Complicated legacies aren’t anything new, and when huge cultural icons pass, their lives are examined and judgments are made. We all know people aren’t perfect. Nobody. We also know that grief and remembrance can be an incredibly painful and lethargic experience. In the day and age of social media, with everyone scrambling to get out the first think piece or the first introspective, the time given to the family and friends of those lost to mourn is reduced to seconds in between tweets, news stories, and Instagram tributes.
Kobe Bryant’s death affected me in a way I never thought any celebrity’s death would. I’ve been trying to figure out why ever since I heard the tragic story. I think there were a number of different things that made it hard to reconcile:
His daughter was on the copter, too. So young, with so much life ahead of her.
The other couple who left behind two small children and the young daughter who also lost her life.
Everyone on the helicopter knowing it was the end and knowing there was nothing they could do.
The abruptness of it all.
It hasn’t been two weeks yet. That feels wild to me. But you know what’s even wilder? The way people have been handling his past. The internet is aflutter with how his legacy is being mishandled by the media. People are chastizing journalists for even mentioning the rape allegations while the family is still in mourning, and though I can absolutely understand wanting to shelter the world from a sordid past, it is not only irresponsible, it’s dangerous. Silencing the situation is silencing the woman who went through the experience and with her abuser’s name all over the internet, it can’t be easy. No one is saying Bryant’s life is less important because of the mistakes he made. They are saying that although his life has ended, the decisions he made live on and will continue to affect her life. Yes, it is painful and uncomfortable to think about, but it happened and no amount of lip service is going to erase that. Pointing out what happened is not attacking him, but ignoring the allegations are sending a signal to those affected by sexual violence that they don’t matter if their abuser is famous.
There are undoubtedly nuances here. It’s up to journalists to report but also be mindful of how fresh this tragedy is for his family.
It was really disappointing to see come out of this that black women were diminishing black men by bringing up their past. How Bill Cosby and Michael Jackson got tied up into this conversation is beyond me. I will say definitively - black women had nothing to do with Bill Cosby going to jail and even if they did HE DESERVED IT. HE DESERVES TO BE IN JAIL. As for Michael Jackson, I think there were a lot of factors that contributed to who he became and I do believe he had some deep-seated issues, but he too is not above judgment or the law.
I don’t know what the best way would have been to handle Bryant’s legacy, but I do know there isn’t a war against black men perpetuated by black women and the fact this is even an ideology flying around the internet is ridiculous.
Bryant’s death is incredibly awful and his past is complicated, but he’s human and he was a whole person with a whole life. It’s sad he’ll never get the chance to be a father, a son, a brother, a husband for his family, but he will be immortalized in history for all he’s done - good and bad.
I cannot imagine how hurt the families involved are and I hope they are getting the space and support they need in this truly horrible time.
EDIT (2/9): I neglected to point out the undoubtedly racist undercurrent of the original accusations and how initially I felt it was entirely racially motivated to bring them up so soon after his death, and it really might’ve been. However, I still strongly feel you can have and there can be multiple emotions to contest with upon the death of someone so ingrained in our culture. His past is still apart of who he became, but it doesn’t mean it’s all he is. Bryant was and will continue to be a role model and nothing will change that. What should change is the way these critical conversations immediately begin to swirl around celebrities before the family even has time to process.