Fry that Chicken: Ms. Peaches and Her Ghetto Fried Chicken Song

Ok, I am black, no I don’t use the “n-word” like it is going out of style. I don’t believe that Spike Lee is right every time that he decides to rant about something, I do believe that he is a brilliant director. I don’t believe that all white people are racist and secretly want to hold my people down. I do believe that there is a “man” or a Mr. Big and when I find him, I will ask him politely for him to get his foot off of my neck. I do listen to hip-hop music, and I am over thirty also I am still trying to hold on to my last strings of the vestiges of my youth.

I am the son of woman that once was a militant and taught me to be very proud of my African roots in her own way. However there is storm rising and there are a dark days ahead. I am sorry to say that black people have just been held back another thirty years. I have to get on my podium and preach with my self-righteous afro-centric indignation and warn my brothers, sisters and white folks about a new menace. This menace is worst than Jim Crow, a burning cross and Soul Plane wrap-up together.

What is this menace you say? Well it’s Ms Peaches and her Ghetto Fried Chicken song. I have never been so offended in my life. Now this includes the racist propaganda that has placed on my parent’s doorstep. This also includes watching Birth of a Nation and Homeboys in Outer Space. Her video hasn’t incensed me since the Rodney King verdict, and OJ, well that’s a conversation for another time (is he still looking for the real killer). Ms Peaches is a 29-year-old rapper from Georgia who has crafted a song about frying chicken, “Oh mammy watch me dance. The video features a sign with the word ghetto misspelled residing in the front of a scrap yard.

She wears a blue wig and stands in front of a cast iron skillet singing the praises of frying chicken. Little children dance around the table in glee, as they eagerly wait with bated breath for her finish frying the chicken. Now as a child I never danced around the table as I waited for my grandmother to finish frying chicken. As a teenager and young adult I worked at KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken). I worked as a cashier and shift supervisor.

During that time I had learned how to do everything needed to run a store. I opened and closed the store and sometimes I had to run the store and cook at the same time because we were short on help. I never danced while standing in front of a vat of boiling hot grease nor did I rap about it. Ms Peaches video reminds of the days of Stepping Fletcher, Amos and Andy, and the times when the only roles for black women in Hollywood were the roles of being a Mammy.

I thought black people; my people were beyond the title of looking like Jigga Boos wearing black face. Economically and socially black people have made great strides. Leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X fought for justice and civil liberties not only for black people, but all people. However crap like Ghetto Fried Chicken doesn’t tell the story of a hard life, nor does this song provides a divergent viewpoint on an issue. It serves to make my people look like fools and thus add fuel to fire of stereotypes.

I do not feel that she or anybody should be censored. As an American free speech is a birthright, however with free speech, the exercise of that right should be used with due diligence and vigilance. Songs like Ghetto Fired Chicken plays on that edge of that double-edged sword called free speech. When someone says or does something that one may not like using the banner of free speech, whether it’s music, or performance art, or running around the front yard painting stick people with whatever is available, that person has that right to exercise free speech.

Unfortunately this applies to Skin Heads, the weird guy on local talk radio, and Ms Peaches. Now, I have one last quip to make because I am tired of thinking and writing about a song that has the musical quality of a reject from the American Idol auditions. Musically the song sucks my twelve-year-old nephew has more talent, at least he can play an instrument.