The Curious Disappearance of Cursive Writing

 I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but...

...why exactly did schools decide cursive was the skill that had to go?

I'm told it's because we needed more time for technology. Fair enough. Kids should know how to use a keyboard. But somehow they can spend hours learning standardized test strategies and social media trends, yet fifteen minutes a day teaching handwriting became too much?

Call me crazy, but three thoughts cross my mind.

First, if nobody can read cursive anymore, fewer people can read old letters, journals, family records, and even parts of our own history without someone translating it for us. That's an odd way to preserve the past. It means that someone else (the government) will have to recreate those documents and translate for younger generations. Think about the things that will probably be "lost in translation".

Second, it seems that the less we write by hand, the more dependent we become on devices. Every note, reminder, and idea now belongs to a phone, tablet, or cloud server somewhere instead of on a piece of paper. No more analog thoughts. Only digital ones that can be tracked and somehow monetized with ads. Funny how independence quietly became inconvenience.

Third, signatures are slowly becoming meaningless. Today's kids are growing up in a world where a fingerprint or face scan matters more than their own handwriting. Maybe that's progress. Maybe it's just one more thing we're handing over to technology.

Do I actually believe there's a secret meeting where people plotted the downfall of cursive? Maybe. Maybe not.

But I do think we've become a little too eager to throw away simple skills because they're "old-fashioned." Not everything from the past deserves to stay there.

Sometimes common sense isn't asking if something is old. It's asking whether replacing it actually made us better.

Jerrod Carmichael Quits

The Carmichael Show is one of my favorite TV shows.  It is a sitcom that features a family of black people who discuss every day topics from "Plan B birth control" to "the N-word".  They take the topic of the show, no matter how controversial, and do a masterful job of making the topic hilarious, while exposing the audience to different perspectives on it.

Well, the show is coming to an end after 3 seasons.  Not because of ratings.  Not because of protests.  Because the creator and star of the show has decided that 3 seasons is enough and that he wants to quit.

First of all, I totally understand that Jerrod Carmichael has the right to do whatever it is that he wants.  However, this is yet another black-created show, within the past decade or so, that I can recall, that has suffered an unceremonious death.

Chappelle's Show (2003, 2004, 2006)

This show was ground-breaking.  Like "In Living Color" before it, it took stereotypes and racism and turned it into something comical.

Dave Chappelle pushed the envelope on what was offensive and what was funny.  For three seasons, he ruled the airwaves as the funniest man on TV until he walked away from the show and a $50 million dollar contract from Comedy Central.

A lot of people speculated on why he left, but in the end, a very creative show, that opened people's eyes to racism, double standards, and more, was no more.

For years, people waited to see if Chappelle would ever bring the show back, but the closest we got was him reviving some characters from his show on a Saturday Night Live appearance last season.

What could he have done with Obama's election, Tiger Woods scandal, or other things that occurred after his show went off the air.  We'll never know.


The Boondocks (2005-2008, 2010, 2014)

This show started as a hilarious comic strip, that I sometimes wonder how it even got printed in most newspapers.

The show featured a radical, modern day, young Black Panther known as Huey Freeman (named after Huey P. Newton).  The story centered around his family (granddad and little brother) and their new surroundings in suburban America.  From the hood to a white environment, the family dealt with everything from racism to the LGBT community.

This show hit on a ton of topics surrounding the black community, including a number of topics that tend to make black people uncomfortable (our idolization of celebs, gay rappers, etc.).

The show never seemed to get traction as each season always appeared to the last.  The show would take hiatus so much that most viewers thought that it was canceled, when it was indeed not.  Whether it was creative control issues with the creator, Aaron McGruder, or problems finding the right people to voice the characters, the show ultimately disappeared.

I could add another show in Key & Peele, which lasted from 2012-2105 until they decided to move on to bigger and better things.  And now add The Carmichael Show to the list.

Another show greatly appreciated by deep thinking fans that has gone the way of the dinosaur just out of the blue.  I was not a fan of Jerrod Carmichael prior to the show, but I hope to be a fan of his in the future.  All of that remains to be seen as he moves on to his next project.  However, my question is: why are these people quitting?  Why are black creators walking away from their work?  Are we doomed to see Issa Rae drop "Insecure" after three or four seasons?


Looks like I'll be focusing on "Black-ish" again until Anthony Anderson walks away from it.  After all, Season 4 is coming up.