The Vanishing Family: Crisis in Black America (1986)

I have no non-suspicious reasoning for why I watched this. This is a CBS Special Reports broadcast from fucking 1986 about why black dudes are such deadbeat dads. It's incendiary and exploitive and looks like something Eddie Murphy would've lampooned on Saturday Night Live. Though that would've been completely unnecessary, as the documentary special is a joke in itself, and better than any attempt of a parody that could be made of it. Isn't it great when that happens? 

Why am I writing about this, though? Well, because the vanishing family: a crisis in black america - that's why. Fuck outta here. QUESTIONING ME!!!

I watched this on youtube like...more than a month ago, I think. The shameful thing should be that I sought this out specifically to watch on youtube. Could I have at least tried to class it up a bit on Vimeo? But nah, the youtube thing can't even be the worst part because, like I said, I watched this over a month ago and am only just now getting around to writing about it. Why? Because I didn't feel like it, and also I forgot all the "characters'" names, and I guess I thought...the longer I waited...the better chance the names would come to me?? It's so weird to still keep being alive every day, that's all I'm saying. 

What was this dude's name? Idk, but he was a fuqboi extraordinaire. He was cute tho, with his gap and "good hair", but he was so obviously aint shit. Also, his looks weren't even good enough for the type of shit people were letting him get away with. Like, he's not Al B Sure, and he's goofy as fuck. No non-Al B Sure lookin' nigga is eatin' off my government check and refusing to take responsibility for his six million kids. Are you crazy? Where did they find this boy? I mean, maybe it was shooting fish in a barrel when CBS turned up in Newark with flyers stating: LOOKING FOR ANY NIGGAS WHO DON'T TAKE CARE OF THEIR KIDS, but they really struck gold with this dude who may/may not/probably was named Jesse. Jesse is such a perfecto deadbeat daddy/fuckboi/starving artist let me hold a dollar right quick name. It's so exact and I hope that really was his name. Also youtube comments tell me he is dead. Who's surprised?! I mean, rest in peace. But honestly niggas like this are cockroaches so he must've not been as aint shit as he was portrayed. I mean, he was a pretty good drawer

Perhaps he was misunderstood, like Basquiat. Basquiat probably would've been considered a fuckboy. Did he have kids? Let's just assume cuz he was black and his hair was weird. 

lol I forgot her name, but she was in that group of young moms who were talking about how they didn't have the dads helping them out with their kids. They also all seemed to be having kids so they could have families of their own, or, really, someone to love them unconditionally, which you assume they are not getting at home. Which is sad and this documentary makes me feel uncomfortable, which is definitely the point of documentaries, but...I don't know, these girls are so young. It's a mess. The girl in the pic above was saying how she didn't have a dad at home, so she didn't feel it necessary for her kid(s) to have a dad either. I don't know anything about raising a child, but it seems like a lot of fucking work. Miss me with the thinking that two parents are not required. Shit a whole village is required, nvm the fact that this^ chick, I believe, was still in her teens. Oh okay so you're going to raise a whole entire human being by yourself when you're not even raised? Ok girl!! But see that's what I'm talking about. Why is this documentary interviewing these little kids? It's so like...geared towards a specific narrative ugh I'm annoyed.

This was another fucboi. I also forgot his name. But he was very jammin' on the one. He had sex with

this girl^. She was verrrrry cute, but like fiffuckingteen. So young. I can't remember how old that Jay-Z looking one was. Nineteen, maybe? She was talking about how cute he was because he was bow-legged or something. Right, but wrap it up, lol. Fuck all the bowleggeds you want. Take them off everyone else's hand, but definitely secure your shit with many layers of saran wrap, that's all I'm saying. These two didn't take my advice, tho, and ol girl ended up having a kid. She too was talking about how she wanted someone to love her, and someone to love back. Her mom was in a few scenes of the doc and I wondered what her deal was? First, why allow your daughter to participate in something like this? And then asking that answers any follow-up questions I might've had. :) 

Smiley was going to school, though. She also seemed to have learned from her experiences? She was talking of bettering herself and giving a better life for her daughter, but she also didn't seem totally hopeful. Or as believing in herself and her daughter as I wanted her to be. It was like "we'll see!". *cringe* Okay. :)

:33 Let's talk more about Jesse. Lol Jesse would be saying mad ridiculous shit and the interviewer dude would be looking at him like

He'd be like: "Jesse, why don't you take care of your kids?" and Jesse would be like "lol don't feel like it!!"

"...Jesse, if you can't take care of your kids, why do you keep having them?" Jesse: "lol I like sex!! I'm an animal, I can't stop fucking haha!!!"

Interviewer:

And Jesse really did say some crazy shit about how he was like a ~~virile, testosterone-filled man animal~~*~ who just could not seem to unhard his dick. Which I think was his explanation for why he kept having kids, and why he had them with more than one woman. I was getting very rape tease from him. And like maybe he'd even be able to get off in court by shrugging and smiling and being like "lol I just gotta fuck, your honor!". And depending on if the judge has fucqboi proclivities, Jesse's ass will be doing like 10 hours of community service bodyguarding that donation box they have in front of the register at McDonald's, tops. He would do no time. Sigh, he's really charming lol 

This was...an intriguing fella. I thought he was a non-factor in the documentary, initially. He was the boyfriend of one woman who had about five kids and none of their fathers appeared to be around. She seemed like a nice woman, though. She took her kids downsouth to visit her family and talked of moving them down there so they could be around a better community. The boyfriend appeared to be helping out in some way with the kids? Though, maybe not? The impression the doc was trying to get over was that this was probably the main father figure in the kids' lives, but it didn't really matter as he was about as aint shit as no father at all. Like the interviewer sat down to talk with him and this dude immediately jumped into discussing how he's been in and out of juvie/prison and shit for beating people to death with baseball bats or some shit? (???¿¿) He was like smiling while talking about his life, but he came off hella unhinged lol. Which was clearly the point of interviewing him. Also I think maybe the doc wanted to show what a kid growing up on the streets with no real role models turns into. This guy^, I guess. It could be worse? *cringes*

lol oh this was one of the commercials shown during the ~broadcast~. Some ppl in the youtube comments section were reminiscing over how white commercials used to be lol I thought that was funny. These commercials were really Caucasianed-up and it was an awkward contrast to the material in the special. But ahh, nice touch, CBS. Stay classy.

This lil sucked-off milk dud was an example of someone trying to ~better~ the community. Lightskinned adonis came from a two-parent, church-going home, so he got to be portrayed in a nice (lightskint) light. I got suspicious teas from him, though. He was training some of the young boys in boxing. One of the boys was the son to...the woman with five kids that she took downsouth. Ol nougat head was talking about how sometimes he spanks that boy when he gets out of line, but that he tells the mother, and she's okay with it. She seems to be okay with a lot of things, which is why that boy has to look to this weirdo as a fucking father figure. I just got very I-molest-these-kids-straight-up-do-something vibes from him. Maybe it's because he's lightskin, maybe it's because he's bald, maybe it's because he said he spanks some of the kids, maybe it's just that boxing in general seems very gay to me. Not that gay equates to being a molester, it's just...he was training kids. And bragging about spanking them. Also I think he said his dad was a minister. Let's just put deux et deux together, oui? 

Jesse on his stroll either to go buy more number two pencils for his art, or to go not buy condoms, for his other art. WINK

THIS WAS SO FUNNY. I'm a bad person, so obviously laughing at a blind dude is just something Lucifer can add to my fucking bill, you know? But this dude was straight out of a Key & Peele sketch and I just could not. deal. 

Stevie Wonderment was like a professor from somewhere. White Interviewer Dude was asking him what the deal was with all these negrums not taking care of their kids. I think in very I was a nerd in school so black girls never fucked with me fashion, he blamed the women. Black women were letting these dudes get off too easily. Black mothers aint shit, they raise aint shit niggas, these aint shit niggas get with aint shit females who were raised by, you guessed it, aint shit black mothers, so in conclusion, black women are single mothers because they are the devil and anyway it's what they deserve and it's what they secretly want anyway :) to be on the bottom :)

lol did he even say any of this? lol I'm screaming, but he was definitely very bougie, and very new black, and it just...was too much to deal with. Like, nigga, you can't even see, how are you talking about what black people are doing and why? People could be lying to your blind ass. Maybe the fuck boys the interviewer is talking about are really green. Hmm? HOW WOULD YOU KNOW, THOUGH? That's all I'm saying. I wish my blog was in braille, sigh. 

So that's pretty much it, lol. Other things happened. There was a whole arc on one of Jesse's baby moms but I never took any screenshots of her because she wasn't really giving me looks. Though I do think I remember her having a jheri curl, so I think I might've fucked up not screencapping her omg she definitely had a fucking--WHAT HAVE I DONE?! Youtube comments tell me she died very soon after this doc came out, which is bullshit. She never even got to live long enough to see if any of Jesse's artwork would sell. This is sincerely distressing. 

Calgon, take me away. I shouldn't have internet, or lungs. I do have eyes, though! SEEEEE MEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

:/

In Secret (2014)

I DIDN'T WANT TO TAKE ANY SCREENSHOTS. The plan was to watch the movie as a normal human being who doesn't feel the need to try and capture a character coughing onscreen. It's impossible. You don't even have the closed caption on so it can at least say [coughs]. And anyway, even if the closed captions were on, it's not like [coughs] would entirely capture just exactly how the character is coughing. I feel sorry for these deaf people who don't know how grating both kid Camille and adult Camille's annoying ass late stage lung cancer ass hacking was. Actually, it wasn't even hacking. It was like those puny little coughs. But over and over again. And poor Thérèse had to sleep in bed with this fucking iron lung candidate. Hmm, wait, what was I saying? Oh, how I wanted to watch this shitty movie normally and not take a billion screenshots of Tom Felton's almost frighteningly oversized fucking forehead. But I can't be proper. And anyway, emphasize on shitty movie. I'm not watching some piece of garbage straight with no chaser, nah son!! Nah!! 

So whatever, here: 

This was my attempt to capture Camille's annoying coughing. I was trying to really hold back when kid Camille was coughing and being all sickly and gross, but I could no longer contain myself when he turned into a full-blown adult and was still laid up in bed on his TB shit. Like, enough. Either die or get better!! 

But lol at how unappealing they tried to make Camille. Like, he's a momma's boy, sickly, an annoying cougher, ugly, lowkey slow, I mean...wow. They were really trying to get us to sympathize with Thérèse. Well, good job, it worked lol. #killcamille

Ugh, so sickly lol. Camille was coughing his ugly little ass off in bed next to Thérèse, and Jessica Lange yelled for her to give Camille his medicine. Nah, bruh, give him permission to release his soul to hell - like enough of this sick frail boy bullshit how did he even make it to adulthood? I'd be so pissed if I was Thérèse. Lol and........she was. Hence pretty much everything that happens in this whole horrible movie :')

Lol, Jessica Lange, whose character had a name but I'm just gonna call her J Lange--WAIT! CAN WE TALK ABOUT HOW THIS MOVIE TAKES PLACE IN FRANCE BUT NAN NONE OF THESE NIGGAS HAS A FRENCH ACCENT? They're all speaking in like Shia LaBeouf in Nymphomaniac sort-of-British? Like, did you even a little bit try? Honestly, it's for the best, because if these niggas were forced to attempt a French accent it would have been so bad and uncomfortable-making and, sigh, I'll just tolerate the weird fake kinda Brit accents and then some people (coughOscarIsaaccough) not even attempting anything? He's the Christian Slater in Nymphomaniac of this movie. I want to die, tho, lowkey.

Hmm so anyway!!! So anyway, in this^ screencap J Lange is...sewing some horrible depressing signage for their horrible, depressing abode and it's like...this movie is doing entirely too much. Lol "don't make a sound, keep quiet". Only the three of you live there so I don't understand why you're acting like it's turn up night every night at a college dorm or something. There's nothing to do or say, or anyone to do or say it with, so I don't get the house rule. Also, do these rules apply to Camille and his coughing? Seems not. Hmm.

I was so disgusted with how ugly Camille is. Not just ugly, but like, sweaty and greasy. I don't understand why this movie didn't even give Camille a chance. He's like Rocky Dennis fused with Brundlefly. Am I being harsh? Sigh, maybe. He's just so gross and horrible and ugly. Hmm, maybe Joseph Merrick fused with, like, Caillou? I don't want to be like this. But...why is his forehead, like, so tumorish? And why is he so wet, and...semeny? *shudders* 

Anyway I kept trying to perfectly capture how ugly and gross Camille was, so that's why there are three pics. There's more of this to come :)

This was when Thérèse asked Camille to kiss her. I don't know why anyone would ask Camille to kiss anything but a fast-dissolving tablet of cyanide. Anyway, Elizabeth Olsen is really pretty and I just found out she broke up with her ex-fiancé (she was engaged? *waka face* okay) the day he found out his best friend died. She'll go far :)

ugh, can you...

ugh. look at that weak ass scarf. No wonder your sick ass is sick all the time! How is that protecting your neck from the cold, dummy? Sigh, why do I lowkey care about Camille secretly? Idk, I feel bad for him. He's so ugly and that scarf is pathetic. It looks like a dried out tapeworm. I couldn't imagine being as worthless and insignificant and clearly doomed from birth as Camille, so, idk, I'm getting in my pity feelings, I guess. 

LOL HELL NO! NVM!!! smh

why do you look 87 years old but also like a 3 week old infant? What is this benjamin button tease ass bullshit I am looking at AND CAN YOU LIKE, DO SOMETHING WITH THOSE HAIR STRANDS. Brush that shit or cover it with a durag or get some cornrows, my family, something! Because whatever u r doing is not and will never be the look, okay, thanx!!

Oh, this was cute. Thérèse was, like, pretending to be a bear. I definitely skipped screencapping all those scenes where Camille and his mommy decided Camille and Thérèse would be married. And also that Camille would get a job in the city and they would move there so Thérèse could find her some d. Or, idk, run a fabric shop with Jessica Lange. Sigh, Camille wasn't ugly enough in those scenes so that's why no screenshots. I do regret not capping him when he was at the zoo stalking that bear, tho. It's so funny that Camille just goes to the zoo on his lunch break. Sigh, he's so accidentally endearing to me :(

iight, enter stage: Laurent. Let's get it poppin. At first I typed "let's get it poopin", and, tbh, pretty much.

Just a couple cute pics of ugly ass Camille posing for a portrait to be painted by Laurent, ~the aRtISte~*~*

Finished portrait. This was so funny because...J Lange was looking at it and talking about how grey and blue it was and Laurent sort of took her comments to mean she didn't like it. Then J Lange, like, I guess to assure or soothe Laurent, was all like "You captured his soul". Lol, so true, tho. But Laurent still sucks because while he successfully managed to capture Camille's wet, dying dog ass essence, he failed to capture how physically he resembles exactly that. Portrait Camille actually looks like possibly a human being? With maybe a touch of hypothermia. Real life Camille has more than a touch of just about everything but. But okay, good job I guess Laurent? You're sew talented and sexy and stuff omg *fangirl cheering* 

Idk. Thérèse was cute rolling around the bed. At this point she and Laurent have started getting it in and blah blah sexy French love affair I guess *fake yawns but then has to real yawn sigh every time*

lol is this Laurent trying to be, like, sexy? How about don't call your girl "lifeless" and liken her to an ottoman. Even if you're referencing past her. Past her was only like two days ago lol so chill. Also ignore the time bar thing in the way and if you have a problem doing that then maybe you'd like to see me in these streets. Any place any time, jabroni. #releaseme

idk

This cat was judging Thérèse and Laurent getting it in on the floor. Me, too, you spawn of satan. Me too.

Thérèse just lying there while Camille goes to pound town. How does that even work? Like, not to be gross, but definitely to be gross, is she even wet? Like how is he just pounding away? Side eye at Thérèse's possible canal of a vagina? No, side eye at Camille wearing a fucking night shirt to bed like he's fucking Ebenezer Scrooge or some shit. 

This was when I knew Camille had sealed his fate. Talking shit to Thérèse. Because at first she was being hesitant about getting on the boat, but as soon as Camille started poppin' off at the mouth, Thérèse was like, "okay, fuck this", and then like two seconds later this pile of rice pudding and tuberculosis spores in human form was dead. 

I felt bad for Camille, sigh. Like, one, Laurent was his "friend". And Thérèse was his "wife". How very Snapped of Thérèse and Laurent to kill off someone that trusted and loved them both. 

smh, why does Camille look better in death than in life come on leave this boy alone, let him rest in peace!!!!

He's...he's dead. He died. Remember? "drowned"? *drake voice* REMEMBA?! 

:/

Matt Lucas was funny talking really bluntly to Camille's mom about his death. The whole movie he kept going into gruesome detail about like cadavers at the morgue or whatever? It was really weird, though, to have these sort of blunt/goofy comedy elements in what seems be a romantic period piece? But also a thriller? This movie is a mess and all over the place. But never in any place that's good. Poor souls.

So. lol. Thérèse and Laurent have offed Camille, and now they're waiting for the appropriate grieving period to be over before it's acceptable for them to be together. Lol, okay. Here, out of nowhere, Laurent is talking to Thérèse about the shop she co-runs with Jessica Lange. He's all, "It'll be us together forever: u, me, AND THE SHOP. SPECIFICALLY THE SHOP." Smh, I was waiting for this negro to turn up on some snake shit. Well, any dude fucking his friend's girl is probably not so on the up and up. Don't get surprised, Thérèse, you beautiful dummy. 

Okay, so wedding night!! Turn up time!!! Right. So Thérèse and Laurent get married. It was decided by Jessica Lange n dem. I'm sort of annoyed that each time Thérèse got married, it was because other people were like "marry this dude". And like, she had to??? And when J Lange and the squad decide Thérèse can marry Laurent, she's already over him by then. Sucks for Thérèse, I guess. But I mean, it's Oscar Isaac. Can't be that difficult to fake your way through with him. Or maybe it is, idk, he seems douchey. I think he went to Juilliard. 

lol, mere moments before Camille's ~untimely~ death. Smh, this is so him.

lol J Lang sees the ghost of Camille. He's so ugly eternally. Camille's apparition causes J Lang to have a stroke.

Aw, I thought it was cute that Camille drew him and Thérèse as bears. :( #feelbadforCamille

lol, so J Lang's incapacitated from her stroke. Thérèse and Laurent are left to care for her. They're all bitter and horrible now. Laurent attempts to toss J Lang from the top of the staircase. Thérèse calmly reminds Laurent that he needs "both" signatures to gain ownership of the shop, so he falls back from tossing J Lange to hell. For now.

Laurent's lovely artwork :)

Just a handful of adorable pics of J Lange drowning and shit while Thérèse and Laurent fight about how horrible and gross they are :')

me waiting for the movie to end

J.Lang can't talk after her stroke. But she can hear and shit, and both Thérèse and Laurent have been talking all kinds of reckless around her. "You killed Camille!!" etc etc lol. Just being messy. So while hanging out with her friends one day, J. Lang makes an attempt to tell them about Thérèse and Laurent by etching into the table with her nails. I think she gets as far as "Thérèse and Laurent are" before her hand tires and she can't write anymore.

Mackenzie Crook decides to finish the message for her :) He's all like:

right. riiiight.

lol Shirley Henderson is like "...why is she crying?". I thought she suspected Thérèse and Laurent of being murderers at this point, but then like immediately after this scene she reveals herself to be only suspicious that they may be expecting a baby. Sigh.

Mackenzie is all "AM I RIGHT?!". Why would J Lang be painfully trying to communicate to them that Thérèse and Laurent are "wonderful children" who treat her well? Lol she was practically breaking her hand. (moaning)

Lol i'm screaming, this can't be real. Are they seriously saying things like "this is a happy home" and "good people live here" while J Lang looks horrified/distraught with tears streaming down her cheeks? BURY ME.

J.lang finally manages to get her message out. Shirley sees it and goes to get squad and the police. Thérèse and Laurent gather J.lang up and they go on the run. They go on this roof thing to kill themselves? Why the fuck they take Jlang? They weren't even gonna kill her. Now she gotta be picked up and moved back to the house siiiiiiiiigh @ Thérèse and Laurent's snapped the kidz bop version level drama. They're so lame, whack, corny, and dumb. But fitting characters for a movie that is exactly all those things and then some. Loljk, no, just those things. Well, also, bad. And not good. And those things also describe Thérèse and Laurent. It all fits! 

gpoy