On the second night of the Republican National Convention, Abby Johnson of Planned Parenthood provided a graphic description of abortion to pull on the heartstrings and taunt the consciousness of a conscious-less audience. She preceded this anecdote by disclosing Planned Parenthood’s racist origins. Johnson’s speech was undoubtedly supposed to be moving, however, it illuminated the…
Category: Pop Culture
Vanity Ain’t Fair: Examining The Black Woman as an American Prop Though Breonna Taylor’s Posthumous Popularity
If the world had seen Taylor before they could never see her, if she mattered when they could look her in her eye, the readers of these magazines would not have encountered Taylor on the news or as a Covergirl. Rather, she would have been a person they pretended not to see on the street, precluded their children from befriending, or a person who motivated their move to all-white neighbors on the outskirts of the city.
The Democratic National Convention, An Overview
Social media enabled the “ordinary” person to live like a celebrity. By this, I mean that social media provided a platform where regular people could conduct their lives how they’d like others to see it. This praxis denotes the essence of politics that should seemingly illuminate insincerity, yet, the incorporation of social media into societal…
WAP: White Africanized Presence
On the first Friday of August 2020, Cardi B debuted a new song and music video featuring Meg the Stallion. I maintain my inaugural stance that Cardi B is a Lil’ Kim/Nicki Minaj #knockoff that illuminates the white imaginary’s attempt to improve a design engendered to Africanize America. It is for this reason, that I…
Blonde as King: A Second Look at Beyonce’s Black As King
A colleague* sent me a still from Beyoncé’s Black Is King film where black men don the blonde wigs donned by the traditional judiciary. The image is a disturbing one for a plethora of reasons. On one hand, the cognitively dissonant image represents the antithetical relationship the black collective has with the law. On the…
Black is King, A Black Female Perspective
Beyonce’s Black is King delivers an aesthetically pleasing cultural collage. From waterfalls to regal braiding, the film captures the pure beauty of black people who occupy both central and peripheral spaces in the film. The music also engenders a Pan-Africanist sound that melds the diaspora together in a melody as diverse a the colors of…
Peace and Political Pussyfooting
Civil rights, for those of us whose philosophy is black nationalism, means: “Give it to us now. Don’t wait for next year. Give it to us yesterday, and that’s not fast enough.” In The Wretched of the Earth, Frantz Fanon articulates “reason” as what the white world holds the black world to amidst anti-black adversity….
Why The Real Can’t Keep a Black a Woman
This week, amidst global unrest, The Real Co-host Amanda Seales announced her departure from the daytime show. The announcement comes six months after Seales’ addition to the table and five years after Tamar Braxton’s ejection from the talk show series. Seales and Braxton brought vastly different components to the table, but both are outspoken Black…
Protest Participation and Black Power
We met on the hilltop. The chants occurred sporadically, ascending when passing those translating our footsteps to footage on their phones. The African adjacent came with signs more often than the African descended. The crowd knelt with raised fists twice, a gesture synonymous with closing one’s eyes to pray. In studying the ancestral plight to…
HBO’s Insecure and Social Bleaching
Honestly, I should have stopped watching Insecure years ago. However, my desire to be proven wrong too often supercedes the reality that awaits me after ever episode. This reality manifests itself in the disappointment that hits me at least twice before the credits roll. The scene with Lawrence having a threesome with two white women…
Whispers of a Womanist 