Just... Don't.

I’m tired of black women being objectified even in satirical videos. I’m just tired of seeing black women gyrate because “they’re so good at it,” or because it adds an element of (exoticized) sexiness to a video. I’m tired of people being seen as too uptight, or unable to have a sense of humor because there is this very real ideal they don’t find comical.

I get it. This video what’s her face did is suppose to be making fun of all of the crap women go through in life. It’s suppose to be this retrospective on women in pop culture, but it just seems like time and time again black women are on the outskirts. They’re being represented but not in the same way other women are being portrayed in these grand commentaries on feminism. I’m just kind of over it. I don’t need a pop star telling me about feminism.

I don’t need anyone to continuously defend (never apologize- that would be ludicrous!) their, though stupidly oblivious, sordid decisions. I just want more people to read. Read a book on why these videos satirical or otherwise are incredibly offensive. Read a book about why certain cultures have evolved into what they are and that culture (EVERYONE’S CULTURE) is so much more than what society insists on showing through tiny little filters in the media. Read a book about race. Read a book about race-relations or talk to someone who is black who is willing to explain, why, yes, anger is an appropriate emotion to project when black culture is constantly misconstrued and perpetuated absurdly in flagrantly unbelievable ways. Nobody likes to talk about racism which is why I guess I find myself writing about it on multiple occasions. There needs to be an open dialogue. People should get irritated, bewildered, flustered, startled, alarmed, amazed, confused about racism. It’s a confusing thing considering it’s all a global social construct, but whew. That’s for a different time. Let me reiterate here how perturbed I am by the lack of open discourse not only about race, but race in feminism.

I went to this forum about a month ago, where a whole bunch of “lady bloggers” (some worked for The Hairpin and Jezebel among other feminist/women-focused websites) addressed all sorts of vapid questions about how they fund their sites and how they got to where they are today, but there were absolutely no questions about race and feminism. I won’t even bother to talk about how ridiculous the term “lady blogger” is- OMG *takes a breath* Ok. Then it was the audience’s turn to ask questions. When one lady at the end of the Q&A attempted to get the panel’s opinion about race in terms of the feminist perspective, the moderator simply didn’t get to it. She just ignored it. I was floored. That would have been the perfect setting to discuss issues with minorities in feminism, but even there, WITH MINORITIES ON THE PANEL, no one wanted to talk about it. Mind-blowing. Sometimes, I just don’t care know about society…

Twerk This.

The internet has been ablaze these past few days with commentary of Miley Cyrus’s diabolical scheme to appropriate black culture in the most disgusting way- by dancing- to further her sad, sad career. I have read so many damn articles about how mad everyone is and ya know what? I actually have gotten comfortable with the fact that I just dgaf. In the end the only thing that pisses me off is the fact that people ignore how much money and exposure this little moron is getting due to this nauseating provocative performance and all the BLACK entertainers also making bank due to her seizing episode  twerking.

Don’t get me started about the whole “twerking” being a real term now. My brain is melting struggling still trying to wrap itself around this ridiculous concept. Twerking existed before Miley Cyrus and was never considered to be entered into the OXFORD DICTIONARY, but her erroneous/embarrassing display of  booty shaking is what prompted the word to be added. It’s sickening. After all of that though the thing that really vexed me was the lack of coverage of EVERYTHING ELSE GOING ON IN THE WORLD. Like, oh, I dunno, SYRIA. Or hmm, maybe the anniversary of the I HAVE A DREAM SPEECH! No, news sources were instead focusing on that gross chicken butt Miley Cyrus, granted I am solely speaking about my twitter feed, which until now I thought was a well-rounded collection of fluff and real journalism. Nope. I understand that entertainment news is amazing in all of its -celebrity break down-baby having-jail going glory, but when everywhere I turn all I see are articles on how Miley Cyrus is single-handedly perpetuating these misguided, longstanding, irritating stereotypes about black women when there are children being killed by their own government. I dunno. It just seems like our attention can and should be focused on numerous events at once. Honestly, I think the American people aren’t given enough credit when it comes to news coverage. It’s like the media gets together and is like, “Ok, one thing at a time, we don’t want them to hurt themselves. Miley Cyrus first and let the other stuff hang on the back burner. We also don’t want them being too informed. We’re not sure even how to do that properly, so I guess that won’t be an issue.” We can multitask our news. We’re capable of consuming vital news (I just got a weird flash of Lori Beth Denberg) and pop culture. I know this isn’t the first time this happened nor is it the last, there’s just something about this particular moment in pop culture infamy that really grinds my gears.

Ok, I’m done ranting. Ugh.