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/* Written 11:57 AM  Nov 10, 1994 by ctwo in igc:ctwo.news */
/* ---------- "Selling Success to People of Color" ---------- */
The Sweet Sell of Success: Glossy Mags Aimed at Communities of
Color

By Larry Salomon

*****************************************************************
This article originally appeared in the July/August 1993 issue
of Third Force. It has been reprinted many times. The July/August
1993 issue was a special issue on the media.
*****************************************************************

Complaining about media coverage is a time-honored tradition in
comunities of color. The "white-owned media" ignores important
issues, trivializes concerns and political movements, misses the
big stories and paints a picture of inner-city people of color  as
addiction to welfare and drugs and suffering from a variety of
"underclass" afflictions. But this way of framing the problem
implies that if the major commercial media were only owned by
people of color, the coverage would be different. At least in the
case of high-circulation glossy monthly magazines (the only
national media owned by people of color), the reality doesn't come
close to the ideal. In an enterprise where advertising fills the
owners' pockets, the class affiliation of the top executives far
outweighs their racial identity.

Fifty years ago, when John H. Johnson published his first edition
of Negro Digest, he likely didn't believe he was initiating a
future trend. The Digest was discontinued a few years later, but
in its place grew Ebony and Jet magazines and with them the
beginnings of a new Black-owned and operated media. With Johnson
Publishing Company (JPC) leading the way, the medium has given
birth to other high-quality, glossy and mass commercial magazines
aimed at communities of color. Monthlies like Essence, Hispanic,
Asian  Business,Hispanic Business and Black Enterprise all owe
their success to Johnson and the path JPC beat.

Johnson's own success story was recently featured in Ebony's 50th
Anniversary issue, which isn't all that surprising, given the
magazine's tendency to glorify individual success stories of
people like Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey and Bill Cosby. In fact,
Ebony shares this tendency with its offspring, as Essence,
Hispanic and other monthlies continue to produce issue after issue
emphasizing rags-to-riches stories of athletes and entertainers
like Gloria Estefan who have "made it big."

The image projected by practically every major commercial magazine
geared to communities of color is the one of individual
success---affirming the oft-repeated American creed that if you
work hard enough and apply yourself, you can achieve anything.
"Ebony promotes and speaks for Black middle and upper class
values," said Austin Long-Scott, a journalism professor at San
Francisco State University and a member of the university's Center
for the Integration and Improvement of Journalism. "They have
never dealt very effectively outside those values. The whole tone
of the magazine, from the ads and images and photos, basically
convey the message that what we want as African Americans is to
integrate into the values of mainstream American society.  Their
angle is to push the American capitalist ethic, which is certainly
individualistic and says that if you go along, you'll get along."

THE AMERICAN DREAM
Take for example a feature in a recent issue of Hispanic, which
gushed over the stunning success of Estefan and her "estimated net
worth value of 40 million dollars, making her one of America's
wealthiest Hispanics." In typically breathless prose, Estefan was
praised as an example of the American Dream come true---"the
daughter of anti-Castro Cuban immigrants who refused to see any
barriers on her road to success and stardom." Another recent issue
of Hispanic highlighted the bad press the Latino community gets
from big-city newspapers. According to editor Alfredo Estrada,
Hispanic's mission was to counter the negative images of gang
members with those of "Hispanic entrepreneurs" and other role
models. One might beg the question, which focus is more damaging?
The Black-oriented magazines, especially Ebony andJet follow a
similar formula. In between pages of advertisements for luxury
cars and hair care products are feature-length pieces on such
controversial topics as the Bobby Brown/Whitney Houston marriage
and the latest doings of Latoya Jackson. Ebony, in particular, has
successfully packaged the Black middle-and-upper- class ethic by
consistenly giving widespread coverage to emerging African
American business executives such as the vice-presidents of
Coca-Cola, IBM and other Fortune 500 companies. "Most of these
magazines have only a passing interest in things like civil
rights," says Robert Allen, author of Black Awakening in
Capitalist America and the senior editor of The Black Scholar.
"Their values are based on individualism and the self-help/you-can
make-it-too ideology which obviously does not speak to the issues
the community must deal with."

There are a few low-circulation magazines out there that make an
attempt to substantively address current political and social
concerns in commuities of color, but their cumulative reach is far
less than any one of the John Johnson magazines or the various
glossies that target high-income "consumers of color." The editors
and contributors to TheBlack Scholar, for instance, can spend a
year producing "The Urban Crisis 1993," but the magazine has a
circulation of only 10,000 people. Meanwhile, Ebony has a
circulation of 1.9 million, Jet and Essence both nearly a million
and Hispanic over 150,000.

As far as these mass-market publications are concerned, issues
like police conduct (unless you count the warm and fuzzy six-page
feature on new LAPD top cop Willie Williams) and the crisis of the
inner city barely exist, much less efforts to change them. A
recent Ebony survey of the "50 Leaders of Tomorrow" was filled
with Black faces in corporate America, millionaire entertainers
and athletes and recently elected big city politicians---a
veritable who's who of the Black Elite. Grassroots activists and
organizers struggling to improve the conditions faced by most
people of color in the United States were (with one or two
exceptions) nowhere to be found. For the folks Ebony and Jet care
about, Johnson proclaims, "despite real and continuing problems,
the American Dream is still alive and well in America." Maybe
Johnson's only other source than Ebony is Hispanic Business' now
annual "Rich List"---another who's who of the "Hispanic
Elite"---or Asian Business and their yearly survey of the "Most
Admired Companies."

Even the most pervasive corporate influence couldn't prevent the
Black-oriented magazine press from running feature stories
associated with Malcolm X last year, as Spike Lee's film
approached its release date. In accordance with the same tendency
to glorify individual success exhibited in a piece on Michael
Jackson, however, the coverage on Malcolm was plain awful. Ebony
spent its cover issue on Malcolm discussing in-depth how Denzel
Washington's portrayal was right on the money and on the many
difficulties the makers of the film had getting it released.
Absent was any kind of analysis explaining what relevance Malcolm
might have today.

In fact, the Black-oriented mass media takes basically the same
line on Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr. and other famous
political leaders as the white-owned press: that they were "great
men" who espoused universal values. The aspects of their lives and
work that upset the status quo, criticized capitalism or condemned
imperialist wars are studiously ignored.Essence  did a little
better with at least a thoughtful editorial on Malcolm's legacy,
but the bulk of the issue was devoted to a coversation with Betty
Shabazz and was mostly about the couple's personal life.

Every Black monthly (and most white ones, too) featured Malcolm on
late 1992 magazine covers, but most only went as far as an Upscale
(the name speaks for itself) by showing us nice glossies of the
man completely divorced from any real political content. Even
Black Enterprise got into the act, although naturally from the
angle of the major market success of the "X" fashion trend.

With the exception of Emerge , a new magazine that sometimes
offers a striking contrast to the lifestyle focus of the
Johnson-style magazines, a reader of the major Black monthlies
could have been led to believe that Malcolm X had done little more
than dethrone Michael Jackson as the "King of Pop." No wonder the
renewed interest in Malcolm X led to an "uprising" of X hats and
$50 t-shirts, but barely a glimmer of renewed political activity
in the African American community.

To be sure, the picture is not entirely bleak even in the worst of
these magazines. Ebony continues to publish the work of historian
Lerone Bennett, Jr. while Essence occasionally runs thoughtful
pieces by feminist writers like Angela Davis, June Jordan and
Paula Giddings. Despite the fact that nearly three-fourths of
magazine space is occupied by lengthy features on fashion, beauty
tips and "contemporary living" (i.e., home decor), Essence  and
the other Black magazines have at least published some critical
essays on such topics as racism in the criminal justice system and
aftermath of the Los Angeles  rebellion. Of course, the same could
be said of Newsweek, The Atlantic or even Fortune. The sporadic
appearance of counter-status quo tidbits does not change the
overall message.

"It is true that you can get a lot of information from places like
Ebony and Essence that you just wouldn't find anywhere else in the
mainstream press," says Long-Scott, adding that the fundamental
concern with getting into and living the middle class lifestyle is
unaffected.  "It varies with some. Essence is a little more
questioning, a little more critical, but for the most part these
magazines don't really attempt to shake up the status quo."

Interestingly, it was Ebony which, in 1955, courageously published
the gruesome photograph of Emmitt Till's mutilated face and body,
sparking much controversy, discussion and outrage which some have
said galvanized people to get involved in future civil rights
demonstrations. Today, with an entrenched readership relying on
the Fall Fashion Preview, there isn't much room (or so the wealthy
publishers and advertisers say) for the same kind of controversy.
In an era today in which a Martin Luther King speech would
probably be called "I Have a Nightmare," where does the average
person-of-color-on-the-street turn for cogent, substantive news
and analysis?  As mentioned, Emerge  (with a readership of
150,000) has, since its inception three years ago, started to
produce issues which avoid the polite decorum of so-called
objective outlets. Self-touted as "Black America's News Magazine,"
Emerge has just in the past few months taken a more provacative
approach, as evidenced by their May cover photo and (accompanying
story) which showed two white cops brutalizing a young Black man
under the bold headline, "It's War! Cops vs. Blacks." "We have
seen enough of the focus on athletes and entertainers," said
George Curry, Emerge's new editor-in-chief," and we've said
'enough!' This magazine is going to have a sharper edge to it and
we'll make no apologies for it. We recognize the need out there
and we think that many of the high-circulation magazines have
underestimated communities of color; they don't just want
celebrities, they want serious news too." With the exception of
Emerge aside, The Black Scholar's Allen is less sanguine. "The
fact is, and it's sad to say, the majority of our people still
rely only on television for their news and ideas. Ebony and the
other Johnson-type magazines have settled into serving middle
class interests, and within that middle class is the least
progressive segment which is not about rocking the boat. The real
tragedy is that there isn't a mass outlet for progressive ideas on
social issues to be heard in the community."

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Art McGee [amcgee@netcom.com]
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