More than half a century ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream that one day, black and white would join together in harmony to create a world where one would be judged not by their color, but by the content of their character. Today that dream has been realized, as MTV devotes 12 hours to “color-blind” programming, in which little black and white pixels join together for a marathon airing of Catfish. Let freedom ring over a nation in which all men are at last truly equal, because they all lie about themselves on Facebook.
In a momentous first not seen at MTV since Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game” video, the network has devoted most of its day to airing entirely in black-and-white, from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. “Millennials believe strongly in fairness, but they can also find it difficult to talk openly about race—to be not simply ‘color blind’ but ‘color brave,’” MTV president Stephen Friedman said, highlighting the fact that, despite our superficial differences, we can all be united by empty marketing buzzwords. “Our audience is looking for a way to bring the national conversation on race into their homes and this campaign will give them a forum to express true color bravery.”
As the MTV schedule for today reveals, that expression of true color bravery will take place while watching episodes of the talking-head series Girl Code, in which female comics irreverently discuss “the wonders and woes of womanhood;” Catfish, in which people meet the shut-ins who have been pretending to be attractive, in order to lure them into online relationships; and an edited for television version of Scary Movie 3. Presumably, the bored, indiscriminate teens who would turn in to watch these things—only to find their picture drained of color—will simply assume their TV is broken, giving them ample down time to talk about what races they don’t like and why.
In between, MTV will also run taped personal reflections from Common, Jordin Sparks, Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz, Sen. Rand Paul, and other people millennials respect, as they discuss the importance of discussing race in a frank and progressive manner—and definitely not brushing it aside with token, empty gestures.