TOLD YA – BET EXPLOITS BLACK CULTURE FOR WHITE PROFITS
Is BET really the Belly of the Beast?
An open letter from Andreas Hale
To friends, colleagues and those that should know,
As of today (September 8, 2009) I am no longer the Executive Editor of Music at BET.com.
Upon entering the position at BET I said that I needed one year to see what really went on inside the belly of the beast. I needed 365 days to sleep with the enemy and infiltrate the system. One year to see if they REALLY wanted change at BET.
As someone who has been critical of BET for many years, it surprised many that I would leave my post at HipHopDX last year to take a position at BET. But it was an opportunity I absolutely had to take. I could no longer be critical of this company without accepting the opportunity to change it when given. Although I was hired to bring about change, I was systematically shut down. I wasn’t hired to make noise, I was hired to be silenced.
The truth of the matter is that everything that you thought was wrong with BET is true.
Over the past year I’ve seen a lot to reinforce my position that BET is too far gone in the negative to turn into a positive. We have all always thought the worst, but to actually see it in action is another thing in its entirety. The unprofessionalism, the tom foolery, the favors, the misappropriation of resources, the bad ideas that reinforce negative stereotypes, the emasculation of men, the meetings that break down in full fledged cursing battles, the unpaid overtime, the tears from employees scared for their underpaid and overworked positions and ultimately the unwillingness to change are all harsh realities that I’ve witnessed firsthand.
That is not to say that there aren’t some good people who have sat in the offices of BET. Unfortunately, the good people are not in positions of power to instill any change. Instead, they work their fingers to the bone just to keep their jobs in this harsh economic climate. The other good people ran out of the door as soon as an another employment opportunity presented itself. To say BET was a revolving door would be an understatement.
I came in with a plan to provide balance and to deliver good music to the masses and help make BET relevant again – at least in the dot com world. Those attempts were shut down by out of touch executives who run a dot com but could barely turn on a computer. By those who judge their metrics by page views over absolute unique visitors (that‘s ad sales talk). By those who simply don’t understand the internet.
They brought me in because of my track record but never once took a look at my body of work. If they did, they would have known that I was the pen behind editorials such as “BET’s Coon Picnic” or were aware of the many times I have been critical of their award shows and programming. All they knew is that I played a major role in making a once unknown website into a online media outlet that surpassed theirs and they wanted a piece of the action. Too bad they never researched who I really was.
During my tenure I worked long hours and sometimes succeeded at bringing in decent content to try to reflect the change I wanted to achieve. But it wasn’t without opposition. While some interviews and content initiatives were able to make it through, many others were either shut down or met with ridicule. I offered ideas to incorporate the blog world and to spotlight new talent before MTV did. Those ideas were met with comments such as “This isn’t HipHopDX” or “You don’t know what you are talking about.”
BET is not about the quality of your work. Rather, BET is about the relationships you have with powerful people within the company. BET is not about challenging. Instead, BET is about accepting and saying “yes.” If you have known or followed me over the years, you would know that these are things that simply are not in my character and ultimately resulted in my removal.
For the artists and labels that I have worked with for years, I tried. I did whatever I could to achieve that balance many of us wanted to see happen. To the writers who wanted to writer for BET, I made an attempt but was never given a budget to work with.
Upon my arrival, I was told I would be given a staff. Not true. I had a staff of one to carry out daily operations on a website. I fought tooth and nail to accomplish the minimum (an embeddable player and a site people could navigate) and was constantly brushed off. It was a position that was set up for failure. But I endured as long as I could.
Alas, I have been removed from my position after infiltrating the system and the timing was perfect. I wasn’t let go because the site’s numbers were down. Not because I didn’t work hard. Simply because of a personality clash with an individual whose proverbial ass I didn’t kiss enough. Again, not about the work you do but about the relationships you keep and the sides you take.
I’d like to thank BET for covering the cost of my relocation to bring me to the great city of New York/New Jersey. I’d also like to thank them for putting me in close quarters with people who think like me and will hopefully work with in the near future. I’d also like to thank them for providing me enough controversial content that I observed firsthand and will make for many tales to be told.
I said it and I meant in: One year to either make changes or move on. I left HipHopDX on September 16th 2008. Today is September 8, 2009. Eight days short of a year. Most thought I wouldn’t even last that long. But in that year I’ve had my greatest fears about Black Entertainment Television affirmed.
There is so much wrong with BET that I’d rather not break it down in a single email.
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October 16th, 2009 at 17:26
Fact is viacom owns BET, the guy that own viacom,
Sumner Red stone, is a real cracka. I saw a interview
of him. and he said, he bought BET only because it
was generating profits,from a certain market,he otherwise would not be entering. And since the profits have gone down,they’ve cut the budget and employees of BET by 50%,and if profits continue to go down, he’s will be cutting more, not try add more and new content to bring in more viewers. This guy said he’s a straight capitalist.When they ask him was he concerned about the cultural content of BET suffering because of the cuts in their operating budget. He said he is only interest in it as a business venture to generate profits, and that they have competent people at BET to work out any problems as far cultural content, and any other challenges the BET Network may be facing. And that he’s a business guy, and that he might sell the some parts his entertainment holdings to his daughter, she want to buy and control the MTV’s,Disney,BET,VH1,.He said
his daughter has made him pretty good offer.
Now this guy has charged by other media networks
for manipulation of public opinion.He owns the largest
television and radio station network in the United States.That’s CBS,Paramount,CBS Records,CBS Television Studios and most of their production assets,the MTV’S,Comedy Central,CW,Showtime,VH1,Spike,
Logo,Nickelodeon,Teen Nick,Nick Jr.,TV Land, and a hold lot more.He even took Google to court over video
content, and Google Compromised, a legal term for made a deal with him.BET is currently a plantation overseen by house nigs, uncle toms,and they hate real niggas. What those uncle toms are hiding from Black people that watch BET,is that BET is being run by a real redneck that doesn’t give a damn about Black people Black culture, Black music, Black movies,hip hop,or anything else that has to do with Black
people period. He let those uncle toms and tometts know that any niggas that gets outta line and not gettin his money, to kick those hoes off the plantation or their next. And that’s real world shit Black people don’t know, and most don’t want to know.But Jessie Jackson, Al Sharpton, the NAACP,the Urban League, and the Black Caucus know,and their not saying nothin,.That’s why I always ask, who’s really doin the pimpin. But he and his boys did order the Business Pro Pimp Kits, with Life Time Guarantee. Their not fuckin around!