Will the Real Black People of ATL Step Up?

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In a piece for the Huffington Post, Kelly Smith Beaty asks how a city that was once the crowning jewel of black America has allowed itself to be positioned by television as the melting pot of black affliction.

I, like many of you, watched in complete horror as a cable network debuted yet another reality drama based on black life as it purportedly unfolds in the ATL. I will refrain from mentioning the name of this show because if you saw it then you already know what I'm referring to and if you didn't then I do not wish to entice or encourage you to seek it out …

More recently, a show about popular entertainers and the women who love them premiered an Atlanta-based installment where the term popular was subjective and women suggested that other women should be put "on the track," a prostitution reference that is particularly damaging for a city that is already noted for being one of the largest hubs for child sex trafficking in the world. To put it mildly I was offended. To state I plainly, I was aghast.

How is it that a city which was once the crowning jewel in the story of black America has allowed itself to be positioned as the melting pot of black affliction?m…

So for those who seem to have forgotten who we really are, I'd like to offer a brief REALITY check on the Real Black People of Atlanta.

Read the rest of Kelly Smith Beaty's piece at the Huffington Post.

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