It has become more acceptable in today's time to create cultural biases due to society's submissive and unquestioning attitude towards the media's perception of certain ethnicities. "We live in a society that is racist and white," says Alice Walker during an interview (Bloom and Smith 940). Society depends heavily on these false images, sometimes unrealistic views, and preconceived notions towards people of different cultural backgrounds. More importantly, it is often the image of the black male that is tainted by these false depictions of him as a gangster, exotic primitive (Dates and Barlow viii), sexual aggressor (Dates and Barlow viii), and criminal in movies and television shows. With the following underlined traits black men are more apt to be society's source of entertainment, and the primary target for societal problems. .
In order to break this cycle of cultural ignorance, the media-which include you the people that perpetuate these ideas and the individuals who do nothing to educate the minds of those who are unaware of the truth-must stop broadcasting and encouraging bias, stop categorizing those of different backgrounds into subcultures, and further implement a more culturally welcoming attitude towards all ethnicities; and more notably that of the black male. .
Others may add that the images that are broadcast are in some way relative to images in which they've seen. Many individuals may add that the stereotypes that are created are associated to some truths. How can one prove that this brand of hopelessness on the African-American male is false and in no way reflects his attitude and behavior? One cannot prove this without experiencing every aspect of another culture for himself, nor can he or she begin to prove this without knowing every individual in ones culture; but all individuals do have the right to generate an opinion for themselves.
Furthermore, it cannot be said that stereotypes are completely false, and have no relevance to that which is stereotyped, but the media has no right to sway the opinion, nor the view of anyone or anything.