In 2006 shortly after Debra Lee took control she was blamed for a lot of things that did not happen under watch. She was parodied in an episode of The Boondocks that depicted her as a tyrant who only wanted to see black people look stupid on television. The episode was never aired on TV but can still be seen on DVD. In 2007 the National Association of Black Journalist gave BET the Thumbs Down Award for their lineup. They claimed there was too much reality TV and that the channel only portrayed black people in the worst light. In 2010 co-founder Shiela stated she was ashamed of BET and what it was as wells as:
I don't watch it. I suggest to my kids that they don't watch it. When we started BET, it was going to be the Ebony magazine on television. We had public affairs programming. We had news [...] I had a show called Teen Summit, we had a large variety of programming, but the problem is that then the video revolution started up [...] And then something started happening, and I didn't like it at all. And I remember during those days we would sit up and watch these videos and decide which ones were going on and which ones were not. We got a lot of backlash from recording artists [...] and we had to start showing them. I didn't like the way women were being portrayed in these videos.This is coming from the co-founder of the network who hasn't watched since she left the company. She left because she and her husband Bob Johnson divorced. While she is standing there pointing a finger and shaming BET for what it had become, she's ignoring the fact that she and her husband were in fact the ones that caused BET to become what she was ashamed of. To be disgusted by your actions but refusing to watch the channel and how it had changed since the Johnsons had left is silly.
Behind the scenes Debra Lee was trusted with control of BET. She increased the production budget by 50% and refocused the staff on creating original programming hoping to have 16 original shows before the 2007 fall season. It wasn't just reality TV either. Attempting to replace BET Nightly News, the show Don't Sleep! was introduced and hosted by TJ Holmes. There were comedy dating shows like Hell Date suddenly appearing, Baldwin Hills, a reality show based on affluent black families and the teen comedy Just Jordan. None of these shows lasted more than two years and that was okay because BET did find it's step after learning what didn't work.
While the initial batch of TV shows didn't work, BET did find something that did work for them, award shows and honor shows. BET had always had the BET Awards but it introduced several others. The Hip Hop Awards which celebrated all of hip hop and not just the commercial aspects. It brought a focus back to hip hop ciphers and allowed unlikely combinations at the time to rap together like Tech N9ne, B.O.B, Machine Gun Kelly and young upstart known as Kendrick Lamar. Additionally in contrast the The Source Awards it provided a place for rappers to come together and end beef.
Then in 2008 they added BET Honors. It's a show filled with performances and honors people for the contributions to the world. However, it's not just music or film, but business, technology, education, public service and so much more. BET had always been criticized for it's "gangster" image, yet here they were doing the complete opposite and nobody was paying attention for those first few years. It's a night where Patti LaBelle, Lee Daniels, L.A. Reid, Eric Holder and Mellody Hobson are praised for their live's work in different fields.
In 2010 came Black Girls Rock! put together by Beverly Bond. It focused on honoring black women who were often overlooked. It didn't matter if it was for sports, activism, entertainment or any other field. The movement turned award show kept gaining momentum and is still a major event for BET each year.
After finding promise in recognizing black talent BET again attempted to create a lineup of originals and cut back on the syndicated television. That meant cutting classic shows like In Living Color from the lineup. During this time BET also quietly stopped reruns of The Cosby Show in early 2007 after he settled a civil lawsuit brought against him by one of his dozens of rape victims. This allowed them to refocus on creating original content.
Currently there are 18 original series on BET and 1 reboot. BET hasn't just focused on reality TV either. Two of their biggest shows right are Real Husbands of Hollywood, a scripted comedy and Being Mary Jane, a drama heading into it's fourth season. While there are still reality shows like Ink, Paper, Scissors there are also reality shows showing the opposite like Desean Jackson: Home Team or somewhere in between like Nellyville. BET is still going to show reality TV, it's just going to show multiple black realities now. They've even given local white man Gary Owen his own reality show.
That just goes to prove that once again BET isn't divisive. Bet was created to give black entertainers a place to be recognized at a time when white networks were not doing so. It was a time when white rock stars were asking MTV why they didn't play music videos from black artists and television shows with black casts were hidden away. Yet despite that BET never tried to be exclusive. Instead they invited everyone to the party from NSYNC to Robin Thicke, to Eminem to Daddy Yankee, to Fat Joe and the list goes on. Not only that after the passing of Teena Marie, known as the Ivory Queen of Soul for her time creating music with Barry Gordy and Rick James, BET was the only award show to mention her passing and additionally held a tribute for her. The channel may be titled Black Entertainment and majority of the people you see will be black, but BET has never been exclusive.
BET has completely changed their image and people have not been willing to give them the applause they deserve. Their website has even changed and is now full of around the clock news updates, and not just entertainment, as well as content like "On Kid Cudi, Kanye West And The Heartless Response To Mental Illness: Don’t Go to Los Angeles to Fight Your Depression," BET has worked hard to do a 180 degree turn on it's image and deserves credit for that, but people who don't actually watch the channel continue to throw dirt onto a mass grave full of debauchery that BET had climbed out of long ago.
You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet. You can also check out his playthrough of Sleeping Dogs.
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