Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing” Still Resonates for African Americans 20 Years Later

Spike Lee’s 1989 masterpiece Do the Right Thing was a firebomb of a film, delivered in a year of box office blockbusters. Thing was the coalescing of all of Lee’s visual and directorial trademarks into one unbelievable power bit of filmmaking. Set on a hot summer day in Brooklyn, the film explored the conflicted (and conflicting) racial dynamics of that neighborhood. In Lee’s masterful storytelling, no one is given a free pass or let off the hook. One can interpret this film as a glaring spotlight on race relations and a reflection of everyone in modern multicultural society.

Twenty years later, the message of Do the Right Thing rings even truer than it did in 1989. More specifically, it resonates with more and more Americans around the country everyday. Spike Lee’s Brooklyn neighborhood was a melting pot of black, Irish, Italian, Jewish, West Indian, Puerto Rican and a host of other ethnicities—all trying to coexist in the same space. Two decades ago, that kind of cultural diversity was only true in major cities like New York and Los Angeles. But today, after the rapid growth of Hispanic and southeast Asian communities in the South and Midwest, more Americans are learning to exist in a world that isn’t exclusively cut between ‘black’ and ‘white.’

Throughout these smaller regions of the country, there have been instances of racial unrest regarding these ‘new’ inhabitants–the beating death of a Mexican man in a small Pennsylvania town and the harassment of a Pakistani family in Kentucky—both are signs that the unrest showcased in Lee’s film is beginning to resurface outside of our nation’s metropolitan centers. But one central of that film that we all must carry with us as we try to sort through the complexities of race relations, is that we’re both capable and susceptible to acts of bigotry and prejudice; denial of those facts can be dangerous for all parties involved. –todd williams