The Hypocrisy of BET's Bob Johnson's Obama Smears

By Davey D, Davey D's Hip-Hop Corner. Posted January 24, 2008.

Former BET president and founder Bob Johnson is an asshole and hypocrite. Lemme not pull punches, be politically correct, beat around the bush or try to impress high-brow readers who feel I should be less crass and gentler with my words so I can appeal to their sensibilities. It's 2008 and unfortunately being nice and proper doesn't quite get the message across, especially when it comes to Bob Johnson and his recent disparaging remarks about presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, I'm referring to Johnson getting onstage to introduce Sen. Hillary Clinton at a rally and expressing outrage about Obama's past. He said, "Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood. I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in his book."

It was a cheap shot -- referencing Obama's drug use when he was a young man. This was an activity that Obama freely admitted to in his memoirs Dreams From My Father, and on some level I can see it being fair game, but coming from a guy like Johnson, that's like former President Bill Clinton giving marital advice to Halle Berry's former husband and admitted sex addict Eric Bonet. I heard Johnson make these remarks, and I was like, "Negro, go back into your cave; please sit down and leave the politics to someone else."

I keep asking myself: Where does Johnson get off slamming Obama about the wrongs of drug use when he piloted one of the largest media institutions (BET) that provided a worldwide platform that for the most part glorified and legitimized the lifestyles of those who not only used drugs but also sold them? In all the years we've known of billionaire Bob Johnson, we have not seen him get on any stage and diss former drug dealers like Jay-Z, 50 Cent, Rick Ross or any number of artists whose videos he would routinely play coupled with sit-down interviews conducted by fawning hosts who never, ever challenged these artists for resurrecting a "criminal" lifestyle they supposedly left behind in both their songs and videos.

The Bob Johnson we know has never gone out of his way to publicly smash on artists who like Mary J Blige or Fergie, who admitted to using drugs in the past and have since gotten their lives together and moved onward and upward. If anything, the former head of BET could be seen publicly praising them while courting them to appear at his award shows or Spring Bling concerts.

Johnson certainly never came out swinging on admitted drug abusing artists like Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown, Flava Flav or DMX, who all had reality shows either on BET or one of the other stations within the Viacom network where he had influence as a VP.

One would think a guy of Johnson's new found "high moral character" would've been smashing on drug use and drug peddling a long time ago. Could you imagine what sort of shock waves would've been sent around the world if Johnson, even as a retired media mogul, had spoken out and said, "No, Bobby! No, Whitney! We won't give them a reality show until those two get themselves healed and free of drugs"? Can you imagine if he insisted the DMX show Soul of a Man was centered around him getting over cocaine addiction?

Imagine the shock waves if Johnson said, "Hell no, Jigga. We ain't supporting your album American Gangster cause you highlighting the sordid lifestyle of heroin dealers like Frank Lucas, and we are against that type of behavior? Could you imagine if Johnson found his nuts when at the helm of BET and shut down any and all videos from artists who had "dirty pasts" that they were trying to exploit?

Sadly the Bob Johnson we know has seemingly had no problem in making billions from highlighting the drug-dealing, drug-using lifestyle. Adding to this disappointment is the fact that this proud African-American billionaire did things like remove programming that would make us question and shun such questionable behavior. It was on Johnson's watch that BET got rid of great award-winning shows like Teen Summit. It was on Johnson's watch that we saw incredible commentators like Tavis Smiley and Ed Gordon disappear. It was on Johnson's watch we saw the BET nightly news shrink and then become nonexistent. These shows were shut down in spite of the objections ranging from scholars like Dr. Cornel West to the eight major black fraternities and sororities to, more recently, church groups leading the "Enough Is Enough" campaign. It was on Johnson's watch that many in the community were up in arms protesting BET when they had that Step-N-Fetcher-like cartoon called "Cita's World." Y'all remember that one, right?

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Davey D is a hip-hop historian, journalist, DJ and community activist.

http://www.daveyd.com/

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