coming up on BET, and I won't be watching!! Nor will I be viewing "Hot Ghetto Mess" with or without the name change.
ReplyDeleteAKA LYnn
Eddie you are correct although Ill say this, since I grew up folks have always been ragging on the darkest skinned people the most its nothing knew.
ReplyDeleteI have heard folks say things such as if she was lighter she would be absolutely gorgeous.
Or one time when Langston Hughes wrote an article about a preacher who he described as a black the preacher actually sent world to back to Langston to not refer to him as black but to call him brown.
So this self hatred has been going on for a long time now it didnt start with DL, now boycotting his ignorant behind is a start but as a community it is time for us to do some work on how we view ourselves otherwise the next ignorant commedian will do the same or a similar thing.
Eddie along with ramming our foot in Hugleys butt we need to start loving ourselves no matter how dark or what type of hair we have.
Good post. I have heard of this before. People who are misfits sometimes use jokes to get people to like them and stop teasing them. Sometimes the person who is bullied becomes a bully because then they are no longer the victim. He has fun hurting the feelings of others the way his were hurt. Often people use sarcasm as a passive-aggressive way to hurt people. They can insult people and pass it off as a joke but there is usually unhappiness underneath.
ReplyDeleteYou are truly killing me. Get over yourself. It is comedy. It is supposed to be funny. You cannot censor diverse viewpoints in America - that mentality took down the Panthers. Let DL have his opinion. If he thinks the sistas are nappy-headed and ugly then it is okay. He was just making a joke to deal with pain, not payback people who talked about him when he was a child. He is not afraid to step out away from the constraints of popular opinion and say what is on his mind. You have to respect that kind of courage. I wholeheartedly support his right to say it. Another thing we need to keep in mind is that what is being said is tongue-in-cheek. You know he certainly loves his wife of 21 years and he loves black women, but if you have ever seen his show you know he makes fun of her, he makes fun of people in the audience without regard to gender or race. I find that quite liberating. Free your mind!
ReplyDelete"You know he certainly loves his wife of 21 years and he loves black women" How do we know that. There are lots of me who date, marry, and sleep with women but have great contempt for them and hurt them. Men who beat the crap out of their women will still profess to love them. DL Hughley could hate women that much and you don't know.
ReplyDelete"You cannot censor diverse viewpoints in America" Sure you can. Mainstream media censors out diverse viewpoints and so do companies and schools. Every viewpoint is not equally welcomed and supported.
"He was just making a joke to deal with pain, not payback people who talked about him when he was a child." How do you know? Only his therapist would know for sure. I offered an opinion but he would only know for sure after some long and deep self-reflection. He might not even realize what he is doing.
Dave Chapelle did not and he ended up quitting his show. Richard Pryor did not until he visited AFrica and vowed to never use the n-word in his comedy again. Chris Rock did not until later he decided to never do the joke about here being differences between Black people and n-words. Sometimes later on these comedians realize the hurt they were causing and change their minds. A few years from now DL might appologize and vow to change his comedy routines. You don't know for sure what he was thinking or what he will think about his behaviour in the future. No one likes to be told what not to do, but in the future he might think that what he did was actually in bad taste and offensive.
Mark, it does go deep. Remember Stevie Wonder's "Living For The City"? "His sister's black, but she is sho nuff pretty". But? And this is from a blind man!
ReplyDeleteHughley has the right to say anything he wants to. And I or anyine else has the right to critisize him for it if we don't like it. That includes boycotting him. And I'm sorry, but a supposedly mature man in his mid 40's is not courageous for saying something stupid, no matter the context.