What was the big reveal from this year’s Oscar Awards or Superbowl game? Well the Oscars is still dealing with fallout from not having a host for the show over recent years. This time they called on past hosts Steve Martin and Chris Rock to do an opening bit. It had some folks thinking…heck they might as well have hosted the whole show.
Concert Performance
With the Superbowl, fans were buzzing about the halftime performance of showing more skin while sports commentators were breaking down how the Kansas City Chiefs pulled out a win. Jennifer Lopez and Shakira were the first-ever latin pair to perform on the big stage. Since then, they’ve had over 100 million views of their performance on a Youtube channel.
Maybe a takeaway from the game that’s just as big was about 5G phone networks coming to a boulevard near you. The wireless companies are all rolling out their version of 5G this year. The tech articles say that it’s a major speed boost for device-to-device communication. It’s also a plus for how gadgets will connect with each other over the Internet.
The See America In Color (SAIC) campaign is getting ready to make its 5G pitch at the upcoming Awards event. The Superbowl might have been a place for some firms to give theirs. Plus, by now we’ve had the State of the Game Report from the Commissioner. We’ve heard from public officials and biz execs with the State of the Union, State of the State, State of the City and State of the Brand. So with 5G on the minds of some regular citizens, who’s getting ready to give the State of the Culture Report?
5G Network
As we wait to see what 5G will mean for our social apps and digital maps, what will it mean for the next big thing in civic life? Will we choose between 5 Lanes of Grievance or 5 Lanes of Greatness? It’s like the old saying, ‘misery loves company.’ Well social division loves grievance. How we use 5G in civic life depends on whether we enrage or engage our citizen-to-citizen communication in business, media, education, government and community.
When we “See America In Color: With 2020 Vision” and with a Black History Moment view along 5 Lanes of Greatness, we’ll have a better picture for how privilege gets masked as fear. This happened during the lead-up to the Civil War. Some still question whether it was about economics or race. The record shows that secession (breaking away from the USA) was about slavery and slavery was about economics. The State of the Culture back then was fear of losing the privileged position others had from slavery, which brought States to war.
After the war ended the nation entered a phase of Reconstruction. It was a time of mixed feelings as some saw it as a chance to re-unite while others used it to incite. We’re seeing some of that in the State of the Culture today. It reminds us that there’re times when ignorance gets masked as cute. One example from back then was how name-calling occurred among public officials.
Segregation Sign
Words like “scalawags and carpetbaggers” were used by those wanting to maintain the privileged status-quo against those pushing for Emancipation reforms. We also saw during Segregation there were ‘Colored’ signs in towns and cities. In today’s State of the Culture, a different set of terms are being used where hate gets dressed up as personal/political conviction. This pollutes the social atmosphere and makes the civic environment toxic.
There’re different ways that hate might show-up on the hometown front. But the root of the matter is when prejudice gets dressed up as black & white. Some like to say they don’t see color. Upon further review, it’s really a question of whether we’re dealing with bias at the edges of the screen or racism at the core of the picture. When we See America In Color, we can move from being ‘color narrow’ to being ‘civic smart.’ That’s like what has happened in TVs going from black & white to ‘HD smart’.
Civic Engagement Speech
With the SAIC essay contest and civics programs being rolled out, we’re not waiting for the next incident of bias/bullying, violence, hate or tragedy to be trending on social media for us to See America In Color. What if we waited for #BrushYourTeeth or #TakeABath or #BuyGasNow to be trending before doing what we should? We’d have lots of stopped cars on the road, missing teeth among friends and ‘smelly tragedies’ in public spaces. SAIC is where we believe that civics isn’t supposed to be political. It’s meant to be aspirational as citizens, workers and students connect with one another and get the ‘W’ for next-level goals and dreams.
See America In Color 