# OK, what kind of idiots run BET? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 20, 2000, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485 "2000-12-20T06:18:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/21 "2000-12-21T15:52:16Z")
A cable TV “Nerds Package?” Sign me up! [hijack] **Juanita** Are you an urban paddler? Where? Please email me. Thanks. [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/22 "2000-12-21T16:21:39Z")
[quote] (making note the Harlan Ellison formally abdicated his status as a Sci-Fi writer when he published “Boys from Brazil”). Ira Levin, the same guy who wrote “Rosemary’s Baby,” “The Stepford Wives,” and “A Kiss Before Dying,” wrote “The Boys From Brazil.” Harlan Ellison has for years rejected the term, “science fiction writer”; he prefers to call himself an author of speculative fiction. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/23 "2000-12-21T16:37:15Z")
I don’t get BET anymore–but when I did, years ago, I loved watching the old “race movies” they showed, with all-black casts, from the 1930s and '40s. Remember “Dirty Gertie from Harlem?” Two dumb mistakes I’ve seen on other networks, though, related to some above: A PBS Special on the history of vaudeville kept referring to Bert Williams as “the first African-American to star on Broadway.” Bert Williams was neither African NOR American. And one of those endless stand-up shows had a comic just KILLING. Every time he opened his mouth, you could hear the audience roaring with laughter. Then they made the mistake of panning over the audience: looked like Easter Island. Not a chuckle. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/24 "2000-12-21T17:00:42Z")
Phil remarked: > [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > (making note the Harlan Ellison formally abdicated his status as a Sci-Fi writer when he published “Boys from Brazil”). > > Harlan Ellison is Ira Levin? Color me surprised. Well, he **wanted** to do it as a collaboration, but Will S. was busy making the rewrites his editor demanded on “The Three Musketeers,” H.G. Wells and Ralph Ellison were reviewing each others’ “Invisible Man” chapters, and Sartre was nauseated by the idea. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Minxsmom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d07c76/32.png) [@Minxsmom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Minxsmom)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/25 "2000-12-21T18:38:04Z")
Zen, Ellison wrote _A Boy and His Dog_. Maybe that’s what you’re thinking of? ---
**Author:** ![jmullaney](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/85e7bf/32.png) [@jmullaney](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmullaney)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/26 "2000-12-21T19:39:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by zen101 \* > I was quoting from memory and I’m certain it was Ellison and I know it was a year he won a Hugo award because Niven made a point of mentioning Ellison and his award and his formal announcement that he was “leaving the sci-fi ghetto” and I’m also certain he mentioned Boys from Brazil as well but maybe I have that out of context. I’ll find it and repost today if I can. Good luck, since I’m positive you are actually thinking of an interview of **Phillip K. Dick** entitled [“The Mainstream That Through the Ghetto Flows”](http://www.id-online.de/ufo/pkdint.htm). An exerpt: > [@](#): > > Interviewer: Well, Harlan is leaving the field of science fiction. He says, “I write what I write.” > > Dick: He is? > > Interviewer: Yeah. Now he says, “I write Harlan Ellison stories and not science fiction.” > > Dick: That’s a tautology. “Harlan Ellison writes Harlan Ellison stories”: the predicate is applied to the subject. Recently, I listed for Publisher’s Weekly the people who had left science fiction, and > I didn’t even think to add Harlan. I did read Harlan’s letter in F & SF, where he said, “Come on, America, bleep it or bleep it as regarding science fiction.” And there’s Barry Maltzberg, who > published the most marvelously crazy statement in the universe. In all the history of science fiction, nobody has ever bum-tripped science fiction as much as Barry Maltzberg did. And I think he’s a > great writer. But you don’t break up a marriage that way and you don’t leave science fiction that way, by saying, “Everybody in it is rotten and everything that has ever been written is rotten, > except what I wrote.” Which is what Maltzberg said. But he’s going on to bigger and greater things. And then Vonnegut. Vonnegut has always never written science fiction. Or so he discovered > when he looked back over his career and discovered that he’d made a lot of money at some point. And at that point, retroactively he became like the Pope, who gets to say, “Everything I say is > true, and I never was writing science fiction, even if you read Player Piano and thought it was science fiction. You were wrong. And Cat’s Cradle likewise. And Sirens of Titan. They’re not > science fiction because I say they’re not science fiction. Come to me and I will tell you.” That’s what Harlan always says, too. > > Interviewer: Silverberg is also leaving the field. > > Dick: I know. He’s rich. I don’t know how come he is; I can’t figure it out because none of the rest of us are. I’ve always asked him that same question over and over again, and he just smiles that > superior, enigmatic smile of his which means, “I know something you don’t know, and that’s why I’m rich and you’re not.” He didn’t make it from science fiction, because if he did, he sure does > know something I don’t know. I think he reinvested his royalties in a Pizza Hut or something. ---
**Author:** ![monkeylucifer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@monkeylucifer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monkeylucifer)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/27 "2000-12-21T19:54:35Z")
The oddest thing about BET is the fact that it has the absolutely sharpest surround sound of any channel on my cable system…it blows away Mtv…too bad I absolutely hate the music the showcase. What is with that computer animated video hostess they have? I cannot make out anything she’s saying. ---
**Author:** ![jmullaney](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/85e7bf/32.png) [@jmullaney](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmullaney)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/28 "2000-12-21T21:05:22Z")
I am remembering wrong, or isn’t BET a broadcast station in D.C.? ---
**Author:** ![SterlingNorth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@SterlingNorth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SterlingNorth)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/29 "2000-12-21T22:00:13Z")
Dearest Spoofe: > [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Remember DiResta? > > I haven’t the foggiest idea what that is. > > Sterling, what are you trying to prove? That since not ALL of the “primarily black” shows sucked, NONE of them sucked? I was trying to figure out what the hell your point here was. This thread was started chronicling the absent-minded mistakes made by a slipshod network. Then you come in with this wonderful non-sequitur about UPN and the WB. If it wasn’t for your later comments, I would be racking my brain trying to figure out what on earth booty-shaking videos have in common with “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”. OK, now both tend to show “ethnic” sitcoms (at least UPN and the WB care to pay for first run shows. BET can’t seem to refrain from shopping Goodwill). What conclusions were I to draw from that Sphinxlike riddle? A sign of a shipshod network is playing host to black sitcoms? (Which is generally segregated to one or two nights out of six!) > [@](#): > > I know that there are very excellent shows with a strong cast consisting of talented black people. I never even hinted at that. > [sub]Empasis mine[/sub] Which was the problem. **I** had to. Remember my Moesha post. However you responded to that with… > [@](#): > > Remember “Homeboys in Outer Space”? > > 'Nuff said. (Notice how no-one ever labels it as a crappy sci-fi comedy.) What, are we still atoning for that sin? How many good shows have to come out of UPN and the WB before we can forget about “Homeboys.” (I don’t even remember any of the cast except “Star Trek’s” Scottie. Of course my big mistake in “non-sequitur tit-for-tat” was picking a show so blastingly mediocre no one has heard of it. I should have reached into the “Concepts so bad, SNL would have you fired” bin. I should have said… [ul]-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Remember “Whoops!” --------------------------------------------------------------------------------[/ul] It would have been perfect symmetry. This was a crappy sci-fi comedy that lasted only one season on Fox that had an **all-white** cast. And we could have hijacked this thread onto what’s really plaguing television. Crappy Sci-Fi! But hey, it was well after our bedtimes. You can’t be clever all the time. > [@](#): > > But the fact remains that there have been a good number of shows that _relied on the fact that a lot of the cast members were black_. A show with such a weak base for entertainment, in my opinion, sucks. > > It’s not a matter of “the actors are black”. It’s a matter of “the show’s poorly written”. If I saw a show which relied on its cast being white, I’d come to the same conclusions (admittedly, I can’t think of any examples at the moment… but it IS 2:30 AM). [sub]That’s funny, I can think of more than a couple (OK, it’s not 2:30am anymore, but I bet you I could even then).[/sub] “Friends.” What’s that now? “That show’s not relying on its cast being white”? “It’s about a gang of hip twenty-somethings living and hanging out in New York City”? Oh, I see. A different demographic is being targeted. They get to use different adjectives in its press releases. Sorry. Let’s look at the amazing long list of unfunny (a network at random) NBC sitcoms that missed your list of single demographic wonders. [li]Jesse[/li][li]Michael Richards[/li][li]Steve Weber Show (it will be cancelled, trust me)[/li][li]Veronica’s Closet[/li][li]Battery Park[/li][li]Suddenly Susan.[/li]Different template, same crap! So is it better, worse, or just as fair to fill in the \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ with “black” as opposed to “twenty-something woman” or “Cosmo Kramer (but not Cosmo Kramer)”? I could go into the spiel about how Steve Harvy is about an inner-school teacher struggling to inspire minds, or how Moesha is a teenage girl figuring out how to juggle friends and family, but that’s beside the point. > [@](#): > > I like my entertainment to be fucking _entertaining_, not “ethnically diverse”. A show can include all ethnicities without sacrificing entertainment value (as your own previous examples prove). Sorry, but phone lines are now closed. Try again next time. > [@](#): > > Or maybe I just don’t like sitcoms… I find myself as turned off to shows like “Nikki” as I was to “The Steve Harvey Show” (yes, I know both shows are probably relatively popular… I’m not trying to claim as such). > > Anyway, I’m going to bed. I’m sure somebody can find a can of worms or two somewhere in that post whilst I slumber. There we go, something we can agree on. “Sitcoms Suck!” And it even fits on a bumper sticker. Who says you can’t reach consensus in the Pit. Sincerely,                          Sterling. ---
**Author:** ![SterlingNorth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@SterlingNorth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SterlingNorth)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/30 "2000-12-21T22:13:49Z")
[quote] I am remembering wrong, or isn’t BET a broadcast station in D.C.? **jmullaney** **BET** ’s a cable network that is headquartered in DC. Or at least until Viacom completes the purchase. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2000, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/31 "2000-12-21T22:34:06Z")
One thing BET could do to get me back as a customer would be to bring back the classic early 70s TV program **Roll Out** , sort of an all-black **MASH** , starring Stu Gilliam and Hilly Hicks, and featuring Garrett Morris (of **SNL** fame, of course, and Darrow Igus (who was a regular in ABC’s **Fridays** program). Mel Stewart prograyed their long-suffering boss, Sgt BJ. They’ve aired this excellent series before, but they haven’t done it in a while. Maybe they drew heat from lines like (Stu Gilliam as Cpl “Sweet” Williams): “Sgt BJ is a big, black fay-ree.” Another exchange: (Sgt BJ) “Williams, I’m gonna have your butt for breakfast.” (Cpt Sweet Williams) “Sergeant, I didn’t know you was a gour-may.” ---
**Author:** ![SterlingNorth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@SterlingNorth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SterlingNorth)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2000, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/32 "2000-12-22T01:10:54Z")
[/quote] [/quote] Test in response to [this thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=52203) (Click “Show a Printable Version” for more information.) ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2000, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/33 "2000-12-22T04:15:14Z")
Ugh…and why is the student cafeteria big screen always in tune to BET and MTV…_sigh_ Um, correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Shakespeare die before any Musketeers even EXISTED??? Jesus, help us all! (I’m a history major, and this really sucks…talk about “creative” anachorism!) Also, I don’t know if sci-fi doesn’t make it to the bestsellers…wasn’t Shadows of the Empire, a Star Wars novel, on the NY Times list? ---
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2000, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/34 "2000-12-22T05:00:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jmullaney \* > > Good luck, since I’m positive you are actually thinking of an interview of **Phillip K. Dick** entitled [“The Mainstream That Through the Ghetto Flows”](http://www.id-online.de/ufo/pkdint.htm). Very similar to the Niven article. I actually found a reference to the Niven one in another Niven book “Three Storys of Known Space”(the one with World of Ptavvs in it). The article appeared in “Playgrounds of the Mind”, and unfortunately I can’t find my copy. ☹ Thought I might have had it at work but it isn’t here which means I have to actually clean my home again this year. ugh! The articles are similar, but Niven’s is a lot funnier. The jist was that Ellison got the Hugo (and it may have been for A Boy and His Dog, great book and movie btw) and then announced that he was “Leaving the Sci-Fi ghetto.”. Niven got an award that year (Neutron Star I think) and ran into some fen in an elevator, they didn’t know Niven and asked where he got the Hugo, he said that Ellison was “giving them away.” and gave the fen Harlan’s room number. This was the same con where Heinlein made the infamous “Gay Nazis for Christ” quote to some hapless woman in another elevator. Looks like Ellison’s comment struck a chord with a few writers. But w/o regard to this serious hijack I think the point I was making (even with the wrong book reference) is still valid and on-topic. If anyone has “Playgrounds of the Mind” please look this article up and get back to me or post the correction here. I"m afraid I won’t be able to find the book this weekend or get to the bookstore to replace my lost copy. ---
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2000, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/35 "2000-12-22T05:03:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Guinastasia \* > \*\*) > > Also, I don’t know if sci-fi doesn’t make it to the bestsellers…wasn’t Shadows of the Empire, a Star Wars novel, on the NY Times list? > \*\* Re-read my whole comment on that. It stated that when sci-fi was starting out it was like that. If you had a sci-fi label at one time you were guaranteed marginal sales. But I noted that this changed and that so it may/should go with nich-programming on television. Also note that today there are almost as many “best sellers” lists as there are professional wrestling titles and many of them are specialized. Thus often times sci-fi does not compete with Tom Clancy or Danielle Steel in the same forum. Sorta’ like the Bilboard Country charts vs the Bilboard R&B charts. ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2000, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/36 "2000-12-22T05:50:29Z")
> [@](#): > > I was trying to figure out what the hell your point here was. I remember what I forgot to do!!! I forgot to tie in my comments with the OP!!! My apologies… when you C&P a lot in a post, you tend to forget stuff… ::ahem:: Allow me to rectify that… The OP was about stupidity over at BET (well, two instances of stupidity, anyway). This came with the implication that things over at BET HQ aren’t as professionally run as, say, CNN. I took this a step further (maybe too far?) by making a vague allusion to its shows being poorly written and poorly set up. Also, in later posts, I wanted to point out that if the only “virtue” of a show is “ethnic diversity” - that is, crappy writing and acting - then I’d feel safe in concluding that show to be crap. Now, how THIS ties in with WB, UPN, and Fox… those three networks have had a good number of gimmicky shows over the past couple years. I haven’t a clue as to whether or not there’ve been more or less of these (usually) short-lived gimmick shows on those networks compared to CBS, ABC, etc., but I, personally, have noticed it more on those three. You’re absolutely right about all those shows relying on cheap gimmicks, although I disagree with you on shows like “Jesse” or “Nikki” relying on a “white cast”… shows like that were relying on a big, noticeable name (hence the titles of the show). Same concept, but different category. My example of the much-deplored (by me, at least… I don’t care whether you liked the show or not) “Homeboys in Outer Space” applied better to the notion of “relying on ethnicity”, since the whole premise of the show was “Hey… let’s put black guys in space!” (Feel free to disagree witht his… this is my impression). Similarly, BET seems to rely solely on having “black” shows, instead of trying to show _entertainment_. In short, they’re relying on a single, weak gimmick. This trend has existed since the invention of the movie camera, I know, but the notion of “let’s make a show with black guys!” is becoming more of a trend in other networks… most noticeably (to me) in the WB, UPN, and Fox. Again, it’s not a matter of race (not directly, anyway), it’s a matter of stupid business, planning, and writing. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2000, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/37 "2000-12-23T03:33:04Z")
Ooops, Zen, you’re right, sorry. LOOONG days working at Krapmart… ---
**Author:** ![McKenna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/db5fbb/32.png) [@McKenna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/McKenna)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2000, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/38 "2000-12-23T04:50:17Z")
Check out the comic strip “The Boondocks”. Aaron McGruder’s characters are always making fun of BET. ---
**Author:** ![diamud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@diamud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diamud)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2000, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/40 "2000-12-24T19:33:13Z")
There have been many fine television programs featuring black actors, in all-black or racially mixed programs. I think the point that some of the posters above are trying to make is that, viewing the program as a hypothetical color-blind viewer, the shows are terrible. While having black programs on a black network is important, when the show is simply terrible, and usually stupid, it becomes more of an embarrasment than a point of pride. In fact, you could argue that having a network specifically geared towards and run by members of minority group, and then having that network be just pitiful would be a point of shame, and something that you would want to see corrected immediately. I would also like to point out that if you took that transcript of some of the comedian’s performances on BET, gave it to a white man, and replaced the word “white” with “black”, there would be a national outcry. Making fun of another race, even if you are a minority, is never cool. ---
**Author:** ![zen101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c68b51/32.png) [@zen101](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zen101)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2000, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485/41 "2000-12-26T05:12:51Z")
I found my copy of “Playgrounds of the Mind” by Larry Niven. The article is entitles “Ghetto? But I thought…” and is on page 533. Ok, I now know where I got the Boys From Brazil thing confused. The article mentions that when it was published it was nominated for a Nebula award Ira Levins publisher quickly got the boow withdrawn from the group of nominated works. The con where Harlan resigned from the Sci-Fi Ghetto was NASFIC in 1976. Harlan was the GOH and did not recieve any awards at that con so I was completely off on that. But at least I know where I got the Ghetto thing and I would bet that the fellow who interviewed Dick got it from the same place or same group of people. I note that that interview took place in the 70’s which is the timeframe for the Ellison story. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-what-kind-of-idiots-run-bet/46485.md?page=3)