I’m not the biggest movie fan. I don’t watch a lot of action movies, especially in the theaters. I don’t go to movie premieres. I’m not a comic book person, so I don’t know the full depth of the Marvel and DC universes.
But I went to see Black Panther when it came out Feb. 16…AND IT WAS EVERYTHING!!!
For me to sit in the movie and feel like an 8-year-old little boy, cheering for Black Panther/King T’Challa, mesmerized by the graphics and colors of the land of Wakanda (when does the plane leave again?), basking in the beauty of strong, intelligent dark-skinned black women, quoting lines all weekend and dissecting their cultural significance in my own word today…this movie was all that and more.
But one of the biggest things that I walked out the movie with was a desire to be like Black Panther, both physical (the brother is cut!) and personally. And that’s big. I’ve always ADMIRED superheros, like Superman, Batman, the Hulk. But never have the words slipped past my tongue, “I want to be like _________ (insert superhero here).”
And at 26 years old, that’s a big thing for me; to be able to fully relate to a superhero beyond just his abilities, but because of who he was and what he represented; a black man who was a real hero and looked like me.
That is something that every little boy and girl needs to see growing up; themselves.
Seeing Myself Growing Up
I started singing when I was about five years old; I learned the words to the Star Spangled Banner that was played every morning in kindergarten and started humming and singing it under my breath until teachers noticed me and started having me sing more around the school.
But I never thought about really pursuing singing until I was about 9 years old. I remember coming home after school one day and turning on Disney Channel. There was a music video for a song called “I Like It” by a singer named Sammie. Imagine my shock when I realized that Sammie was the little black boy who looked just like me, dancing and singing in a black and yellow jacket outfit. I’ll never forget my shock to see: he looked like me! Dressed just like I did with the oversized jackets and matching windbreaker pants, thick black hair, big ears, brown skin! I had never seen a singer who looked like me; young, black and talented. 
Suddenly, I believed that I could become a famous singer at a young age, too. I remember running to the living room and showing my mama, saying “He looks like me! I can be a singer too!” I bought his first CD and wore it out; every opportunity I got to sing a song by him in public, I did and people loved it. To this day, I still refer to Sammie as one of my inspirations musically, not because of his voice or his musical style (although he is a really good R&B singer), but simply because he reflected me at a young age.
I share that story because I believe that was the first time that I experienced first-hand how powerful it is to see someone who looks like you doing something you’ve only dreamed about doing, pursuing a passion that is deep in your heart. I had seen and heard black singers for years, but many of them were older than me (like Luther Vandross and the Temptations, or Whitney Houston and Mary J. Blige) or were female singers (Monica, Brandy). Now, I had someone I could relate with a little more; almost like a slightly older brother in my head that I could relate to.
Changing The Game
Some people may not think that diversity and representation means that much, but how many times have we heard people say, or say about others, that they are products of their environment? Imagine an environment where the only time you see people who look like you is when they are handcuffed, dealing drugs, standing on street corners in skimpy clothes, smoking, getting drunk, sleeping around, acting crazy, being beaten…the list can go on. How many people will believe they are better than what surrounds them, if they never have a counter-narrative?
How many young girls were in awe of the success of Gabby Douglas and Simone Biles in the summer 2016 Olympics, despite what their edges looked like? How many young boys grew up to see President Barack Obama take over one of the most powerful offices in the world with poise and dignity, big ears and all? How many #BlackExcellence posts have been shared over the past few years, in the midst of the #BlackLivesMatter movement? How many times do we quote and point out countless examples of #BlackGirlMagic and BlackBoyJoy in the course of a single day?
My mother strongly pushed me to learn about African-American history, to look up examples of black men and women who made great strides in American history. At the time, I didn’t understand why, but now I realized that she was planting seeds in me. Learning about so many “firsts” and the bravery they displayed over and over again inspired me to want to be like them; breaking barriers of some sort in the world around me.
And I can say that I have walked down a similar path; I was the first black male news reporter at The Villages Daily Sun, a newspaper in a mostly white, senior citizen community that (for the most part) embraced my blackness and authenticity. And not just a news reporter, but an award-winning news reporter who worked on the investigative reporting team as the charitable giving and social justice reporter, helping to change lives and gaining recognition through various awards statewide. And I did it because, in the back of my mind, I know one day, another young black male journalist will look at my accomplishments and say, ‘Hey, the famous journalist/writer Drexler B. James got his start at this newspaper and was the first black male reporter there. Because he did it, I can do it too.”
A Splash of Color
If we want to hear young black boys and girls say, “I can do it, too,” we must give them something positive to aspire to; athletes, doctors, entertainers, lawyers, politicians, business owners, pastors, engineers, astronauts and more.
But it’s more than just to have a black body represented, but a positive one. It’s not just enough to see black athletes, but athletes giving back and speaking up on our behalf. It’s not enough to just have black actors and actresses, but ones who are diverse in their roster of acting skills and representing at the Golden Globes and Emmy awards. It’s not enough to see black doctors and lawyers, but doctors in their communities, healing physical and emotional hurts and lawyers winning cases no matter how hard. There are plenty of negative images everywhere; we need some more positive ones.
That’s a major reason why seeing Barack and Michelle Obama as the President and First Lady of the United States of America was such a historic, significant and momentous moment for the nation. I will admit, I never thought I would see the day that a black couple would sit in the most powerful position in the nation. Whether or not you agree with their policies, you can’t deny that this meant so much, not just for this generation, but generations to come. Children will grow up believing that they can do anything, because they saw the Obamas do anything.
That’s the importance of even films like Black Panther. Seeing a black superhero, a rich country of strong black people, intelligent and articulate, is such a strong visual to plant in the mind of a people, a culture, who usually see themselves as comic relief, thugs, criminals and worse in the media. No one will take a person seriously when their whole lives, they have been represented as less than the status quo.
It’s 2018 and we still use the phrase “the first African-American to ________________.” It’s tough to say that everyone has been equal for years when we still have years where that phrase is an adjective to describe an accomplishment. But the game is changing; we’re starting to see splashes of color in areas that we never have before.
If you don’t believe me, let’s look at the TV show This Is Us. It’s one of my favorite shows right now and, yes, I relate the most to Randall, the black main character. Not only because of his own personal struggles as a black man, but some of his struggles growing up black and trying to identify himself in a world that didn’t look like him at all times. And the actor that plays him, Sterling K. Brown, has broken color barriers even now, becoming the first African-American actor to win the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Drama TV Series in 75 years and the first African-American to win the Screen Actors Guild award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series, proving that we can play serious, intense, emotional roles in mainstream media.
You never know the seed that will be planted, simply because a child saw someone who looked like them do it first.
The Book of James 