Jesse Williams has a message to be heard: black Americans are not inherently angrier than anyone else.
During a recent interview with The Guardian, the "Grey's Anatomy" star broke down the "angry black man/woman" stereotype and the misguided assumption that a black person's anger is a product of being black. "There is zero evidence, zero evidence that black people are more inclined to be angry in vacuum than anybody else,” he said.
“They are upset. Is being upset bad? Is anger just a negative quality?” he asked. “It doesn’t begin with rage, right. It’s a community that’s fucking hurting and is really disappointed in itself, in the people that it trusted, in the government it paid taxes to... That is where the frustration comes from.”
Williams has spoken before about how the media drives the narrative about black people in a negative way. In regards to the Michael Brown case, the 34-year-old questioned the media’s focus on video footage showing Brown involved in strong-arm robbery at a convenience store, during an August 2014 interview with CNN.
"You'll find that the people doing the oppressing always want to start the narrative at a convenient part, or always want to start the story in the middle," he said. "This started with a kid getting shot and killed and left in the street for four hours."
Read more of Jesse Williams’ interview with The Guardian here.
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