A Very Special Story on Vocal

Remember when networks aired "very special episodes" of shows, which detailed (among other things) the same issues that we face today? Remember when said issues on TV were taken seriously back then? Remember when people actually watched and actually gave a damn?

Pepperidge Farm remembers.

In all seriousness, I'm just old enough to remember when TV networks actually aired episodes that centered on a lot of big time human issues. Topics included drugs, alcohol, domestic abuse, child abuse, sexual assault, eating disorders, peer pressure, gun violence, and of course, the topic of this story, issues involving race and the LGBT community. I can't really pinpoint when this actually started, I want to say it was some time in the 1970s, but I do know I saw a lot of these during my childhood. The TV episodes were always billed as "very special episodes," and this was regardless of genre, and there have even been telefilms on these subjects as well.

Examples include, but aren't limited to, "Ashes to Ashes," a second season episode of the original 90210, which dealt with police brutality against an innocent young black man. The same subject hit an episode of Family Matters, and I remember this one, where Eddie Winslow was harassed by a group of racist cops. A lot more 90s/early 2000s shows did episodes centered on the ugliness of racism; an episode of The Parent Hood saw a racist hockey coach not allow Black players (one of them being Nicholas Peterson) on his team, and he even told them to "try basketball instead." An episode of Smart Guy saw Yvette Henderson hired to work at a clothing store, only for the racist owner to instruct her to only follow the Black customers, and an episode of That's So Raven saw Raven apply to work at a clothing store, only for one of her visions to reveal that the owner was a racist who refused to hire Black applicants.

We've also seen episodes and films address the LGBT community, for example, an obscure 1986 film known as Willy/Milly, where the central character, 14-year-old Milly Niceman (played by Pamela Adlon) has been hampered with being forced to live up to "traditional gender roles" in response to her being a tomboy. Feeling that boys don't have a lot of pressure, Milly wishes to be a boy, and an actual wish during an eclipse comest true for Milly, who becomes Willy Niceman. My point is, for decades, we have seen TV shows and movies expose these issues many times, and back then, they were embraced. However, despite this current period being even more progressive than the 1990s/early 2000s, if we see such messages on TV now, backwards-thinking people would roll their eyes and depict this as "woke garbage" from the "mob."

I said this before in an earlier story, but sadly, some people still don't get the message. People act like "woke" is a "fad," a passing fancy, a recent buzzword. It's not. Woke has been around for decades. We've been seeing stuff like this on TV and films for a long time; an exposure of the truth regarding issues in POC and LGBT communities. There was no problem with it then, nor should it be, so why is it a problem now? Why are certain members of society (including and especially political ones), when they hear the truth about what POCs and LGBT people have to deal with, running away faster than the Road Runner?

I vividly remember a lot of those special episodes, and back then, TV producers and networks were willing to film them and get those messages out there. Now? Not so much. It's down to a select few thanks to idiots blasting the most insidious phrase out there: "Go woke, go broke." I can't stand that bullshit phrase. That phrase, plain and simple, is a hideous belief that being inclusive isn't financially beneficial, even though there's so much evidence stating otherwise. I'll never forget when that phrase was repeated on social media when the USWNT was eliminated in the last Summer Olympics. Actual Americans were actually rooting against our own women's soccer team because they were progressive and were campaigning for equal pay. That's just disgusting, and honestly, the "Americans" who rooted against us should be charged with treason. But that's another story.

It just baffles me that these important messages went from being embraced around 20-30 years ago, to being dismissed by backwards-thinking neanderthals as "propaganda from the woke mob." We need more of these "special episodes," like the recent one from Raven's Home centering on Juneteenth. The messages are factual, they are real, they should not be dismissed. Running away from the truth is part of the problem. The sooner that we watch these special shows and embrace their powerful messages once again, the better off we'll be as human beings.