Last weekend BET Awards 2016 premiered. I had forgotten it was airing until a commercial on Spike TV revealed itself; to my surprise this commercial indicated the awards shows was coming on next...on Spike TV. In an effort to record the Prince tribute, I pressed some button on the remote and saw another channel, LOGO, was also airing it too. To kill my curiosity I continued to scroll and caught that a host of channels: E!, MTV, Nickelodeon, etc. were covering the event.
Once it started, I though is the the power of Queen Bey? She was the opening act in a powerful and clearly comment provoking performance of freedom with Kendrick Lamar which illustrated tribal dancers taking the stage and dancing alongside her in water. Beyoncé also made HBO do a promo weekend when her visual album dropped a week before her tour.
There were several tributes to Prince. There were likely enough for his own mini-tribute time-slot; but of course sprinkling it throughout the full length of the awards show made more drama. There were so many great artist who presented Prince well.
As the award show continued there were several blatant and arguably shameless plugs for viewers to vote and know the platforms of these candidates. Some presenters were clear in sharing who they were voting for and why; while other performers were verbally silent and allowed for their clothing ensemble to do the speaking.
There was also Jesse Williams who was also a huge focal point of the awards show. The magnitude and longevity of his resume beyond Grey's Anatomy was beyond me until last night; but in his several minutes speech of being the recipient of BET Humanitarian Award, I marveled. Williams was direct and very clear about his mission, his goals, his ideas, and provided viewers with a plan on how to become a part of a movement focused on change for the better. Williams left no qualms regarding his position and verbalized focused on race, conditional freedom, and several other related topics. #blacklivesmatter
Although I have never been hard pressed to tune in for the BET awards show, I'm so glad I did! Im still not completely clear on what created its appearance on so many channels; however, I applaud BET for using their star power to create commentary on things that matter beyond just the popularity of music. It was courageous and widespread; I heard the messages and hope others did too!
I have used this as a platform to talk to others, both young and old about pop culture, history, voting and race issues. I have found this awards show as well as the avalanche of following commentary to be a great breeding ground for thought provoking conversation and education. No matter what your stance or opinion having the conversation is courageous as an individual and illustrates a change-maker within your community. I say- create a few ripples and cause a meaningful conversation, one with depth and hopefully related self-reflection. For we all know: change is difficult but necessary, so we must be the change we wish to see!
#latepost😅
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