Black History's Heroes & Saints

Part drama, part sports flick, part urban exposé, The Blind Side tells the inspiring true story of NFL star Michael Oher and the white family who transformed his life -- and had theirs transformed as a result.

The elevation of Black dysfunction and the invisibility of positive Black images are sending destructive messages about the reality of Black life, both to our young people and to those outside the Black community.

This edition of Pop & Circumstance is all about the "youngins" -- from the tragic tales of Precious Jones in Lee Daniels' latest film and Rihanna's triumph over domestic abuse, to the underage vixens of Gossip Girl. Join us as we take a look at the young stars who are making headlines -- and, at times, making many of us adults a little nervous.

After a few weeks off, Pop & Circumstance is back! (Did you miss us?) As you probably suspected, we've got plenty to talk about, including the return of BeBe and CeCe, Mary Mary's questionable new pursuits, and a new book that will rock your world. But first, let's check in with our favorite born-again sister from The View.

I used to imagine a camera crew was following me around, secretly recording every bit of my life like The Truman Show. The crew would follow me to the Laundromat and record for hours as I separated the whites from the coloreds. Sometimes viewers at home would watch me reorganize my bookshelf or agonize over what kind of food to order for dinner on a Saturday night. Chinese or Italian ... Chinese or Italian...? It was a pretty boring television show. When you think about it, real life is never as exciting as a movie.

Putting BET's Business in the Street
Andreas Hale, former Executive Editor of Music for BET.com, got the pink slip this week and tried to take the company down with him. After nearly a year at the urban entertainment network, the executive left his post by sending a fiery email to industry friends confirming what many critics of the network have long suspected: BET is a hot mess.

If the stories in this edition of Pop & Circumstance have a common theme, it's the call for audiences -- viewers, listeners, and users of media -- to exercise more compassion, discernment, and responsibility in the way they interact with pop culture. Come to think of it, those are themes found in many editions of P&C. Anyway, we talk about them more explicitly this time around. So let's get started.

Here's this week's rundown of pop-culture stories. Lots to talk about, so let's get started.

Usually it's the book that inspires the movie, but in the case of author Catherine Claire Larson's As We Forgive: Stories of Reconciliation from Rwanda, it was the other way around. The book, a gripping exploration of the aftermath of the 1994 Rwandan genocide and the miracle of forgiveness, is a literary extension of Laura Waters Hinson's award-winning 2008 documentary of the same name.

As the pastor of a church with a deep desire to love others as Christ would, I've recently been telling folks, "If you only read one book this year, then you must read The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns." And that's saying a lot, given that my own book just came out! I feel that strongly about Stearns's message.