I'm So Used To Black Women Being Dissed I Almost Missed the Lesson!

For yesterday's post I wrote with a certain amount or irony how the virtue of white women was reinforced by Letterman’s very public chastisement and remains as viable as ever. Even he was bewildered about what happened. I wasn't defending what he'd said I was just surprised by the backlash. I’m certain he’s got the message now! (Bill Maher – you’re next!!) He may have thought he was just being harsh on the Palin family but what he failed to understand is that he unleashed the battle cry for a war against other white men over the continued domination of the “white” race.

White women and girls are to be protected at all costs.

I admit I hadn’t quite comprehended the full ramifications of this. As an African American woman I tend to think in historic terms of the relationship between the two and how patriarchy was reinforced during and after slavery. In other words I’ve had visions of Scarlett O’Hara dancing in my head….and I’ve wanted to take a mallet to that image. I’m certain I’m not the only one that would like to see certain things dismantled. I’ve written my share of posts were I’ve lamented ruefully how white women were being put on a pedestal because it was so painfully obvious to me that Black women were not.

I get it now.

Excerpted comment from Evia: 

Letterman had the audacity to attack a ww and her children, so other wm QUICKLY put him in his place. This sends a powerful message to OTHER wm of all ages who may be thinking about denigrating a ww publicly--to NEVER do that and if they do, they're going to be very sorry. This is why Letterman is blathering apologies all over the place. Unbeknownst to lots of AAs, many wm see plenty of faults and flaws among ww, but they understand that when you degrade your women en masse PUBLICLY, your WHOLE group is headed for destruction.

See Black women wouldn’t know what being protected is like because we're being attacked every day by other people who look like us or share a more recent lineage as well as by those that don't. They either don’t want to be part of the tribe or want to thoroughly bash it. Just so that we’re clear I’m speaking about the collective. I know there are plenty of individual situations where this is not the case.

This is why DL Idiot was allowed to go on Leno and call other Black women ugly and say he agreed with Imus. It was why Imus felt free to make such a comment in the first place. It’s why the would-be rapper Asher Roth revisited that “joke” on Twitter and couldn’t understand the angry response. It's why the denigration in "our" music will continue to lead us on the straight path to hell. It's why Nancy Grace rarely does a story on missing and exploited Black females. It's why so many women are self-medicating ourselves into an early grave. It's why many of us can't walk down the street in certain neighborhoods without being verbally assaulted with the underlying threat of physical harm. It’s also why I’m going to hear a lot of excuses from some Black men who read this post, but that the most virulent denials and objections are going to come from….cue the lights: other Black women.

We don’t know what it’s like being protected and held in such high regard.

It’s like tasting really fresh vegetables for the first time. We didn’t know it could be so good. So something must be “wrong” with it then! No, it’s just the way things are SUPPOSED TO BE!

Letterman may have thought he was deriding one woman politically and socially while being willing to use her offspring to do it. This is a teachable moment for all of us that even that ONE INCIDENT was NOT TOLERATED because it would CHIP AWAY AT THE COLLECTIVE leaving it in a WEAKENED STATE. So next time someone wants to make an excuse about how a song referring to a Black woman as a BITCH is “just a song” or “about a particular kind of woman” let’s look at this situation and compare how other white men stepped in protect their women (even if they can’t stand some of them) from one of their own. If they hadn't it would've been the start of a very slippery slope indeed.

If Letterman had been allowed to continue without pause it would have signaled it was okay for other men that it was open season. One incident multiplies, accelerates and mutates in ways you cannot control after a while. It goes from "hoes" to "no dark butts" to "why can't I talk about my preference for light-skinned women" to "I don't want to be Black" to "I want to stick my *ick in you" to "raping you is no big deal...it's the white man's fault anyway" to bye-bye collective.

Now that I’ve learned this lesson I have to ask: when are Black women going to get their respect and protection from Black men? 

Warhol Meet Palin: There's the Door!

In the future everyone will be world famous for 15 minutes - Andy Warhol

Failed VP candidate Sarah Palin is holding on for dear life what Warhol so famously quipped about! It's a looong way to 2012 though! I had a laugh as her continued attention addiction led her this week to complain Caroline Kennedy gets the white glove treatment and how the big bad bloggers openly ridiculed her. Why should she care what we think? We're just "losers who live in the basement and wear pjs" anyway. Psst! We have moved on - and so should you pretty lady with the guns. I needed a Sunday filler post to be frank and I do derive a little bit of pleasure poking fun at her. It's the hypocrisy that compels me to discuss this though.

This reminds me of last spring's Democratic primary when Hillary Clinton would not leave. She had been trailing since Iowa in reality and never recovered from the Obama Movement, but being the fighter that she is meant wearing out her welcome. She still has campaign debt by the way even though she and Bill are worth 8 figures. She's not the most qualified candidate for the job either but she's likely to be our next Secretary of State. They all think they're Effie White, justified in their stubbornness and unfairly cast aside. What happened to competing on a level playing field? Why the huge sense of entitlement? The reality is their time was just up. Or at least it should have been. Hillary still got a fat reward for being Obama's nemesis.

The thing she and Sarah have in common besides ovaries is the all-hallowed WPP. White Woman Privilege - or White Woman Pedestal depending on how you'd like to define the situation. It's how Ann Coulter and Elisabeth Hasslebeck bask in their pedestal privilege while sneering at Michelle Obama but get away with it because they "have friends who are or date Black men". In Sarah's case it's when you get praised for your mediocrity while claiming to be at a disadvantage. What else explains the corporate media fawning? Openly courting racists? Especially after (nearly) everyone had figured out what a fraud her image was compared to the reality. In Hillary's case it was the ridiculous argument that sexism trumped racism in the Oppression Olympics which it clearly doesn't when there's zero consideration of  any non-white women in this equation. Hello!!!

WPP is why Affirmative Action mostly benefits the Sarahs, the Anns as well as the Hillarys of this country. That and legacy admissions/promotions and having your relationship with a male relative be a boon to you career-wise. Be it generational wealth or generational considerations it's hard not to succeed when it is expected for you to do so and a path has been cleared. Not that we all don't have our individual trials and tribulations, but certainly we can see they are all still here and that the Hill & Bill show will never be cancelled. 

The only push back I noticed was from certain members of the Republican wing who didn't like their accidental Chosen One. She believed all of her own hype - remember how shocked she looked when McCain conceded? Your gonna love me - or else! It wasn't the Democrats that leaked the clothing non-troversy. Even I thought that was rather low (some of the time) but some quarters of society view the dumbing down of their party a serious mistake. They'll take the votes of course but they don't want to actually have to see or interact with their minions. 

They would've had to relinquish the moral superiority crown and they did not want to be seen as common. The Republicans are known to be rich, elite, intelligent but exclusive (at least in their minds). Cocktails at the country club are de rigeur, not beer bongs and strip malls. The Palin clan came chock full o' nuts: kids with funny names, kids who'd dropped out of high school, kid(s) who had unintended and unplanned for pregnancies: if they weren't white they would've been the talking points of everything that's wrong with other people. How can they fundraise with the steerage passengers running the ship. Nuh unh!  

So if you're not familiar with the talent show, Showtime at the Apollo you'd recall the time after the crowd has spoken and the curtain is about to be drawn on the performer who has bombed? The show runners brought out the Sandman who yanked them off with his hook as he tap danced. Check out this hilarious sequence on the Cosby Show - no embedding allowed :(. Now I don't care for or underestimate the appeal that some still have for Sarah but I still say the exit is located Stage Left.....