Tag Archives: television show

Buckwheat

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Buckwheat: (n) an Asian plant milled into flour

The first black person I ever saw was on a television screen, watching “The Little Rascals.”

His name was Buckwheat.

He looked really weird to me. And of course, the producers of the show did little to play down his ethnicity.Dictionary B

No–that was the goal. The purpose was to establish that even though this crazy group of kids had invited in a snooty rich girl–Darla–and a black bug-eyed little boy named Buckwheat, that it was completely normal because these were all children of the neighborhood.

From that experience, I learned the power of imperfection.

While some people may scream about injustice in the world, there are those who quietly and perhaps awkwardly introduce ingenious concepts into our lives, and by doing so, gradually contribute to the common good.

Even though Buckwheat was a very stereotypical “tar-baby” type of character, the mere fact that he was in the gang and included with all the white kids, rich kids, Italian kids and kids with cowlicks, caused me to deal with the possibility that the races might just possibly be comfortable mixing together.

Without that, I don’t know how long it would have been before I ever saw what we then referred to as a “Negro.” And by that time I would not have been six years old and pliable to the notion of accepting another race.

Even when ideas are not perfect, if within their imperfection they are moving toward social justice, we should certainly support them.

 

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Bogus

Bogus: (adj) not genuine or true; fake.

Dictionary B

Although I’m sure the word “bogus” has not been used by anybody since Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure finished playing at dollar theaters, I must say that the definition and the concept is rather important, and certainly would be enlightening for our times.

Somewhere along the line, or absent a line, we have begun to believe that real life has to be replaced by the exposure of reality.

So if a television show is done about a preacher and his family, we don’t focus on the good deeds, but rather, the conflicts that often arise in their character, which contradict their Biblical nature and expose their human foibles.

We are fascinated with failure.

Pointing at bad people does make us feel good. Therefore, symbolism is preferred to experience.

Whether it’s politics–where we have an Electoral College with a confounding number of votes to select our next leader; or the College Football Playoff, with a coalition of experts to muse over the manly efforts of the varying teams; or a church, where we replace the message of the Nazarene with bread and wine as a token of his life, it is bogus.

But like I said, since that word is outdated, we will just have to find another way to describe a season where illegitimacy is honored–because to revere the legitimate might leave us all convicted of our lack.

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