Photo Credit: Michael B. Jordan/Instagram
If anyone knows Black Hollywood in 2020, it would be Michael B. Jordan. He starred in Black Panther, a black utopia, Fruitvale Station involving an officer who mistook his gun for his taser getting just 11 months in prison and recently Just Mercy alongside Jamie Foxx about overturning a wrongful murder conviction. He joined protesters in the streets of Century Center in LA asking for Hollywood to hire more blacks.
“I want us to invest in black staff, “ Jordan said. “I use my power to demand diversity but its time for studios and all the agencies, you see all these agencies, all these building that we’re standing in front of I want you to do better.”
“You committed to a 50/50 gender parity in 2020. Where is the challenge to commit to Black hiring? Black content led by black executives, black consultants. Are you policing our storytelling as well? Let us bring our darkness to the light. Black culture: the sneakers, sports, comedic culture that you guys love so much. We’ve dealt with discrimination at every turn. Can you help fund black brands, companies, cultural leaders, Black organizations?” Jordan added.
Jordan has a point because if you go through history, especially a lot of the black shows of the 90s and 2000s, you’ll see they’re covered in white writers which explains a lot of the exaggerated black behavior and stereotypes being portrayed in front of us. If black stories must be told, it’s important to have black voices doing the storytelling.
This piggybacks on Jordan sharing a picture of him standing in front of Public Enemy’s logo saying, symbol represented “the target on black folks’ backs.”
“Too many look at us as public enemies, only some see us as humans, and yet we need to be superhuman just to survive. We must strategize, organize, and train ourselves as we demand more. One arrest isn’t enough. This is just the beginning,” Jordan wrote.
