Fox’s Juan Williams: ‘Dr. King Would Cry’ Over State of Black Families
On Fox News Sunday, analyst Juan Williams praised the progress of African Americans since Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech fifty years ago this week, but reminded the panel that there were still considerable challenges facing the black community on familial and cultural levels.
After commending figures like President Barack Obama, former Secretaries of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, and Supreme Court Justices Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas, Williams denounced the breakdown of the African American family and the undue influence of hip hop culture.
“If you look at the realities of today, you’ve got to talk about things like family breakdown,” Williams said. “You’ve got to talk about the fact that 70% of blacks are born out of wedlock—I think Dr. King would cry. You’ve got to talk about the fact that there is a horrific dropout rate in the country, failure of urban schools. That’s the civil rights challenge of this generation.”
“And the culture!” Williams continued. “Think about the culture for a second. Jay-Z, on his latest album, he’s using the ‘n-word’ repeatedly. It’s pornographic! It invites people to think authentic blackness is, you’ve got to be hip hop, you’ve gotta be hard. Education—not valued. To me, this is the tragedy of our day.”
Watch the full clip here, via Fox News:
————
>> Follow Evan McMurry (@evanmcmurry) on Twitter
Image via Fox
New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!
Comments
↓ Scroll down for comments ↓