Critiquing Boondocks Characters - Huey & Riley

I must admit that if it had not been for the start of its first season, I would never have known what the Boondocks was outside of my vague understanding that it was a comic strip written by a black dude, Aaron McGruder. After having watched a few episodes of its now completed first season, I am attempting to understand, critically, the purpose and significance of this comic-strip-turned-cartoon. Today I begin with Huey and Riley.

Let's start by stating the obvious: Huey and Riley are angry. But from where does this anger emerge and to whom or what is it directed? First, I understand Huey and Riley to be representatives of contemporary youth in Black America. In my opinion, the anger in young Black America results from witnessing the tumultuous events of the last 40-plus years. First, there was the near mystical, highly effective Civil Rights Movement of the late '50s, '60s and '70s. Any student of history must admit that the progress made in what African Americans could demand from America and on what grounds was the result of a phenomenon not easily explained; hence, the mystical element.

In the '80s, the fervor behind the movement decomposed into stagnation. This stagnation was sparked by black contentment and/or bewilderment depending on socio-economic status and what effect the deaths of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Huey Newton, etc. had on a given individual. Then there was white flight, Reagonomics and the resiliency of racism. All had a hand in the stagnation.

Desperation, therefore, bum-rushed the '90s. It was a desperation that led many Blacks to cling to Bill Clinton like he was the second coming of the Savior - calling him "the first Black president," please?!?! It was also a desperation that intensified the turf mentality and its vulnerability to the media-fueled East Coast - West Coast beef.

Witnessing the last forty years and the effects of race as a higly determinative, social construct has led young Black America, as represented by Huey and Riley on the Boondocks, to a place of anger. It does not matter that Huey and Riley have not individually or personally witnessed the 1-step forward, 2-steps back cadence of black people's socio-economic and political progress in America; but they have generationally. Huey and Riley are apart of what is called the Hip-Hop generation, a generation whose ways of being, doing and making meaning are the product of the last 40-plus years. They are angry because it is their birthright.

On the Boondocks, McGruder seems to use Huey and Riley represent two possible mentalities that may result from the anger that smolders within them like a low fire. Huey, the character that I believe McGruder uses most to voice his own opinion straightforward, is the militant, introspective and pessimistic idealist. He is conscious of himself and others. But his idealism is reserved solely for his militancy. About all else, especially the plight of black America, he remains pessimistic.

Riley's anger has taken him to a mentality of utter disregard. Most obviously, Riley disregards authority, rules, the establishment. But also Riley, in direct contrast to Huey, has no regard for himself or others. In trying to describe Riley, lyrics from Tupac's Dear Mama come to mind: "They say there ain't no hope for the youth when the truth is it ain't no hope for the future. And then they wonder why we crazy..." In other words, Riley's disregard is his own way of handling hopelessness. The hopelessness in Riley is equivalent to the pessimism in Huey.

Through the eyes of Riley and Huey and from the perspective of black, youth culture, McGruder is able t critique specific segments and elements of both the black experience in America in general - in an angry yet comical and always controversial way.