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If you had been on the south or west side of Chicago when “Say it Loud..I’m Black and I’m Proud” was in major rotation on Chicago’s black radio stations, you wouldn’t have needed a radio to hear it. All you had to do was open a window because almost everyone who had a radio was blasting it. This was before “boom boxes”, the politically correct term for “Ghetto Blasters” as they were first known. People were into transistor radios, car radios, and the ubiquitous "record players". No CDs, a dribble of cassette players and a drizzle of 8-track players. The dominant media was vinyl: 45RPMs and LPs. The fact that so much street noise could be generated with so little fire power was a testament to the popularity of that song.
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The impact that one song had on the psyche of black people not only in Chicago but nationwide, even internationally, was astounding. When a lot of people were saying how worthless blacks were, here comes Mr. Brown telling them, don’t listen to them, listen to me.
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For many blacks it was an opportunity to express their pride in who they were in a public way. It was like an announcement to the world that we don’t care if you like our hair, if we are light or dark skinned, if we spoke the king’s English or like dis-n-dat, we are human beings, just like everyone else, and will be respected as such. Not only that, we are PROUD of who we are and where we came from and that we like ourselves, whether you like us or not. It was quite a statement, especially at that time.
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The biggest impact of that song was that it helped give blacks a sense of hope and confidence. That is an intangible asset that can not be measured in record sales or dollars made.
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Thank you Mr. Brown.
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~ TDaddy
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