More food for thought

I first did this post of random thoughts during a rough time for the Wolfpack basketball program almost five years ago, and I've brought it back because the NC State team is struggling and will likely miss the Big Dance for the first time since 2011 and I need a diversion.

First up is the neverending drama with Downtown Greensboro Incorporated. Last month, it was revealed that the embattled organization will be getting competition. I say, good because the truth is that old saying about downtown Greensboro being a strip is spot on. When most people think about the Gate City's central business district, South Elm Street gets top billing and DGI's focus has been on that particular street and certain businesses that are a block or two west of South Elm while other parts of downtown might as well not even exist. Speaking of NC State and letdowns, the current DGI president and his immediate predecessor...Yeah, as an alumnus of that fine institution, I want nothing to do with either guy. Also, check out the EZ Greensboro and Dang blogs to show just how much of a mess DGI really is, contrary to the local fluff pieces.

Second topic is cola alternatives to Coke and Pepsi. In the Raw Cola is good for what it is but nothing special. Sure it has stevia, but it also has caramel color. When it comes to natural cola alternative to the Big Two, I'll stick to Virgil's.

My final topic is the all-white Oscars for the second year in a row. I will say this: "Creed" was the victim of a major screwjob but "Straight Outta Compton" was not. The latter centered around a rap group that served a backlash to the revolutionary attitude of rappers of the late '80s and early '90s. It may be time for black actors and filmmakers to completely go off the reservation by building up our own studios and selecting another location to set up "the black Hollywood" of the 21st century because it seems that Hollywood only cares about blacks when it's about slavery, segregation, or something that stereotypically paints us in a bad light.

And the Oscars are out

So, everyone's buzzing about what happened with the Oscars nominations--namely that there was a dearth of black nominees. At this point, why should anyone be surprised? After all, this is the same industry that once listed an overtly racist film in its top 100.

Do Denzel Washington playing a crooked cop in Training Day, Halle Berry sleeping with an old white man in Monster's Ball, the praise over movies like 12 Years a Slave, and "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" winning an Oscar for Best Original Song have anything in common? These movies all have black people in stereotypical or subordinate roles for which there were lots of critical acclaim. That the people behind Selma failed to send screener DVDs to the voters and the uproar over how LBJ was portrayed by the 37th president's apologists as may have been the movie's undoing is really a sign to me that there's still a lot of old boy club mechanisms at work.