Tyler Perry....I Need You to Stop

So before I start I already know this post probably won't win me any friends but  after seeing the previews for Madea's Witness Protection, I can't stand it any longer.  Now I know some of my people love Tyler Perry, they watch all those terrible shows, they pay eleven dollars a ticket to see his movies, and they bring buses filled with the entire church congregations to watch his famous drag shows stage plays, but I cannot drink the southern sweet tea flavored kool-aid. 

I'm tired of the Sambos and Mamie like characters, the over use of trite Christian themes and his employment of ignorant buffoons who can't pronounce words and don't know the difference between Algebra and Aljero.  I'm tired of seeing some fat angry black woman running around, brandishing weapons and showing less intelligence than my 3 year old cousin and I'm tired of seeing skinny angry black women in every movie.  I don't want to see another light skin black man save some damsel in distress from her violent dark skin husband and for at least a year no more CRACK HEAD STORIES! I'm tired of the repeated story lines and sophomoric writing and the terrible acting.  I'm sick of the faux drama he creates in every one of his shows and if I see another damn person who's had their house burned down or who's mother, father, sister, cousin is on some type of drug I'm going to lose it. 

And I think what really bothers me is the fact that Perry honestly believes he's speaking for black America....AND doesn't mind saying it.  Now I'm not saying that nobody lives in this perpetual state of ignorance but we all surely don't and what's probably most troubling is the fact that white America is eating this stuff up.  Characters like Madea and Mr. Brown have become household names in black and white suburbia.  These shucking and jiving images aren't making white people uncomfortable, they've embraced them and they aren't laughing with Madea and people like her, they're laughing at them.  Sadly black Americans are only to blame.  Large amounts of us have embraced Perry as our great filmmaker and spoke person and turned our back on people like Spike Lee who have spoken out against him.

Now before I'm called a hater and a sufferer of "crabs in a barrel" syndrome I do want to say this.  I'm not knocking his hustle I'm knocking his message and methods.  As a Christian I don't think pimping the Church for monetary gain is cute and as a conscious black individual I don't appreciate ANY ONE portraying my race as ignorant or coonish.  The NAACP fought to have Amos and Andy removed from the air for their coonery so for that same reason I think we need to take a more critical look at Perry and his many works

So maybe instead of running to the theaters to see Madea Goes to the Unemployment line or Madea Fries Chicken we can all pop in Spike Lee's Bamboozled because that's where we're heading if this mess doesn't stop.