Blaxploitation-Gangsta Comparison

I think that there is a bit of a difference between these two "uniquely-Black" genres of film. For starters, I feel that Gangsta films, despite the romantic image they create of an otherwise-dire situation of life in urban America, are more authentic, while Blaxploitation films are more of a metaphor. By this I mean that these films are visual representations of the sentiment of Black America at the time. These films were made in the early- and mid-1970s, a time when African-Americans were still fighting for equal footing in the nation. The creation of films depicting strong, independent, attractive African-Americans taking names would have obviously appealed to the target audience, but would have also paralleled the ideas of Black strength and power at the time.