Rape, Consent and Race in Marvel's #JessicaJones

Marvel's Jessica Jones is the latest, best example of white feminist fiction: excellent on sexism, terrible on racism. There are a lot of great things about this series that speak directly to the ills that women face on a daily basis. Kilgrave, the central villain, is chillingly terrifying, specifically because the only difference between him and your garden variety abuser is his total power to enact his will. The examination of male entitlement in ways both large and small (by contrasting Kilgrave and Simpson for example) are excellent and poignant. But as I watched the 13 episode first season, I was struck by how callously black people's lives were treated on the show, rendered into convenient plot devices in service of the white female protagonist's character development. As a black woman viewing the show, it was easy to see that the active pursuit of liberation from abuse was not a struggle that this show believes includes me (an ongoing struggle for Marvel). Ironically, the best parts of the show are its treatment with its villain, while the worst are its treatments with its female anti-heroine.

While I do have several critiques of the show, there were a number of things that I thought were handled exceptionally well. Firstly, this is a show driven by women about the fears and terrors that women must navigate in the world shrunk down to a micro-level, enabling us an intimate look at the various levels of abuse women routinely endure. The contrast between Kilgrave and Simpson is genius, as it helps demonstrate the full scale of abuse that men knowingly and unknowingly enact on the women around them. The two men are flip-sides of the same coin. While Kilgrave simply takes what he feels he is entitled to by means of his powers of enhanced persuasion, Simpson intially takes a less forceful but no less sinister approach, exemplified in his treatment of Trish after he realizes that Kilgrave has compelled him to murder her. As Stephanie Yang writes in a Bitch Magazine review:

The warning signs are there early on. Under Kilgrave's control, Simpson assaults Trish inside her own apartment. Once Kilgrave's control wears off, he's wracked with guilt and comes back to apologize. The problem is that Trish doesn't want Simpson's apology; she wants him to just leave. Trish doesn't want to be reminded that she was attacked in her own home, or feel trapped by her own high-end security system while her attacker lingers outside. But Simpson is insistent, sitting in her hallway and talking to her through the intercom. Simpson makes his apology about his needs and his absolution, not about Trish's needs, safety or mental health. It's entirely understandable, but it's still wrong. 

Simpson and Kilgrave certainly have different motivation for their destructive actions. But as Jessica points out, intent doesn't matter. Their actions and consequences are what matter. That's an important distinction that needs to be made at a time when courts and media alike dismiss many real-life cases of abuse because the abuser "couldn't know" what they were doing was wrong. Violence is a symptom of a culture that indulges bad behavior as being inherently and unavoidably part of masculinity, or even a romantic expression of desire and protectiveness.

I would go a step further and name Simpson's insistent apologies to Trish as outright abusive on their face, specifically because they prioritize his need for absolution over her need to heal. Trish is the victim in the situation, and yet Simpson manages to find a way to center himself in the story of this trauma. As with Kilgrave and Jessica, Simpson's abuse is rooted not in a cartoonish hatred of women as we are often led to believe, but rather in prioritizing his own will and desires over Trish's.

Where Are The Women Of Color?: On Marvel's Problems With Race

It’s no secret that Marvel has a diversity problem. With every new release in film or television, the problem becomes larger and more noticeable. However, many of those that criticize Marvel’s diversity problems, tend to highlight the wrong thing. The large majority of criticism stems from the lack of representation of “women” in the MCU, and while there’s a bit of truth to that condemnation, it’s also another conversation that falsely centers white women.

In Film

Over the course of the last 7 years, there have been 12 films in the MCU, starting with 2008s Iron Man through to this year’s release, Ant-Man, and there is at least one white woman (or a woman that presents as white) in every single one of them. Many of them are exhibited as love interests first and foremost, which is the primary point of contention of the female fan base. But while there are very few female superheroes, none of which have headlined a film thus far, women do exist in the MCU even if they play supporting roles, and nearly all of them are white.

What’s missing from the conversation is what is always glossed over and forgotten about, when we talk about “women”: Women of Color. To date, there has been exactly one WoC character of note with a name and speaking role, out of all 12 Marvel films: Dr. Helen Cho. Dr. Cho makes her appearance in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and thankfully she is not bogged down with the usual tropes and stereotypes that surround Asian women in our media . She is not simply relegated to a love interest, and she does play an important part in the creation of Vision, but her contributions are overlooked by the rest of the characters. She is not what I would consider a “hero” in the traditional sense, and she is primarily a secondary supporting character, with no backstory or development, unlike every single other female character in the entire franchise.

There were two other female characters that appeared alongside Helen Cho, both of whom are white: Black Widow and Scarlet Witch. Both women would fall easily into the “hero(ine)” category. In fact, most of the women in the MCU do in one way or another (eventually at least), whether they are super-powered or not. With the exception of Helen Cho, Jane Foster, and (arguably) Pepper Potts, the women in Marvel films all have fight scenes in which they demonstrate that they can more than handle themselves, even if they may pull double duty as love interests. And even those who are not shown to physically fight, are all in positions of power (Helen Cho and Jane Foster are world leading scientists in their respective fields, and Pepper Potts is the CEO of Stark Industries) And whether with wit or brawn, none of them are entirely helpless (Peggy Carter, Sif, Maria Hill, Hope and Janet Van Dyne, Gamora, Sharon Carter, Frigga, & Nebula).

So really the problem for white female fans is not lack of representation, or even the kinds of representation (because most present the “Strong Female Character” archetype everyone says they’d like to see), but that there has yet to be a Marvel film lead by a woman. And while that is certainly a valid complaint, I can’t help but point out that there are exactly zero WoC (or non-Black MoC) heroes in Marvel films at all, and there have been exactly zero MCU films lead by a Person of Color thus far (and no, Gamora does not count as a WoC because while Zoe Saldana is an Afro-Latina, Gamora is not, nor does she code or present that way. And if you were thinking of a joke about her as a “literal WoC” because she’s green, smack yourself in the face for me).

Free The People. Fight The Power. Fuck The Police.

Darren Wilson will not be indicted.

I think we all knew that it was coming but it still feels like a slap in the face. For me, it's painful on so many different levels that it's honestly a little difficult to process.

It's so much more complicated that not getting justice for Big Mike. It's about realizing that there's little we can do short of setting the world on fire, to undo the systems that oppress black bodies every day. It's realizing that it isn't just Ferguson or Florida. It's the whole world. Anti-blackness is global and white fear will always be more valuable than black life.

The psychological effect of carrying that in your heart every day; of having to fight to see humanity where the world sees a threat? It takes a toll on your spirit. It eats at you. It lessens the person you're trying to be. And when you finally retaliate they tell you that you deserve your pain and the mental battle to hold fast to your dignity starts anew.

I don't know if I can keep doing this. I fear for my friends, for my brothers. I fear for the brilliant women who allow me to witness their lives online; giving of themselves in a show of solidarity for the men and women who look like us. And I don't want to live in fear. I don't want to read another story of a little black child barely out of infancy, lost to us forever because their skin made them loom larger and more terrifying than they were.

But I don't know what to do. I don't have any more tears to shed for this latest injustice. They've sucked me dry.

Pop Culture, Racism And Values Dissonance: Dr. Algernon Edwards On Cinemax's #TheKnick

If there's any show you need to catch up on this summer, Cinemax's The Knick is it. Set at the titular Knickerbocker Hospital in 1900's New York, the show centers on a group of surgeons working at the turn of the century, using the era's boom in technological advancements to refine and improve their craft, and attempting to drive down obscenely high mortality rates.

So far, I've been thoroughly engrossed in watching the show unfold, but I've had a deep discomfort about the experience as well. As you may likely have deduced, 1900's New York was not.... a progressive time in the history of the United States, and much of the storyline revolves around the racism that Dr. Algernon Edwards (Andre Holland), the first black doctor at the hospital, must face not just from his colleagues, but also from the patients he treats and the world at large. The Knick does nothing to sugarcoat the prevalent racial attitudes of the time, nor does it make the show's protagonist Dr. John Thackery (Clive Owen) suspiciously enlightened for his time. Rather, the show goes to great lengths to reinforce that pretty much everyone is racist, and it refuses to let you forget it.

There's an element of respectability to Edwards' story too, that I didn't pick up on until I started writing this. Algernon Edwards is the best of the best. Having studied surgery all over Europe under the patronage of the family that owns the hospital (his mother is their longtime maid), Edwards is far and away the most qualified doctor at the Knick. He has co-authored and published papers in well-respected medical journals, and innovated surgical techniques and tools. His skills are unmatched by his fellow surgeons and yet, they refuse to work with him; Dr Everett Gallenger (Eric Johnson) is openly hostile to him within the surgical theatre and without, harboring perhaps understandable resentment that Edwards was appointed Deputy Chief of Surgery over him.

Edwards is reduced to running an illicit clinic for African-Americans in the subterranean office that was assigned to him in disdain in order to actually treat patients. Even under these conditions he is able to devise a  new technique for hernia repair, and create a new tool for suctioning excess blood during surgery (using a modified vacuum cleaner). The Knick goes almost above and beyond to show us that he does not deserve this; this being the racism directed at him from all corners. But what I think the shows misses is an understanding that it's his inherent human dignity that should shield him from racism, and not his surgical qualifications.

That said, this show traffics in values dissonance in a very heavy-handed way that I personally have found to be quite triggering at times. Last Friday's episode featured a mob attacking random black people in street in retribution for the death of a police officer at that hands of a black man. Never mind of course that said (corrupt) police officer had first propositioned the man's wife and offered her a place at a brothel because "it's always good to have some dark ones around" and pulled a weapon first. The mob scenes were understandably violent, but framed against the backdrop of real life police violence being done to black people in 2014, from Eric Garner to Mike Brown, there was almost something obscene about the way the show used faceless and nameless black bodies as the stage upon which it made its point about racial discrimination. 

And while I'm definitely happy that The Knick confronts the race relations of the time rather than trying to side step it the way Mad Men does, or mention it in hushed tones the way Masters of Sex does, it's unsettling to see that depictions of black suffering are the only ways in which it could think to do that. And that isn't to negate that these things happened. After all, lynching is a particularly dark stain on our collective histories. But in a contemporary context, I'm disappointed that there wasn't a more elegant way to allude to those events without subjecting the viewing audience to such intensely triggering imagery. One scene has a unknown black woman shoved against a metal gate and beaten across the face with a brick. And though the point was certainly made, I can't get the image out of my head; another person who looks like me, mercilessly beaten for the crime of having been born with skin darker than society deemed acceptable. More than anything, watching this show has reminded me that not enough has changed, and ripples of these archaic and bigoted attitudes are still being felt today.

But don't misunderstand me. I really do enjoy this show. It's brilliantly acted, the music is fascinatingly appropriate and it is masterfully filmed. The sense of time and place is exquisite. I really like seeing medicine in the historic context of the 1900's: from chopping off limbs in barber shops, to using cocaine as a painkiller, to prescribing turpentine(!) for stomach ailments. It makes me wonder if 100 years from now the surgeons of 2114 will look back at our medical techniques and remark at how primitive they were. One of the storylines centered on sanitation and the spread of disease. (Apparently people didn't yet know to wash their hands in 1900.) Another deals with a nun who performs illegal abortions for the desperate women who come to her. But the heavy handed treatment of race in The Knick transitions too quickly from poor sanitation to punching the black doctor in the face, and eliciting derisive laughter from his colleagues. The mood whiplash is so severe sometimes that it takes me out of the show. 

For all my misgivings however, I'd still recommend the show. It is a brutal look at the social mores of the times, but perhaps a necessary one, given Hollywood's inclination to whitewash things of this nature. Just once though, I wish we could have a period drama that didn't evolve around a white protagonist.

Race, Racism and Mental Health: A Look At #OITNB's Suzanne "Crazy Eyes" Warren

I'm pretty convinced Suzanne Warren's mother is racist. Unintentionally so, but to detrimental effect.

As you know, I was very excited for the Season Two premiere of Netflix's Orange Is The New Black. I stayed up for hours and watched three straight episodes before my body gave in to fatigue and I went to bed. I spent the rest of the weekend inhaling the new stories that these women had to tell us, and I was grateful to be able to immerse myself in their lives once more. 

There were more than a few surprises when it came to the backstories that were explored this season most notably Morello, Poussey and Miss Rosa, in my opinion. But the backstory that stood out to me most was Suzanne's. In the second season's third episode, Hugs Can Be Deceiving, we get a glimpse into the difficulties Suzanne faced growing up as an adopted black child in a white family, who while clearly loving and protective of her, remained stubbornly blind to her mental health needs. 

So why do I think Suzanne's mother is racist? It's a bit difficult for me to articulate, so I'll defer to this completely out of context quote from Bitch Flicks about a young black female character on the Disney channel show Jessie:

"The worst part about her character to me is not just the stereotypes, but the fact that she is exhibiting urban Black stereotypes despite never having been a part of urban Black society. She lives in an Upper East Side penthouse and was born in Uganda. It is reminiscent of early 20th century ideas: things like social darwinism. These characteristics of Zuri exist in her genetics just because of the color of her skin."

Emphasis mine. Just let that percolate for a bit while I get into this next bit.

We the audience have had two seasons to get to know Suzanne, but even from the very beginning when she doggedly pursued Piper and nicknamed her Dandelion, it was clear that she suffered from some form of mental disorder. While demonstrably very intelligent (can you quote Shakespeare from memory?) Suzanne is inappropriately sexually aggressive, lacks social boundaries, and demonstrates difficulty understanding interpersonal cues. That she is "different" is plainly obvious to the casual observer.

And yet. 

In Hugs Can Deceiving we see Suzanne's mother self-righteously accuse another mother of racism for not wanting Suzanne to attend her child's sleepover in a flashback scene. The sleepover is for her 6-year-old. Suzanne is 10. The scene rubbed the wrong way for a lot of reasons. 

On The Erasure of People Of Colour From Dystopian Fiction

I've been thinking a lot about the comments made by Noah co-screenwriter Ari Handel that have been circulating recently. Asked about the extreme whiteness of the cast, Handel said that the "the race of the individual doesn't matter." Presumably this was meant to be a defense:

"From the beginning, we were concerned about casting, the issue of race. What we realized is that this story is functioning at the level of myth, and as a mythical story, the race of the individuals doesn't matter. They're supposed to be stand-ins for all people. Either you end up with a Bennetton ad or the crew of the Starship Enterprise."

Handel's comments were so completely bizarre to me because of how blatantly they reinforced the problematic idea that whiteness is a universal experience that everyone and anyone can relate to. He acknowledges that the movie is myth (and therefore a fiction they have created, over which they have total control) yet refuses to acknowledge that this does not in any way, logically translate into an all-white cast. His words reminded me of a little quote from novelist Kayla Ancrum I stumbled upon a little while ago while perusing a tumblr blog about women of colour in sci-fi and fantasy:

"Seriously guys, put PoC in your sci-fi movies, books, and tv shows. Seeing a film with none of them at all is actually kind of scary for me."

"It would be like you sitting down to watch a movie about a dystopian near future and there are absolutely no men and the plot doesn't address that at all. Like, literally wouldn't your first thought be that men were at some point eradicated completely by the women?"

"That is what we're pretty much forced to think about your entirely white fictional society. Maybe y'all herded us into death camps Maybe y'all just shot us all in the streets. All I know is there are none of us left and no one seems to find it suspicious or unusual."

"If you don't want people to think that about your work, then for the love of God, include us in your narrative."

It got me thinking. What does it mean that so many white authors and filmmakers find it perfectly natural to erase the presence of people of colour from their dystopian narratives? Forget addressing the issue of fleshing out actual minority characters, but literally just not including them at all?

Illustraion by Ron Ackins

The usual argument here is that authors are allowed to create whatever characters and worlds they wish, and that they shouldn't be forced to be "politically correct" about their imaginations. In theory, I agree. But when we exist a world where racial disparities often dictate things like access to wealth, proper healthcare, proper education and fair treatment under the law, it's disingenuous to pretend that continuing to marginalize people of color in fictional venues is anything less than equally egregious. The fact that so many authors think that it's not a problem to completely omit the very existence of millions of people and cultures entirely when constructing a narrative, is a product of white supremacy and the attitudes and thinking that come with it.

I've seen it said that the reason many black authors gravitate towards futurism in their works of fiction is because it allows them to envision a different world where they set the rules and I can definitely see the appeal. With the ability to craft a narrative completely from scratch, science fiction is a way to create characters that reflect us, as well as help us explore a world free from the political constraints that plague us in the real world. It's why speculative fiction is so intriguing to me. At it's core, it's all about answering the question, "What if?"

To me, this is why I tend to lean towards Ancrum's thinking. If we're talking dystopias; worlds in which the theoretical apocalypse has already come and gone, and there are no people who look like me in it? I'm going to wonder about why that is. I'm going to wonder if that whiteness was intentionally constructed by the people who remain in that world. I'm going to wonder if the people like me were exterminated. There is, after all, a "historically accurate" precedent for that assumption.

When it comes to an author or filmmaker having free reign over their imagination, my concern about their inclusion of people of color isn't about trying to please everyone. It's about wondering what kind of thinking they live by wherein minority people simply do not exist, the issue is never mentioned, and the fact that they are nowhere to be found is nothing to be alarmed about. It makes me wonder about the kind of people they are that their race blindness is so severe that even in their minds, we're invisible. Or worse, that the only people they recognize as human, are white.

Personally, I think the lack of diversity in science fiction is particularly egregious because it's the one area where you can't claim "historical accuracy." Speculative fiction opens up possibilities that would never exist in the real world, allowing us to imagine scenarios that we could only dream of in real life. That so many of those imagined possibilities still include whiteness as the default, to the point of whitewashing characters originally imagined as non-white, is disheartening.

When you get to create a world completely from scratch, where you could rewrite the laws of gravity or the science behind genetics should you so choose, but your vision of all the people is still lily white? I really do find that worrisome. It bugs me that people are more easily able to imagine the existence of non-human intelligent beings, or interactions with a completely alien race, than that a protagonist might be anything other than white. It tells me that in the real world, we have a problem imagining the humanity of people of color. It tells me that as a culture we still see people of color as nothing more than bit players in the lives of white characters, if we even see them at all. Why is it that so many people find nothing problematic about the willful erasure of people of color from their visions of the future? Because there's a real and almost tangible problem with race if audiences can suspend their disbelief enough to accept that a fictional character can burst in to flames, repeatedly, at will, and not die, but not enough to accept that the same character could be black.

I don't think that we should force our way into meetings and demand that casts be more diverse, or hold authors hostage until they rewrite the features of their protagonists, but I also don't think there's anything wrong with continuing to hold people accountable for the prejudices they may display through their creative choices. I can't force anyone to recognize the implications of the message they send when they simply "forget" to write minority people into existence, but I can keep pointing out how those biases in fiction, in representation, continue to affect the way we interact with race in the real world.

In the same way that authors and filmmakers continue to question why they should include people of color in their narratives, I continue to ask:
What exactly is it do they think their stories will lose if they did?

On Ron Burgundy, #CancelColbert And White Racial Satire

Today I finally saw Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues. It was an okay-ish movie I suppose. I certainly didn't see anything spectacular enough to warrant the two hour run time. Back for another go-round, loveable doofus Ron Burgundy rounded up his merry band of newsmen to begin broadcasting on the nation's first 24 hour news channel. Some jokes were made, and I smirked here and there, but for the most part, the movie simply retread the same territory that was covered in the first film.

Except for Linda Jackson.

Linda Jackson, played by Megan Good, is Ron Burgundy's new boss in the film. She is also black.

Much is made of Burgundy's disbelief that he is in the presence of a black woman, and he uncontrollably repeats the word "black" several time upon first meeting her. The audience is meant to laugh. Later in the movie, after Ron and Linda have begun dating (because of course) she takes him to dinner with her family where he proceeds to heavily rely on racial stereotypes to "relate" to her family. When Linda asks what he's doing, he says he's "addressing the white elephant in the room." Despite clear indications that he is offending them, Ron continues, and his antics culminate in a beat down that occurs off screen. In the next scene Ron tells Linda that he thinks the night went well. When she points out that her family beat him up, he replies that he thought he was "being jumped into a gang. Only with dinner guests!"

You can probably tell that I didn't find the scene to be particularly funny.

Ruminating on the movie, I was starkly reminded of the events of the last week concerning Suey Park and #CancelColbert, and the dozens of arguments that were made in defense of Colbert's joke. When it was pointed out that invoking Anti-Asian sentiments to defend Native Americans only served to engender more racial discord, (ironically, using a satirical hashtag that was itself meant to demonstrate that satire is often not an effective means of activism) Colbert's defenders (and later Colbert himself) dismissively asserted that what Colbert said was meant as satire, that Colbert played a character that parodied things the Right would say in earnest, and that finding fault with the tasteless execution of his well-meaning sentiment in defense of Native Americans and against Dan Snyder demonstrated a lack of understanding of the concept of satire, and was a symptom of "rage addicted social justice warriors."

And in watching the offending scene in Anchorman 2, I thought about why this particular brand of racial satire didn't sit well with me. After all, I have watched The Colbert Report for years, and generally consider Stephen Colbert to be "one of the good guys." This is not the first time he has invoked stereotypes to make a point about the ridiculous nature of some of the genuine positions held by Conservative American lawmakers. Additionally, years of Family Guy has normalized white racial satire for me. It is certainly not a new concept.

But I realized that what bugged me about the execution of Ron Burgundy's lines in that dinner scene was one of the same things that bugged me about Colbert's joke. I was unsure of who the audience was meant to be. Who was supposed to be laughing here? Because it certainly didn't feel like me.

"You clearly don't understand satire!" is something that I heard a lot in the last few days. Colbert's defenders insist that the very nature of satire is such that it swings into absurdity, effectively acting as a shield against consequences for offensive statements. "Satire is supposed to be ridiculous!" I was told, over and over and over again. When I asked how, in a structural sense, racial satire, differed from actual, racially offensive things, said in earnest, I once again heard the refrain "it's satire!" and it was implied that the intent of the satirist trumped the actual impact of his words.

Well, as we say on the internet: "Intent is not magical."

Discussions Of Sexuality Are Not The Same For WoC: Let's Stop Pretending They Are

Back again. This time to share this comment thread (and specifically the comment below) where I talk about Rashida Jones' comments about "women being whores" and how it relates to Rihanna (because Rihanna is the devil incarnate/Illuminati Queen/Bringer of all that is Evil in the world. Naturally), and the way in which the conversations about "pop stars being whores" always manages to find a black woman to scapegoat:

I also think that it's imperative that we talk about racial disparities when we talk about this stuff because sexual expectations are just different for WoC. For WW, virginal is the assumed natural state, and expressions of sexuality are seen as liberating (Madonna). For WoC, crass and oversexed is the assumed natural state, and any self motivated expressions of sexuality are seen as a reinforcement of that stereotype (Rihanna). If we push against that assumption we're prudes, and how dare we refuse a sexual advance with our ugly black ass selves? We can't win. And I know because it's something that I personally struggle with daily. 

That is what so many WW fail to recognize and acknowledge. The rules are different for WoC, especially BW who have been the subject of specific, pervasive, racialized myths that have devalued our sexuality. You cannot judge a black woman's sexuality by the rules of white femininity. You just can't do it. The historical context that exists distorts the conversation from the get-go. It is useless to have a discussion about "women's sexuality" without the intersection of race. To do so is to consciously and bullheadedly ignore the fact that there is a stratification of worth when it comes to women and their "inherent value" with WW on the very top and BW on the very bottom. 

I don't remember who said it first but essentially, a lot of the sexism that WW face is misguided benevolence. You can't do X because you're dainty/fragile/precious/must be protected. The misogynoir that BW face is sexism couched in racism and disregard. "I know you're a woman because I see breasts and a vagina, but you're dark and ugly and therefore exist only as a receptacle for my penis, whenever I feel like it." Yo. There's a reason that BW were considered "unrapeable."

I  talked about this at length in the piece I wrote about her Pour It Up video, and the way in which the sexual double standard doesn't just play out across genders, but across races. We really need to get past the idea that all issues affect all women equally. THEY DON'T. They never did. And whether you not you want to acknowledge it, WW have always had it better off than WoC. This is simply fact. It is no one's fault (well.... nope, not touching it) but it is the way the world works. To ignore that it so condense the conversation down into unrecognizable territory and to do a complete disservice to the millions of women who have a dog in this race too. 

That is why Hood Feminism's discussion of #FastTailedGirls was a noticeably and intentionally all black space (that very quickly shut down cries of "me too" from WW). That label is used almost exclusively to police BW's sexuality from childhood. It's why the Onion calling Quevanzhané Wallis was not satire or a joke, it was misogynoir. We really need people to listen when we say that a specific act affects us differently because of our current place in the social landscape.

Say it with me: THE EXPECTATIONS OF YOUR SEXUALITY ARE DIFFERENT WHEN YOU ARE BLACK AND FEMALE. YOU CANNOT APPLY THE RULES OF WHITE FEMININITY TO BLACK FEMALE BODIES.

Just a morning PSA. 

  

Sexualization, Exploitation, And Black Female Celebrities: On The Subtle Womanism of Rihanna and Nicki Minaj

I've been thinking about writing this post for a while. It was originally conceived as an examination of the "Stripper Anthem" as presented by Nicki Minaj and Rihanna in Beez In The Trap and Pour It Up, as it related to the sexuality and sexualization of black women, but after last week's post on Lily Allen, and some of the... ill-informed responses it received, I realized that there is a different conversation that needs to be had first.

That conversation is about the distinction between the exploitation of black women's sexuality for the (white) male consumerist gaze, and a black female celebrity's reclamation of her own sexuality on her own terms. For whatever reason, there seems to some difficulty in grasping the concept that the most significant difference between these two scenarios is agency, and the way in which the presence or lack of agency determines how a display of sexuality is to be perceived and received.

To that end, I want to examine the images presented in the aforementioned videos, deconstruct them, and demonstrate why despite popular belief, their respective "stripper anthems" are anything but demeaning.

I'm Not Okay With Lily Allen's Racist New Video: When Satire Crosses The Line [UPDATED]

I'm.... conflicted about this video. 

Lily Allen has always been a bit of a socially progressive, feminist badass, and I do love her for that. In her new single "Hard Out Here", Allen discusses the state of the pop industry, and the impossible standards that women are held to in order to be allowed to progress. The lyrics are classic Lily Allen; she calls out sexism pretty blatantly, and points to the ways in which women are expected to conform in order to succeed:

If I told you about my sex life, you'd call me a slut/When boys be talking about their bitches no one's making a fuss/There's a glass ceiling to break/There's money to make/ And now it's time to speed it up because I can't move at this pace. [...] 

If you're not a size 6, then you're not good looking/Well you better be rich or be real good at cooking/You should probably lose some weight 'cause we can't see your bones/You should probably fix your face or you'll end up on your own/Don't you want to have somebody who objectifies you?/Have you thought about your butt, who's gonna tear it in two?/We've never had it so good, uh huh, we're out of the woods/And if you can't detect the sarcasm, you've misunderstood.

But the video....? It makes me very uncomfortable, and I'm not okay with it.

On Joss Whedon, White Feminism And Intersectionality Failures

Joss Whedon gave a speech the other day and had some things to say about feminism. A lot of it was problematic, but I won't go into it here because it's already been said, and the fact that he said it is only vaugely related to the point I want to make.

See, Joss Whedon is free to say whatever he likes about feminism in a "freedom of speech" kind of way. That is his right. But the arrogance of suggesting that a movement centered on women and their efforts to advance their own causes should refocus itself based on the self-serving suggestion of a cishet white guy is, well.... astronomical.

But truthfully, the bigger issue here is not what he said, but the reaction to what he said. While I don't agree with the nitty gritty of his reasoning, there are legitimate complaints to be made about the word feminist, and the feminist movement. Women of Colour, and black women specifically, created womanism for this very reason; to address the issues that were unique to their intersectional experience as women who were also not white. WoC have been pointing out the problems inherent in feminism for YEARS, and have been summarily ignored. And yet, a cishet white guy tangentially brings up those issues and suddenly it's revolutionary information. Suddenly we should be praising a white male ally for his perfect feminism for parroting what WoC have been saying forever. It's bullshit that contributes to the erasure of WoC from the feminist movement and privileges someone with literally ALL THE PRIVILEGES over the women who the movement was actually meant to benefit.

This attitude is significant because Joss Whedon's speech wasn't just covered, it was covered extensively and lauded as a revolutionary act. It was presented as an intellectual achievement worthy of praise, when almost the exact sentiments have long been championed by WoC to no avail. For a day and half, the white feminist movement hung its hat on the glorification of a white guy who assigned himself the feminist ally label. I don't mean to be a Debbie Downer, but as I recall, things didn't turn out so well the last time that happened.

Fuck You Gawker Media For Victim-Blaming Chris Brown

Because it was apparently so much fucking fun when Jezebel did it, Gawker just doubled down on their "Chris Brown is an asshole for getting raped at 8 years old" narrative.

I.... See, this is one of those things that makes PoC go on protracted rants about white people. And I know it's not all white people, so please don't start. But the the way that CB has been treated in the media since he beat Rihanna has been tinged with racism from the very start (didn't Charlie Sheen SHOOT a woman?!?!?) and this just confirms that the reason white liberals love to shit on Chris Brown is not because he's an abuser, but because he's a BLACK abuser. 

In the Guardian article that both pieces reference, CB admits to having been RAPED. He says he lost his virginity at 8. THAT IS RAPE IN EVERY SENSE OF THE WORD. But it's okay to doubt his story or minimize his abuse because he's black. And don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that he gets a pass for his violent behavior in the time since because of his abuse. He most definitely doesn't. But one can have sympathy for CB the rape victim as well as  condemn CB the domestic abuser. They are not mutually exclusive.

I was so pissed yesterday at Jezebel's piece that I ranted all over the comments section, but to see Gawker not only NOT apologize but continue the narrative? That's it. I think I'm done. I don't know that I can go back to that site anymore. If this were a female starlet that angle would NEVER have been taken, but apparently it's okay to blame a black man for the abuse he suffered AS A MOTHERFUCKING CHILD. What's his face (Dawkins?) made some off-colour comment about pedophilia being fine the other day, and everyone was tripping over themselves to excuse or clarify his words. Black man says something that strongly indicates his internalization of gendered myths of sex in order to cope with abuse and he's an asshole.

Fuck that. Fuck Jezebel. Fuck Gawker. 

Fuck all of you racist assholes who are gonna try to justify why treating CB like shit about his sexual abuse is fine, and genuinely believe it has nothing to do with your racist ideologies.

I'm done.

Hermione Granger Was Not Intersectional OR What S.P.E.W. Teaches Us About Feminism

I'm currently rewatching the Harry Potter movies, and because yesterday's discussion was still on my mind, I realized that Hermione Granger and S.P.E.W. are a great illustrative example of SIFWW! (Or I guess, solidarity is for magical beings...?) I'm not too mad about it because Hermione is amazing and I love her, and also she is fictional, but there are some really good parallels for how poorly we treat minority women and cultures in trying to "save them".

In the novels, after seeing some of the abusive treatment of house elves in the magical world, specifically Winky, house elf to Barty Crouch, Hermione starts the Society For The Protection of Elvish Welfare, aimed at helping house elves gain a living wage, among other things. If you've read the books then you know that house elves are essentially magical slaves who do housework, cleaning and cooking. Scratch that. They are slaves. They just don't seem to mind that much. 

Now, slavery is widely considered to be a bad thing without exception (because DUH) so I can't really be that mad that it never even occurs to Hermione that freedom might not be something that house elves want. But for house elves their "culture" for want of a better word, is that they remain tied to a specific family for their entire lives. The responsibility for that family passes down from elf to elf, and it's something they take great pride in. To be set free means not only disgracing themselves, but all of their elvish ancestors who came before them.

When Hermione sees Winky defending Barty Crouch even though he has made her confront her fear of heights at the Quidditch World Cup, all Hermione takes from the situation is that "Winky has been brainwashed" to defend him. And her limited experience with Dobby, who was ecstatic to have been set free, fuels her conviction that elves should all be freed, even though Dobby is the exception and not the rule, due to the fact that his former masters, the Malfoys, treated him like shit.

I think that's a pretty solid parallel for the way that western women assume that all veiled Muslim women are "being oppressed by the man!" or that they only adhere to their religion because they "don't know any better" even though for many Muslim women, veiling is a choice. Muslim women are not a monolith, and their choices do not exist in a vacuum.

The fact is that Hermione never once considers what house elves actually want. Other than Dobby, she has limited contact with house elves, and has no real understanding of why they are generally satisfied with their lives they way they are, and their place in the magical hierarchy. For example, while Dobby thrives in freedom, Winky falls into a tailspin, getting drunk on butterbeer in the Hogwarts kitchens. 

Ron, the only one of the main trio who grew up in the wizarding world, continues to tell Hermione that the elves are happy the way they are, and that SPEW will only antagonize them, but Hermione dismisses him as a bigot who is simply satisfied with a status quo that benefits him. Though that is probably partly right, it doesn't change the fact that Ron is more likely to understand the working relationship between wizard kind and elves, and has a more informed perspective. 

Ron's objections prove to be right however, when after discovering that Hermione has taken to hiding hand-made items of clothing in the Gryffindor common room to trick the Hogwarts house elves into being set free, they boycott Gryffindor entirely and refuse to clean it anymore, leaving the task to Dobby alone.

The only upshot of her campaign was that she alienated and infuriated the elves themselves. While she was busy knitting clothes to give them in order to set them free, the majority of house-elves are accustomed to their work, and seem to enjoy it. They regarded Hermione's actions as insults to their race. Thus, they refused to clean the Gryffindor common room any more, meaning that Dobby was the only one prepared to carry out this task. Already being free himself, he took all the clothes himself, wore most of them (making a tower of hats on top of his head), and passed some of the others on to Winky in the false hopes of cheering her up^[1]. Hermione was not informed of this development, as no one had the heart to tell her. [Harry Potter Wikia]

Hermione takes it upon herself to "free" the house elves without considering whether or not it was in their best interest, or something that they even wanted. The house elves reaction is similar to the push back that Muslim women give when told by western women that "they need to be saved from oppression". It's insulting to imply that they do not have the capacity to identify or deal with the problems of their culture on their own terms. Barging in and "fixing things" without any input from the culture you are affecting is harmful, unproductive, and ultimately alienating to that culture.

As we learn later in the novels, most house house elves just want to be treated with dignity. Kreacher, beholden to the noble house of Black, betrays Sirius in book five, because Sirius had always treated him abusively. That action led almost directly to Sirius' death. By book 7, after Harry inherit's Kreacher's services, he has learned to treat Kreacher with the dignity that he deserves as a magical being, and their relationship improves dramatically almost overnight. 

The problem isn't that Hermione wants to help. She has an amazing heart, and she is only trying to correct what she sees as a terrible injustice. But being Muggle born, there is an enormous cultural chasm that she hadn't yet figured out how to navigate. By trying to apply Muggle values of right and wrong to a magical perspective, she misses the nuances that makes certain values different or irrelevant in a magical context. Never once does she extend her knowledge of house elf's desires beyond the elves she interacts with directly, and she makes the fatal mistake of extrapolating their individual desires as the desires of the entire group. (Sound familiar...?)

So what can we learn from Hermione's mistake? Listen first. As an outsider, there is simply no way to fully understand the cultural practices of another group. And while certain things are objectively bad, dealing with those particular issues may not actually be at the top of that group's priority list. 

Let's be better allies to house elves and minority cultures. Listen first. Act second. And don't presume that as an outsider, you can ever know what is best for the people of a different culture. 

Shameless Plug Time: Interview with Sammy Lyon of Feminist Magazine

About two days after the article went viral, I did a great interview with Sammy Lyon of Feminist Magazine about the original article. It finally went live last Tuesday (yeah, I know, I'm slacking...) and you can listen to it here, and follow along with the transcript after the jump (provided by an awesome member of GT) because the audio is a little spotty. Or you could just read it I guess... Whatever works for you.

I almost didn't do the interview because the trolling got be a little overwhelming, and as someone who detests being the centre of attention, I really really wanted to pretend that it never happened, and just go hide under the covers for a bit. But my mum convinced me that I if I believed what I had written, (I did) I had a duty to defend it. After all, I had to take my own advice: if your argument can't withstand a few dings, it wasn't a very strong argument to begin with was it? So check it out after the jump!

Reflections On Going Viral // Miley-Gate Post-Mortem

It's been two weeks now since I wrote that article, and I couldn't be more glad that it's over. Going viral isn't fun. Even when you have the most innocuous  content people will find a reason to be negative and hateful online. But throw race into it? Nope.

Do. Not. Want.

So I tried to keep this blog largely quiet in that time. But in the last two weeks I've done a lot of reading. I've done a lot of listening and a lot of paying attention, and I think that this experience was for the better. I definitely learned a lot about my own personal resilience, and about how little the world cares about you when they don't like what you have to say.

But that's okay. Because in the last two weeks I've learned more about feminism and intersectionality that I ever thought I could know, and I'm grateful. So many discussions were borne out of this article (that I never thought would be seen outside the virtual gates of GT) and many of them taught me things. Most of them taught me things. So for that alone, I'm glad this happened. For the education I received by way of internet, I'm grateful.

And as for the people who objected with cries of "but what about when black men do?!" I don't care. I don't care because I'm not talking about the oppression that black women face at the hands of black men right now. That is a different conversation that has been addressed before and frequently. Don't presume to tell me which of my own problems I should be focusing on.

For the white women who responded with "not all white women do that!", I still  don't care. Because I am not going to make your personal feelings a priority in this discussion. The "some" is implied in "white women", and if you can't see past that one omitted word, you're not quite the ally you think you are.

But when it comes down to it, processing this event isn't that hard. Many people objected to my "hands off" comment at the end of the article, and I wasn't as clear as I should have been, so I understand why. I didn't mean that no one is allowed to enjoy or participate in any aspect of black culture ever, be it jazz or twerking. I meant, that until those things can be accepted as innovative and masterful on their own steam, it will never be okay for a white person to co-opt them or exploit them for money. (I'm looking at you Mackelmore)

As The Coquette, masterfully says:

Is there a difference between Miley twerking and Eric Clapton playing delta blues music?
Yes. Even within the context of cultural appropriation, there is a difference between crass exploitation and masterful homage.

Being in a position of privilege means that "appreciating" art or music or dance from a community culture involves elevating the originators of those art forms, not creating a badly synthesized version and marketing it to the masses. At the VERY least, it involves doing the work to immerse oneself in the communities that created those cultures, and learn about them first hand. It's why Eminem and Teena Marie "get a pass" but Miley does not.

You want to call out homophobia in hip-hop? Maybe help promote some of the queer men and women who've been doing that for ages. You really think twerking is cool? Perhaps you should showcase some of the people who've made a career out of popularizing bounce music, rather than making yourself the face of the "Twerk Team."


What it comes down to is this: "Nothing about us without us" You really want to explore a minority culture? Try to find information someone on the inside with first hand experience who can clarify what is or isn't okay for you to have access to. Don't just inauthentically pick and choose the parts you like, and discard the ones you don't, as though someone's culture is a costume for you to discard when you tire of it.

So the lesson is this: DO THE WORK. Whether it's as an access point to a minority culture you admire, or an effort to increase your allyship, DO THE WORK. Don't ask to be spoonfed. No one handed me reading materials for feminism or intersectionality. I sought that information out because I decided that doing so was a priority for me. Make intersectional thinking a priority for yourself.

Here are a few great links to start you off:

When Your Brown Body Is A White Wonderland
Your Guide To Defensive Feminism
After Solidarity Is For White Women: So You Want To Be An Ally. Now What?
How To Deal With Being Called Out
Black Women And Twerking: Why Its Creators Face Bigotry That Miley Cyrus Never Will
Why Whites Call People of Colour "Racist"
How To Appropriately Engage With Blogs That Have Anti-Oppression Related Content
Allies Are Still Privileged. Don't Forget It

These are great sources that can help jumpstart a intersectional self-education. Do the work. And if you prefer to learn by osmosis, you can follow this twitter list I made of insightful men and woman of colour who deal with intersectional issues.

When Did Pointing Out Racism Become "The Real Racism"?

I want to discuss something that's been on my mind for a bit. On Sunday night, right after the VMA's, (and before it-which-must-not-be-named), I had a long discussion with my 20 year old brother about why I was offended by Miley's performance. He's not totally up on social justice issues, and doesn't have the same context for this stuff as I do, but he's insightful, and willing to engage and learn. The discussion eventually segued into the nature of the word racist and how it is used in conversation of this nature.

He thinks that the word racist is "aggressive" and should only used to describe acts and people who do obviously and maliciously racist things (like... lynching I suppose?) because using it to refer to smaller, unintentional acts of racism immediately puts people on the defensive, and makes them unwilling to listen to you and your line of reasoning, even when you're right.

Now, while I see his point, and agree with his reasoning, I disagree with that sentiment. I think that it's even more important to explicitly label the smaller, unintentional acts of racism as racism, in order to help people recognize that no, you're not in the KuKluxKlan, but yes, pawing at a black woman's hair or calling a black man "boy", or dressing up as an "Indian Chief" for Halloween, or pulling your eyes back to make them slant is still, racist as fuck.

And I got this POV a lot in the comments of the article both here and over at GT over the last few days as well. Including this last one that I got just today:

That being said I don't believe that what is acceptable is one culture should be considered racist unless it actual causes harm to someone. And no one will convince me that dance moves are harmful to anyone other than the dancer.

To me, the unwillingness of people to call those smaller acts exactly what they are, feeds into the idea that racism isn't a big problem anymore. I think it contributes to the rhetoric that PoC are "pulling the race card" when they rightfully call people on their naked prejudices. 

I personally think it's incredibly important to start calling those "smaller" acts of racism out as racism, so that it becomes easier for the population at large to see why things like Miley's twerk obsession/appropriation is so problematic. 

Not calling out micro-aggressions as racism ignores the fact that Impact trumps Intent every time, and perpetuates the idea that a racist comment or joke is somehow purged of its racism because "I didn't mean it that way."

People take the label racist as a personal insult, when in fact it's just a fact of life. According to Jane Elliot:

"If you're not a racist when you leave high school, then you should have failed Social Studies because you weren't paying attention."

And I wholeheartedly agree with that. Being racist and/or prejudiced based on race is something that is ingrained in us. It leaches into our consciousness from television, movies, books, everything. It doesn't make you a bad person if you hold those prejudices. It makes you a bad person if you recognize that you have those prejudices and don't do the work to unlearn them. Because that's a huge part of intersectional feminism for me: consciously unlearning the prejudices that were fed to me as truth.

People don't get defensive when they're accused of racism because in their minds, they aren't racist, and accepting that they may have done/said something racist means acknowledging that they hold the "wrong" beliefs. It means facing the fact that they accept harmful ideas as part of their worldview. But "racism" isn't genetic. It IS something that you can change about yourself if you do the work. 

You can't fix a problem you don't know you have. How are you going to know that what you're saying is racist if people keep dancing around the word out of fear they'll offend? I'm sorry, but fuck your feelings. I'm already offended, and I have good reason to be. So I think I have the right to alert you to your racism and the fact that it's harmful to me.

I actually think that calling out racism might be the only education that PoC "owe" to white people. 

What about you guys? Is it better to tiptoe around the problem in order to avoid offending someone? Or is it more important to be clear and precise about calling our racist actions?