The Colored Museum

The Temptations’ “My Girl” plays as a Black man in corporate dress stands at a trash can throwing in items that he removes from a Saks Fifth Avenue bag. Circling around him is the Kid, dressed in late-1960s street-style clothes.

The Man lists off the items as he throws them in the can. His first pair of Converse All-Stars, Afro-Comb, his first dashiki, autographed pictures of Stokely Carmichael, Jomo Kenyatta, and Donna Summer. The Kid complains as the Man tosses away each item.

The Man continues: Murray’s Pomade, first can of Afro-sheen, first box of curl relaxer, Eldridge Cleaver’s Soul on Ice. The Kid’s objections grow more desperate. The Man tells him Cleaver’s book has been replaced by The Color Purple. The Kid is horrified. The Man moves on to popular music albums by Jimi Hendrix, Sly Stone, and the Jackson Five, all to the Kid’s consternation and protests.

The Man tells the Kid that he has to cut any connection he has to his past because his survival depends on it. He says an Ice Age is upon them. He calls himself to a sociological dinosaur and compares himself to King Kong. He throws out all of his 1960s protest buttons.