One would think that racism would be an idea of the uncivilized past. The concept of unprovoked prejudice on a group of people based on nothing but their appearance seems so out of place and illogical. Yet as the latest episode of the Boondocks has shown, racism is not only still prevalent - its still taken badly.

For those of you that don’t know, the Boondocks is an animated satire by Aaron McGruder lampooning modern African American culture. It basically follows the formula of “this show lets the author whine about society” but does an excellent job at drawing parallels between current issues and old yet still prevalent ideals while maintaining entertaining storylines and caricatures. In other words, it typically makes fun of a trending topic by making its flanderized characters go beyond the impossible.

The last episode still followed this formula, but unfortunately for the show it’s trending topic was something that wasn’t exactly trendy: racism. Here’s the plot: Uncle Ruckus, an African American character known on the show for being racist against African Americans, writes a racist song that gets picked up by his racist singer idol Jimmy Rebel. At first Ruckus pretends that Uncle Ruckus is a white guy and that he is his “man-servant” but is eventually found out, except Rebel is completely fine with it. They go back to Racist Records to make a ton of musical “hits” but are chased away at a live performance when the audience sees that Uncle Ruckus is black. Rebel still wants Ruckus to sing with him, as he genuinely enjoyed the songs they made, but Ruckus runs off shouting Rebel wasn’t as “racist as [he] thought [he was].” So as you can see, the episode’s presentation on rapid-fire racism gives the show the impression that it’s morally confused.

The self-hating racist himself, Uncle Ruckus (no relation).

Now, according to the many comments under the site I saw the show here, many fans of the Boondocks were not fans of this particular episode. Sure, the show has always breathed racist - thanks to n-word privileges McGruder can get away with dropping the n-bomb in EVERY EPISODE. But all of a sudden, instead of using it as the standard ebonic equivalent for “man” or “dude” (which is the acceptable version), the word is used in the controversial racist manner we all know and…hate. With the “-er” at the end. By white people.

But if you think about it, this was supposed to be the point of the episode: blatant racism exists but you can ignore it. The plot takes place with one of the lesser characters of the show, somebody already established to be he most racist character on the show. That means the author is indirectly saying he is not in favor of the topic by limiting the use of the main characters, whose only roles are to denounce Uncle Ruckus:

• Grandad: I think I miss Uncle Ruckus. Is there something wrong with me?
• Huey: Yes.
• Riley: ‘n’ he gay.

Half of the story doesn’t even take place in the hometown - it’s implied to be the South, which was deliberately made to be as racist as possible. You can notice how the white people in the episode were portrayed as rednecks and Confederates in addition to their racism, playing on the prejudices assumed upon the Southern white stereotype. In a way, that was just as racist as the typical portrayal of African Americans in the other episodes of the show.

Furthermore, the titular Jimmy Rebel, the white guy, was shown to be the lesser of the two racists. Although he was pretty damn racist, Rebel seemed to explicitly look for the quality of the song rather than the content. He was the one who suggested that Ruckus perform with him, despite the high probability that the audience would be too racist to accept him. At the end he even explicitly states that he wanted to sing songs other than “just about n****rs.” Knowing all of this, the viewer would be less confused when Ruckus runs off CRYING over the fact that Rebel was not as racist as he was.

I don’t want to make the conjecture that this episode “sucked” because of the racism either. You have to admit that the jokes were as intelligent as ever, regardless of their racism. So maybe cramming in as much of it as possible was the point. Either the mass number of jokes was simply to show much racism sucked, or they were taking refuge in vulgarity to maintain their audience (which was the appeal point in the first place).

In the end, it’s best not to hate the show. Hate the fact that racism still exists, but remember that you can ignore it, and anyone who is racist is a complete idiot. Now, if you excuse me, I need to see how bad the Japanese dub of the Boondocks is.

Thoughts?