Five Reasons Black Women Are Angry

Fox News pundit Cal Thomas made a point in a recent conversation about Michelle Obama that there are no non-angry black women portrayed in the media.

THOMAS: I want to pick up on something that Jane said about the angry black woman. Look at the image of angry black women on television. Politically you have Maxine Waters of California, liberal Democrat. She's always angry every time she gets on television. Cynthia McKinney, another angry black woman. And who are the black women you see on the local news at night in cities all over the country. They're usually angry about something. They've had a son who has been shot in a drive-by shooting. They are angry at Bush. So you don't really have a profile of non-angry black women.

(CROSSTALK)

PINKERTON: Oprah Winfrey.

THOMAS: Oprah Winfrey. Yes, there you go, Oprah Winfrey.

[H/T WAOD] Some people aren't pleased with the comments. Taken out of context, as these things almost always are, they are inflammatory, but Thomas is right (though his examples suck, as not all black women are angry because their kid got shot in a drive-by, I mean, come ON). Over at Daily Kos, there's an interesting post which strikes me as a teensy bit reactionary. But really, we know that images of black women in the media and pop culture tend to be angry ones. The unhappy bloggers out there seem to think that there's something wrong with black women being angry. I don't think there is. All black women aren't angry, but many (if not most) are, and I say, why shouldn't they be? Here are five reasons why black women have every right to be pissed.

1. Sisters have to do it for themselves. Something like 70% of black children are born out of wedlock. Some of those kids are supported by single fathers, but most are being raised by mothers, grandmothers, and aunties.
2. Mammy, Jezebel, and Sapphire. Black women in the media tend to fall into one of three categories. Either she's an asexual, maternal Mammy (Oprah), an acceptably lustful Jezebel (Halle Berry), or a bitchy, angry Sapphire (Omarosa). Not only are these dangerous stereotypes, but they also are terribly misogynistic, which contrasts nicely with the fact that...
3. "All the Women are White, All the Blacks are Men, but Some of Us are Brave." White women are the baseline for womanhood, and at no time has that been more clear than during this primary season. The myriad articles about women choosing Hillary, while blacks choose Obama (save one Times piece back in October) make little-to-no mention of the fact that black women are — you guessed it — both black and women. I used to think I chose my blackness first, but in the last few months, it's become clear that it was chosen for me. The fights between white and black feminists have been very telling, as well.
4. Professional black women are all at sea when it comes to dating. While I don't buy into the notion that there are no good black men out there for educated, well-off black women, it's clear that pickings are slim. There's encouragement to date outside the race, but like most women, black women are seeking to find a man who's like their daddy, or other important male figure, who is usually black.
5. There's not freedom to be oneself. Granted, this is something that every non-white-male group experiences in some way — anger isn't exclusive to black women, obviously — but black women are beyond the pale of the mainstream, different, in a way that isn't exotic or acceptably fetishizable, like Asian or Hispanic women are. Black women work so hard to fit in — hair relaxers, adjusting speech/code switching, wearing fashions which weren't designed for women with curves, the list goes on. Maintaining the veneer of acceptability is tiring, and when you think about it, utterly enraging.

So there you have it. Five reasons I think black women are angry. I'm a black woman, so I have a little bit of authority on this. Black women readers! What makes you angry? Not-black-women readers! What makes you angry? Let's talk.

Hey, Feminist Hillary Supporters? Still Want to Vote for McCain?

He called his wife a trollop and you-know-what. Granted, as Slate noted yesterday, as passions have cooled, a lot of the Dems who said they'd vote for McCain have calmed down and come to their senses. I think I maybe just wanted an excuse to post this rather amusing video (which is brought to us by the creator of the "Yes We Can" parody vid). Warning: this one is pretty obscene. [Via Gawker]

The Michelle Obama Watch

It's no secret that I am a fan of Michelle Obama. She was the one who made me sit up and take notice of Barack Obama's campaign. Before she caught my attention, I thought he was little more than the Democrats' flavor of the month. But she's getting vilified in the press, and by people who don't like it when a black woman speaks her mind. Hillary's supporters complain about sexism, but Michelle gets the short end of the stick when it comes to sexism and racism. There's now a blog which records all attacks on Michelle. The Michelle Obama Watch. H/T TooSense.

Virginity is for lovers

"Human Nature" is one of my favorite parts of Slate (beaten only by "Dear Prudence" and sometimes, "Explainer"). In it, William Saletan tackles some truly touchy issues with patience and logic. In the essays, he does an excellent job of explaining why some things we consider to be "natural" are quite the opposite, and vice versa. What those of us who've descended from a judeo-christian tradition take as irrefutable human truths are often just constructs which were developed out of biblical misogyny — and seriously, the misogyny in the Bible is quite breathtaking in both scope and influence. Saletan has written essays on homosexuality and incest, oral sex, and most notably — and controversially — the effect of genetics on intelligence. He took a lot of heat for this last one, and later even wrote an apology of sorts. More recently, Saletan brought up the issue of "virginity restoration." A piece in the Times discussed the growing popularity of hymenoplasty among young Muslim women. The interest is spurred by a court case in France in which a marriage was annulled by a Muslim man who discovered that his wife wasn't a virgin (and he announced this to the still-partying guests before taking the woman back to her parents' home). The uproar is over the fact that French court allowed a marriage to be annulled based on something that's so clearly misogynistic. However, I'm not going to argue that the marriage shouldn't have been annulled. While the man's behavior was despicable, it wasn't totally unexpected. The emphasis placed on virginity in Islam (and even Christianity) is strong, and women more often than not know what they're getting into. But they shouldn't be punished for having sex outside of marriage, and if the structure they reside in won't allow for pre-marital sex, then I think hymenoplasty is a reasonable answer. Saletan:

You and I can sit here all day rehearsing these complaints. And some day, God willing, the twisted culture of virginity hypocrisy will wither away. But until it does, hypocrisy is its own best remedy. Help these women deceive their husbands and parents. If they want artificial hymen restoration, let them have it.

Imagine That

Things aren't looking too hot for the Pied Piper of R&B. As R. Kelly's trial for child pornography* plods along to its conclusion, it's becoming clear that he doesn't have very many people in his corner. Between the jokes about 'Trapped In The Closet: Part One Million" and the titles of Slate dispatches from the trial ("The Shaggy Defense" and "Sparkle's Revenge"), it would be funny, if it weren't so darn sad. There's a tendency to play blame-the-victim in sex cases, particularly when a male is the aggressor. When Mike Tyson was convicted of raping an 18-year-old beauty contestant back in '91, the defense attempted to paint her as a woman who had consensual sex with him, and then got angry she was treated like a one-night stand. I remember hearing a lot of people, men and women, asking why she went to his room. Having been 18, and having been in the room of a boy or two, I can safely say that going there is not always an indication that you want to go there. The willingness to paint men as sexual predators, and women as weak, yet solely responsible for their own sexual safety would be baffling, if it weren't so clearly misogynistic. When I was in college, and the R. Kelly stuff was just coming out, a friend of mine from Chicago told me once that a girl who went to his school had an 'arrangement' with Kelly. He bought her stuff and she let him hit, basically. This is obviously hearsay, but at the time, I, like most of my peers, pretty much just shrugged. Girls want stuff, and men want sex. But five years later, I find the concept that stat rape is okay if both parties are getting what they want to be totally disgusting. The Sun-Times reports that a couple of erstwhile Kelly associates are flying to the Chi to ... have a press conference. About what, nobody seems to know. But it doesn't look promising for Kelly. There was a time when I was able to separate Kelly's music from Kelly the person. But — and this may be directly proportional to the diminished quality of his music over time — I can't do it anymore. I played blame-the-victim, before. But I can't anymore. He's a criminal, and it's time for him to pay the piper. (See what I did there?) * If they prove it's him on the tape, will they be able to get him on the rape charges, eventually? Does it matter that the woman won't testify against him? These are the questions.