right|thumb|294x294px|The character Gus (portrayed in [[blackface by white actor Walter Long), a black buck, is captured by Klansmen in The Birth of a Nation (1915)]]

Black Buck, also known as Big Black Buck, is a stereotype of a black American male: large, violent, and voraciously attracted to white women. It is closely related to the black American stereotypes of the black brute and the mandingo.

According to the National Museum of black American History and Culture, the stereotype originated as European Americans feared freed black American males would exact revenge for slavery against white men by raping their daughters, wives, mothers or grandmothers while Riché Richardson says it was created at the end of the 19th century to justify Lynching in the United States.

The stereotype has been depicted in films to reflect negatively on black Americans such as The Birth of a Nation (1915) and to reflect positively such as Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971), although it has been challenged by some in the black American community as to whether these depictions are good.

Characteristics

An African American male stereotyped as a black buck is large, violent, and attracted to white women in a hypersexual manner; historian Donald Bogle describes these as "big, baadddd niggers". According to Riché Richardson, the stereotype originated in the late 19th century as a justification for lynching, to supplant the dominant understanding of African American males as docile figures, seen in the stereotype of Uncle Tom. seen in the characters of Silas Lynch and Gus. In the film, these characters pursue white women, with an apparent intent to rape and kidnap, Following Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song throughout the early 1970s, a string of films featuring positive depictions of the buck were released. These films updated the stereotype for a new time, making the figure cool and somewhat political

Use by white supremacists

David Duke, former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, was quoted in The Sun newspaper of Wichita, Kansas (23 April 1975) as saying, "White people don't need a law against rape, but if you fill this room up with your normal black bucks, you would, because niggers are basically primitive animals."

The perpetrator of the 2022 Buffalo shooting had the phrase “Buck Status: Broken” hand-painted in one of his rifles.

See also

  • Angry black woman
  • Stereotypes of African Americans
  • African-American representation in Hollywood
  • Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia
  • Racial profiling
  • Stereotypes of groups within the United States
  • Scientific racism
  • BBC (sexual slang)

References