BET Catches More Heat Over Lil Wayne Set, Filmmaker Inks Open Letter

Award-winning filmmaker Byron Hurt has become the latest figure to address BET for their airing of Lil Wayne and Drake's "Every Girl" performance at the 2009 Awards ceremony. Directing an open letter to BET President Debra Lee, Hurt focused on Weezy's set and his reaction to the Michael Jackson tribute.

"BET failed to deliver a solid, quality show," he wrote. "Rather than 'raising the bar' and presenting African-Americans as a creative, proud, dignified people, BET lowered the bar for the entire world to see. The BET Awards drew a huge audience to watch a tribute to Michael Jackson, but left millions of viewers feeling disappointed, embarrassed, and reduced to classic stereotypes...Show executives watched, approved, and applauded as artists Lil Wayne, Drake, and Cash Money brought young, under-aged girls onto the stage to dance and serve as window dressing while they performed 'Every Girl,' a song that reduces girls and women to sex objects. In a culture where one out of four girls and women are either raped or sexually assaulted - and where manipulative men routinely traffic vulnerable women into the sex industry - it is not okay that BET allowed this to happen. BET owes its entire audience - particularly girls and women around the world - an apology for its failure to intervene." (The Urban Daily)

Journalists covering the event also expressed their reactions to the set.

Overrall, the show was a big downer because...many things just seemed out of place. For example, Drake's performance had Lil' Wayne and his pre-teen daughter with other young girls on stage rapping along to "Every Girl in the World," which is a song about having escapades with all the girls in the world. (Examiner)

Reports have also spread online which claim the young girls' on-stage appearance was unplanned.

According to my source, what happened was Wayne's daughter Reginae, 9, was upset that she didn't get the chance to accompany her father, Lil Wayne, to the stage to accept his award because she was sitting too far back in the audience. Once backstage, the youngster began to cry. And Wayne, who they say is a great dad, hated to see his little girl cry. So he told Reginae she could come out onstage during his performance with Drake. Reginae, being the team player that she is, asked the other members of her group to go out on stage with her. (Sandra Rose)

Byron Hurt is known for his documentaries including Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes.

Byron Hurt is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, a published writer, and an anti-sexist activist. His most recent documentary, Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival. It was later broadcast nationally on the Emmy award-winning PBS series Independent Lens, drawing an audience of more than 1.3 million viewers. To date, Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes (BBR) has been selected to appear in more than 50 film festivals worldwide and The Chicago Tribune named it "one of the best documentary films in 2007." (Byron Hurt)

Comment by Anton1u$ on July 3, 2009 at 12:05am: shut the fuck up mutherfucker. individuality is what we all got and no one was taking away from the m.j. tribute, but niggaz wanted to lighten the mood can you blame em? don coenielius came up there and detoured the whole on some reminess type shit and thats cool but they should've started the music on his speech when he was 5 minutes into it. so fuck you, weezy and em did they thang, i mean come on, no more rap city, how do you want the streets to react bitch.

Comment by ReceSSioN on July 3, 2009 at 4:39am: the awards sucked asssssssssssssssss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Comment by D-lo/4g on July 3, 2009 at 9:34am: every since b.e.t went to the white people things have changed, no rap city ,no hits,no b.e.t uncut,all they sho is re runs of old shows that sh*t is 4 kids after school thats what happen when u sell yo sh* t 2 whitey he f*ck yo brand up !!!

Comment by bullcityricky on July 3, 2009 at 10:11am: That shit didnt looked planned out shut the fuck up byron go find something negative to talk about with white people or something stop hatin on your own bitch nigga

Comment by Lay Lowe on July 3, 2009 at 2:16pm: Dam I no they did fuccover Rap city...........R.I.P B.E.T

cuz the white man dont no how 2 run blacc ppl shit

Comment by rez on July 3, 2009 at 9:06pm: byron hurt a dumbass hater and black people listen to that music every day maybe he should check his skin color,he tryin to hard for them crackers

Comment by rez on July 3, 2009 at 9:10pm: p.s that tribute to mike was to get people to watch b.e.t was jus capitalizing on mike death they should change the name to w.b.e.t for white black entertainment television im black as hell and i dont watch that shit i witch more mtv and thats true and sad

Comment by Santo "masquetu" Domingo on July 4, 2009 at 3:21am: Interesting HOW now BYRON HURT has taken an interest in B.E.T Considering If he truly wanted to dismay or share his thoughts when B.E.T "Uncut" was CRACCCKN" he did not. The definition of a American does not Fall behind the opinion or image of ONE individual. If you dont like what you see..change the Channel. B.E.T in no way shape or form REPRESENTS anything of "CONTENT" so WHO CARES!

Comment by Denmark Boi on July 4, 2009 at 2:51pm: y is that BET always the bad guy, VH1 have black women doing stupid shit to act like they going to be with some dude, MTV has gay people and nobody has said anything about that. but wayne bring has little girl on stage with him and its the worst thing on tv. thats why i don't watch Bet like i used to the best thing about it was the music videos and 160 & park has been crap since AJ and Free left.

Comment by Yung D on July 4, 2009 at 8:51pm: True Shit. I was Lyk Why They Bring Girls On Stage That Look @ Least 13 on stage and sing that song all loud and unrated was crazy. Wayne must have been on sum shyt rite der