The ANNOTICO Report 
 
Spike Lee did the Italian American Community a GREAT Injustice when he filmed his "Do the Right Thing" in the 1980s wherein Spike portrays Italian Americans as racists, and approves the use of Slurs and Violence against Sal, an Italian  Pizza Owner who declined one patron's request to add to Sal's Italian Wall of Fame, any photos of any other persons. Spike considered Sal's declining a customers the right to redecorate Sal's Parlor was justification for a Riot.

'Do The Right Thing' Still Asks Burning Questions

The Washington Post; From The Associated Press;  By Jesse Washington; Sunday, June 28, 2009 

NEW YORK -- Twenty years later, the trash can is still crashing through America's window. 

At the climax of Spike Lee's 1989 drama "Do The Right Thing," the eternal battle between love and hate teeters on a razor's edge. The young black man Radio Raheem has been choked to death by white police after a fight with a Brooklyn pizzeria owner. A seething crowd gathers in front of the shop. 

Lee's character, Mookie, a black pizza deliveryman, stands between the crowd and the shop. He's shoulder-to-shoulder with Sal, the shop's Italian owner. They exchange looks of confusion, betrayal and regret. 

The crowd stares at Mookie. He's on the wrong side. Mookie moves over to his brothers, rubs his face, wrestling with the weight of the moment. Then he decides. 

"Hate!" screams Mookie as he hurls the metal can through the pizzeria's plate glass window. The dam bursts. The mob destroys the shop in a frenzy that was both inevitable and completely avoidable.... 

Lee responded by adding two quotes at the end. The first, from Martin Luther King Jr., preached nonviolence: "The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind." The second, from Malcolm X, advocated self-defense against "bad people" who block racial progress: "I don't even call it violence when it's self-defense, I call it intelligence." 

"It got misconstrued that it had to be either Dr. King or Malcolm," Lee said. "It was never meant to be that you had to pick one or the other. These are the two most prominent African-American leaders of the 20th century, and they both wanted the same thing." 

[RAA: A Good Communicator dousn't have to explain himself !!]..

The riot is sparked by the militant Buggin' Out, who demands that Sal add some black people to his all-Italian Wall of Fame. Buggin' notes that Sal's all-black and Puerto Rican clientele provides his livelihood. Sal responds that if Buggin' wants to make decorating decisions, he should start his own business. 

Buggin' tries to organize a boycott, but his black friends have no problem with Sal or his wall. He finally enlists Radio Raheem, whose enormous boom box blasting Public Enemy's "Fight the Power" has offended both Sal and various black residents. 

"They both had good points," said Lee, with a challenging smile. 

[RAA: WRONG: If you don't like the Decor, or the Food, or the Service at an establishment, you don't burn down the place, you take your business elsewhere. Yhe main aggitator couldn't even enlist enough support for a boycott of Sal's ITALIAN Pizza Parlor.... 

Throughout the film, Sal has expressed his love for the neighborhood and its residents. Sal has been lenient with Mookie's meandering deliveries, even saying he's "like a son to me." Sal's shop would have been closed when Buggin' and Raheem arrived if he hadn't unlocked it to feed a few neighborhood kids. 

But after Raheem doesn't turn down his radio, and Buggin' calls Sal a guinea, Sal drops the bomb - "Nigger!" - and destroys the radio with a bat. Raheem attacks Sal, the police arrive, and Raheem ends up dead.  

"One of the biggest criticisms about 'Do The Right Thing' is, 'Spike Lee didn't provide the answer to end racism and prejudice.' That's not my job, I don't have the answer for that. The film was to show what I felt at the time were issues that needed to be dealt with." 

But still no answers, 20 years later? 

"It doesn't matter," Lee said. "I'm not gonna sit here and lie and say I have the answer to end racism and prejudice in America." 

[RAA: Spike Not only do you Not have the Answers, You don't even Know the Question, or a Proper Construct of the Problem. ]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/
article/2009/06/28/AR2009062800823_pf.html
 
 

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