Why Blackish is SO Problematic

When I first heard that we were going to get a TV show about an upper middle class black family, I was thrilled. There weren't a lot of positive black shows for my generation so I grew up on shows like: The Cosby Show, A Different World, and Living Single. I was brought in an upper middle class Black American family and I wanted to see more variations of that. More Black American nuclear families.

As I sat with my mother, minutes before the premiere, I was hopeful that this show would end all sort of stereotypes. The commercials always looked promising. Showing the father, played by Anthony Anderson (Transformers, Hustle & Flow), walking into his LA advertising office with the sun shining on his bright future ahead. His wife, played by Tracee Ellis Ross (Girlfriends, Daddy's Little Girls), a nurse. Their kids are quirky and they have a sassy grandfather that also lives with them.

Something wasn't right though. What started as something hopeful turned into a long sigh and a lot of head shaking. There were so many flaws: racist, homophobic, sexist. I didn't want anyone to see this. This isn't how I wanted black families to be represented. I didn't want the father to tell his son that he couldn't play hockey because it was a "white man" sport. I didn't want the grandfather to be sexist towards his daughter-in-law. It doesn't help that it comes on a primetime television station and at a time that most families were watching TV.

In hoping that we maybe it was just a bad pilot, I continued to keep up with the show; I was wrong. It got worse. In the third episode the father "taught" his son how to get women as a black man. Which just ended up with him cat calling women. I want to like this show so much but I refuse to get behind a show where racism, homophobic, and sexism is part of it. I can't speak for most people, especially the black community. But this show is not only damaging to the black community but it is also damaging to the rest of the world with perpetuating stereotypes that just aren't true. C'mon black producers and directors. We are better than this.