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How Oakland Brought Me #Aquemini

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On Saturday, I met #Aquemini.

I was posted up, waiting for someone, doing me. He then spoke, and asked if I was a professor. I had just come from writing the midterm and reading so I had a bag of books next to my chair. I responded no, I am a teacher. I asked him if he taught, he said, yes, once. He was a substitute teacher in East Oakland and he was just getting ready to talk shit about the Town and I said, “Baby, I’m from there.”

He responded, “Oh, really.” Yeah, Oakland.

I gave him another look, my undivided attention and said, “When is your birthday.” He stated, “June 11th.” I was like shit.

You are #Aquemini. It sounds really creepy as I write it, but I have been really deliberate about having a Gemini or Aquarius in my life.

I have been so specific about #Aqeumini that A dub walked over and said hello, and I introduced her to him and said girl, he is #aquemini, and she raised her eyebrows like word. Word.

I ask people their birthday’s before their names. Why? I am being purposeful.

So we conversate. Marinate. All that.

He apparently saw me before. And spoke last summer. I asked if I was nice. Sometimes I shut it down. He said yeah, “You were nice, but it was clear that I were reading your book and didn’t want to be bothered.” That DO be the case sometimes and I am entitled to that. Time and place for everything, no?

He is currently and anti war lobbyist, adorable and White honey. Like Kevin Costner eye crinkles and everything. As I contemplate the politics of puttering around on that interracial in DC. Man listen.

Black girls pay a social cost when they date someone other then Black men. Because I walk like I have a right to be in the city, the threat of violence is always there. Our current sex/gender system says that women are not entitled to be in public, let alone claim the right to occupy city space publicly. Domination is maintained through violence and the threat of violence.

Ah, but the synchronicity of the night.
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So, first there is the Oakland connection. Then some how he brings up Ta-Nehisi’s blog. And I say #ummp.

He says, the man has awesome prose. And I respond saying, well he does, however I had a really public conversation with Ta-Nehisi last fall when he asked whether or not For Colored Girls was a classic at a White publication in front of a largely White audience, even though he hadn’t read the book since he was a teenager. #Ummp.

I went on to say that Ta-Nehisi didn’t respond well to being challenged intellectually around his gender politics, and I am referring to his willingness to read a Black feminist text to broaden his analysis, and that I found this unwillingness to be problematic.

He was like, what “That was you” and kinda put his hand over his mouth like “Oh Shit.”  I answered yes. Now see, this is surreal because I am not use to my work preceding me.

Further it speaks to importance of remembering that your words go places that YOU don’t go.

Lastly he has done work in South Africa around the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. You and I both know I Love me some TRC’s. So. Um. Yeah.

I can’t call it.

Oh. And I don’t think we exchanged info. #Extra. So Yeah. #Aquemini. Holler @cha girl. You know where to find me @2:26 sec.

#BoomandPow

#VulnerableyFearless

Can you believe that East Oakland ‘ish?

Peace to the Gemini’s.

The Politics of Making a “Black Film” in Obama’s America

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Image of director Kasi Lemmons courtesy of Professor Sussoro’s Blog

Last fall I tweeted that a barometer of Black women’s freedom would be their ability to control, tell, and distribute their own stories.

Having seen Push, and now For Colored Girls, two movies based on texts written by Black women about Black women, but directed by Black men, I am incredibly mindful of who gets to tell which story and why. Story telling is powerful because it is through stories that we come to see who we are in the world. Our stories define us. Stories tell us what is possible.

Consequently I was really excited when I learned that Pariah, directed by Dee Rees had been acquired by Focus Features last week.

A story, by a Black woman, about a Black girl. #Awesome.

In thinking about Pariah I was reminded of a Professor Michelle Wallace’s commentary on Spike Lee nearly fifteen years ago and what it means to make “Black Films.” In the article “Doin’ the Right Thing” she writes,

” …implicit in this formulation of Blacks having their own films was the nagging question as to whether such representations would somehow make black
peoples lives better overall. Regardless whether representation weather a film has value as any value as art, it can , if it chooses closely mirror or reflect the problems
and inequities of society. People make the mistake of thinking that a film can therefor correct inequities. This because we as a culture, are still trying to figure out what representation fully means in still new and exponentially expanding forms: what such forms can and can’t do, what we should and should not ask from them.”

She also say’s something in the article that has stuck with me which speaks to the idea that,

“we can now see that the notion of blacks making their “own” films presupposed the existence of a monolithic black community, unified enough to
posses a common ideology, ethics, morality, and culture, sufficient to override such competing and divisive interests as class, gender, sexuality, age and
education.”

This morning @tkoed Sent me a link from Ta-Nehisi’s blog where Neil Drumming, a screen writer and journalist, talks about about whether he would make “Black films.”

The article talks about how films by several NYU alums made it to Sundance this year. Full disclosure, as a little bear I worked for several years at NYU’s film school as an office manager. NYU’s Black film making culture is a part of me. It is in seeing grad and undergrad student filmmakers grind to make their dreams work that, that in some ways I developed the courage to openly pursue being an artist. Filmmakers taught me the power of story and how to analyze a film.

My homie Jase has just came back from Sundance after working on a doc on Harry Belafonte, Sing Your Song, #wingsup.

My homie’s Marquette Jones and Qwesi Davis both have films in the San Diego Black Film Festival this month.
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I also found this article to be interesting, in that it speaks to how hyper segregated both Hollywood AND the art world is. Furthermore, it is related to a conversation that I was having last week with a Black woman journalist friend about how segregated Washington’s journalism corps are, and what this means for the careers of Black people in general and women of color in particular. It appears that one can operate in the White circle or the Black circle, but not both. Where does this leave people who are neither White nor Black? o.O

Work mirrors life?

Was it this rigid in New York? I don’t recall.

What is material to me is that Neil never disclosed his race. I read the article again, looking then I asked @tkoed if Neil was White. @Tkoed says that this is because regular readers know who he is, and that may be true. But I am not a regular reader, so I finished the article wondering is this a White, mixed race or Black person analyzing what it means to have negro characters in their movies.

Perhaps given how marginalized Black films are, to choose to make Black movies is a choice to have your work live on the margins. This can be tough to reconcile for some.

The homie Dame also sent me a link to an article titled “Can Revolutionary Films Hinder Social Action.” Read it here. This article looks at how the top 1% can use the medium of film
to transmit messages to the masses that then absolve the masses from taking action. For example, if you know that “The Matrix” exists, are you obligated to do something about it?

Oh and Rob has a piece up at The Liberator about the Black Creative Class. He makes some interesting points about who makes up this class and although his timeline throws me a bit, I like
the idea of inter-generational Black struggle that’s not linear and impacted by art. In some ways I think our posts are in conversation with each other.

Excited about Pariah?

Why did we assume that having more Black Films would change the lives of Black people?

Can we have a conversation about the forces that create a “Black Film” genre in the first place?

Race and racism are draining.

On Raising Babies and Leaving Lovers

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A photo he took of me Labor Day Weekend @ Havana’s. This man made me look like Zora. #Tears. #Ummhmm.

Dedicated to @mistmattnash

I don’t know what to say.

I realized two nights ago that I am grieving the fact that I just walked away from someone who is father material. We are still friends but….it ain’t the same.

I knew something was up with me because I caught myself obsessing over two people that I had no business doing so. Thinking about them from time to time, yes, because you DO be needing to process life events and what not, but the level that I was doing it was way too much.

Then I realized rather than feel my feelings I was thinking of other people. #Allbad.

Feeling vs. Thinking are two different things when it comes to healing. Full stop.

I was reading a book on the subject and it said that, “You start to grieve when you get ready to.”

I have dated, I am #oldladyrap, but this situation was like two ships passing and then when I finally put two and two together I realized that amongst a few things our timing was janky.

As a Black feminist I take parenting seriously. Like really serious. Isn’t it bugged that I have never written about this personal choice before? Well, it’s close to my heart.  But nearly everything I write is, luls. Perhaps it is because this is close in another, arguably more profound way. I talk about it with the homies, but I haven’t written about it.

When I write it I make it real.

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The thing about it is blood, everybody ain’t parenting material. I have dated very few other people who I saw as being dad material. In some ways he is the only one seemed to not only desire it but was focused on being good at it. #damngina.

People ask me, especially on dates, where your little bears at? And I tell them that this is a society that needs children in order to survive, but refuses to support mothers, while simultaneously expecting them to perpetually raise new generations. I am cool on those.

If men gave birth there would be cheap and accessible child care on every corner.

How did I get to this point?

The turning point for me about this was over two years ago, Filthy was real clear about how he knows hella organizers whose children don’t talk to them. I was kinda stuck. I had to think real hard about what being #BlackgirlBleekGilliam means to me.

I think this is why I am so fascinated by Lauryn Hill and her choice to leave and raise her babies and peoples reaction TO that choice.

So yeah. I am grieving the loss. And I have to accept it. But daggumit if I don’t want to some days.

You ever think about the choice to parent?

Would you do it over again different?

Why people think Lauryn Hill owe them something?

On My Mothers Language

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One of the things that you have to get use to when you meet me is my colorful use of language. It’s sprinkled with Spanish, bear language, slang, feminist theory, Mobb Deep quotes and some occasional Biggie rhymes.

It’s fun.

I have been wanting to write this post for a while. But I think that watching the Zora Neal Hurston documentary tonight finally compelled me to do it.

From Baldwin, I have learned that we use language to control our environments.

So this is what I keep in mind as I write about my mothers phrases.

The first one that has been on my mind is “It’s your little red wagon, you can push it or you can pull it.”

This seems fairly innocuous but in essence, she was telling me, a five year old, it is YOUR life to do with it as you wish. It makes all the sense in the world after all of these years. Especially as I regularly make “grown folks” choices and deal with the consequences of those choices.

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The third one is “you can eat it fast, you can eat it slow, when you eat it up you ain’t getting no more.” HA! I always heard this as I like snacks. Again, this was her way of teaching me about resources and managing them, and really placing my agency, my will to act, on my mind. It made no sense at five, makes ton’s of sense now.

The fourth one is “Your ass is grass and I have the keys to the lawn mower.” #Jesusbeafence. Why couldn’t this woman just say that I was in trouble and going to be put on punishment. No, she had to show that I was in trouble and she had the key to stop or start my punishment. I like this one arguably the best. Why, because its so colorful.

This one is a little fresh, and gendered but it is what she said. The comment has to do with characterizing women who are seen as “promiscuous.” I probably shouldn’t have been listening when she made this comment, but you know children are nosy. The comment is “She will ____ a snake if you hold his head.” I kid you not. Talk about learning about how women’s sexuality is perceived and shaped from your mother. I think about that line and I just kinda shiver now, but it captures something that is both patriarchal and violent but honest in terms how are taught we see women.

I have a candy jones. During finals there are candy wrappers everywhere. As a kid I didn’t really care for sharing candy. So, my mum would say, “Renina so tight she squeak when she walk.” Still cracks me up. I am SOOOO stingy with candy I squeak when I walk. Like I am the tin man. I am better at sharing now.

What would we do without language?

Do you have any sayings from your family that make sense now, but made no sense at all when you were a kid?

Misogyny and Genius: Assange + R. Kelly

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Image via New Black Man.

During my birthday a couple of years ago I was posted up in Philly with Filthy in that awesome Barnes and Nobles on U Penn’s campus.

The Roman Polanski rape charges were being debated in the New York Times and some folks were defending him saying that it wasn’t “rape-rape”, that happened so long ago, or the alleged rape victim retracted her statement etc.

I was perplexed, why was this White man not in jail for raping an underaged White girl?

I thought, if she couldn’t be protected than my ass was grass.

I said this to Filthy and he looked at me, paused, stared at me for a minute, then said, well you know that’s a real working class Black woman’s perspective. I didn’t really know WHAT he meant by that at the time, but I remembered it, because it felt like I was going to need to remember it. Feel me?

Black men have been lynched and Black women have been raped, historically, in the US to maintain the hierarchical, racial,  gendered, social order. This terror was particularly acute 1880’s-1920’s in the south, as the US tried to figure out what a post slavery nation would look like.

Historically Black women are seen as UNrapeable. Naturally lewd, lascivious, fast and promiscuous. The social system of slavery needed us to be seen this way to normalize the domination of our reproduction and our manual work during US chattel slavery.

Because Black women were the two-fer, we worked in the fields and gave birth to enslaved workers, our sexuality was and in many ways still is looked at in a very particular way, even in 2010.

My understanding of this comes from two books.  The first is Terror in the Heart of Freedom: Citizenship, Sexual Violence, and the Meaning of Race in the Postemancipation South by Hannah Rosen and At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance–A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power by Danielle McGuire.

Back to Polanski. Filthy explained to me that in Western Europe prominent, artists, writers, filmmakers, philosophers and thinkers  are placed on a pedastal.

I was like word?

Then peep game, he said for this reason, he holds these folks to a higher standard WHY? Because they have a platform where they can both influence society and consequently play a large(r) role in changing the world.

Louder voice, conceivably bigger impact.

This bugged me out.

How do I get to Assange and R. Kelly?

Well, I was really interested in three things in terms of how the Assange narrative was emerging:

The lack of a clear narrative around the facts of what actually occurred during the week in question. (h/t to @shoutcacophony for the link.)
The fact that people didn’t have the language to talk about both his genius/subversive actions AND the rape allegation against him.

The fact that Naomi Wolf’s stand point on Interpol as the dating police.

The fact that a group of largely White feminists got Keith Olberman and Michael Moore to apologize after being dismissive of Assange’s rape allegations. More here @ the  #moreandme hastag.

    Whats the Assange/R. Kelly connection?

    In 2008 R. Kelly was found not guilty on 14 counts of child pornography charges with a thirteen year old African American who was suspected to be his Goddaughter.

    A couple of weeks ago, on The Facebook a homie made a comment about R. Kelly’s genius, and a conversation ensued about just sorta being conflicted over him.

    I responded:

    It’s bugged. In terms of R.Kelly, if the issue were Race/Rather than Gender, I don’t think we would be so ambivalent.

    To put it another way:
    Could we really rock to some music made by a Brilliant Racist, rather than a Brilliant Pedophile?

    …R. Kelly Married Aaliyah when she was 15. We *Been* knew he was wrong.

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    Why is sexual domination acceptable for men artists who are labeled genius?

    Then again, sexual domination often goes unchallenged on the day to day, so I just kinda answered my own question. 0.O

    In someways its a part of the success package and that troubles me.

    What makes people short circuit when it comes to holding artists and other genius folks accountable for their janky gender politics, pedophilia, rape allegations?

    Because artists influence people, large amounts of people via their art, shouldn’t they be held to a higher standard, not a lower one?

    Why or why not?