Monthly Archives: September 2010

Resident Evil: Afterlife

September 28, 2010

Went to see it about two days ago. I gave it a go because I happen to like the Resident Evil franchise. There’s not much to say as far as the last film goes….

I can tell from the opening of the film what it was going to be like. Anywhere from one to five minutes of credits focused on a very thin Japanese girl standing in the rain wearing a super kawaii (Japanese for “cute”) outfit. The movie seemed to be more about the heroins’ and other women’s bodies than actually about the Umbrella Corporation or anything else. What else is new?

++What I Got Out of It++

Thin, petite, pale people look pretty kicking ass and standing in the rain. I’ll be the first to admit it.
Milla Jovovich is a lean, mean, ass-kicking machine and looks good in tight black spandex and leather holstering with lots of guns, swords, slow motion, and supernatural powers. Loved her in The Fifth Element.
Resident Evil: Extinction has dusty-desert-zombies, this film had more of a soggy-zombie-sea-tentacle feel.
Milla Jovovich looks good in black?
Gratuitous gore and slaughter.
Milla Jovovich, where did you get that lipstick at a time like this? By the way, you look good.
Ali Larter’s and Milla Jovovich’s characters somehow managed to find plenty of clean water, haircare products, and MAKEUP in a post-apocalyptic world. Go figure. The makeup was totally overdone.
Milla Jovovich looks really good in slow motion.
The only Black guy in the film would be an athlete and model wearing Jordan sportswear. *rolls eyes*
Milla with a shotgun that blows people away with quarters is totally awesome!
Surprise!!!! The Black guy didn’t die like so many Black people before him in horror movies! They scared me for a moment there…
The fights scenes with the primary villain in the film were reminescent of a ripoff of The Matrix.

++The Unexplained: Plot Hole, Producer/Viewer Curtesy, and Consistency Questions++

If Alice (Milla Jovovich) has so much preternatural perception, how did that guy stab her in the neck with that needle and neutralize her powers?
What happened to the rest of Alice’s clones? Was she really stupid enough to sacrifice all of them in a single attack on the Umbella Corporation?
Why are Alice and Claire wearing so much makeup and where are they getting their hair fixed at a time like this? Mere mortals can’t fathom or attain such beauty and hygiene maintenance in times of crisis surely?!
If her powers were gone, how did Alice survive that plane crash?
How did the main villain survive a explosion of his escape plane, capable of destroying part or all of the city of Shibuya and it’s underground, wiping it off the map?
What’s up with the gratuitous fan service (for male viewers)? There are about fifty different things the producers of this film could have done rather show all these gratuitous cuts of the women’s bodies in the movie–one of them being filling in their plot and consistency holes.
Why does Alice look so damn clean most of the film? Doesn’t look like she’s struggling at all to me…you know, what with the world in a state of apocalypse and all, flesh-eating zombies, breakdown of basic services and “civilization”….
Alice just beckoned survivors to come to join the rest of them when a whole bunch of Umbrella Corporation soldiers show up in helicopters–what’s she going to do now? No powers and all, protecting a bunch of people unarmed and incapable of combat….

Save me,

Ms. Queenly

Posted by Taviante Queens in Film and Movie, News Flash! Tags: Black feminist critique, Milla Jovovich, Ms. Queenly, Resident Evil Afterlife

Hancock, Will Smith, white girl, rolls eyes

September 28, 2010

Okay. So after some time, I finally saw Hancock starring Will Smith. I remember that when it came out, somebody criticized it.

Oh. my. god. What a disaster. Now, I can fall for an epic-looking romance representation just as well as the next person, but the sweet but typical racist portrayals and interracial fetishism involved in the plot of Hancock had me trippin’.

Hankcock–the man himself

A Black man dressed like a bum with newspaper over his face, passed out on a bench, wakes up from prodding by a white child who demands that he go and stop a crime. Hm.
Black man sleeping on a city bench, trying to grab at a passing white woman, and drinking big bottles of liquor, which he stores under his bench.
A Black man blasting apart city streets with reckless disregard in a drunken blunder and flies through the air to “Move, Bitch” and shoves men’s heads up other men’s asses to the theme from Sanford and Son.
A crass, mannerless Black man, who insults women and punishes noisy children (though they might deserve it).
An opportunistic white public relations rep (PR) who uses said Black man with so far unexplained super powers to boosts his reputation.
White PR convinces Black man to go to jail for eight years for the thousands of dollars of damage that he has cost the city in damages while stopping crimes and accidents.
Idiot Super Black guy agrees and goes to jail, where he can obviously break out but stays put so that he can become the lapdog of the city’s police force.
White PR’s second wife–stuck up, snotty, secretive, deceptive, middleclass be-yotch reveals the truth–she knows who Hancock is (he suffered a head injury that caused him to lose his memories prior to 80 years ago, since he doesn’t age).
Finds out from her that he’s basically a god and that fact of his identity is why he has all this power.

Weak white female god mated to Hancock

In order to keep her happy little domestic situation with the white kid and husband, she intended to let Hancock suffer without his memories, thinking he was alone in the world, the last of his kind.
She’s supposed to be stronger than him, yet he suffered more injuries than her, and didn’t flatline at the first sign of trouble.
She’s supposed to be stronger than him, yet it seems that he’s defended her all the hundreds of years that they’ve known each other. Aaaaaand…what was she doing?
She tells Hancock that he’s “supposed” to be a hero and she persues her domestic life while he uses his powers to help people.
She lies and tries to tell him that they’re brother and sister when they’re a mated god pair and loved each other for centuries before Hancock lost his memory.
Stuck up, snotty, secretive, deceptive, middleclass be-yotch–typical.

++Themes++

Black man. White woman. Jungle fever fetish–what’s new?
Weaker woman, albeit godlike, superhero man–what else is new?
A white man telling a Black man that its in his best interest to go to jail for his “crimes” for his own good. Hmph.
Black man getting sweet on a white family. Uncle Tom complex?
Yes, only a white female god can be with a Black man. Oh, but wait, racism and their own inherent godlike makeup screwed up that interracial relationship, too, so she decides that she’s destined to live a quiet domestic life with a white family!
Of course, a Black man would be flying around and blasting apart a city streets and buildings to rap music.
White husband and wife treat the Black man like a man-child.
For love and life together, the cost is mortality at the expense of their godlike powers so the white woman and the Black man can never be together. They become mortal in the vacinity of each other and lose their powers. Its the way they were made. *rolls eyes*
So many of the criminals in the movie are Black men. Go figure.
So the weak white female (god) can have her peaceful domestic life, the Black male (god) has to be the one to leave and go to a different city.
The female “heroin” would, of course, be hiding her identity in the guise of loving, weak, house wife, who pretends to need her husband to open jars for her. *rolls eyes* Whatever.
And, yes, the Black man will go and put the white man’s company symbol on the face of a celestial body, the moon–capitalism and white supremacy at it’s finest.

As a romance, its really cute, but other than I’m so tired of this shit.

Keepin’ It Real,

Ms. Queenly

Posted by Taviante Queens in Film and Movie, Popular Media Tags: Black feminist critique, Charlize Theron, Hancock movie, interracial couples in popular media, interracial fetishism, Ms. Queenly, Will Smith

1 comment

Top 6 Asshole Attacks on the Web

September 24, 2010

I’ve run impromptu, informal social experiments publically and on the web for years now. In this time, I’ve learned that there are several excuses and arguments that people will apply in an attempt to invalidate the views/arguments of those that they do not agree with or those who challenge them, particularly on the web. A few of them are as follows:

“You are saying that because you are…X.” This is usually a personal attack on your character or beliefs. It really has nothing to do with what you said, and everything to do with how the attacker views you as a person when they are threatened or criticized. Very common.
“You’re being sensitive.” The good ol’ Sensitivity Argument. If they can make it about you being “sensitive” on a topic, it takes the attention away from them and what they’ve said/done. No matter how valid your points or comments are, the attacker lingers in doubt and fear as they scramble to make you seem like whiner. At this point, people will either side with you, or side with the attacker. Some will try to stand on their rock and appear to be fair, just and impartial.
“You’re only sticking up for people ‘like you’.” The Self-Interest Argument. Of course, you’re only looking out for you and your people!
“You’re taking this personally.” One of my favorites. Very similar to the Self-Interest Argument and the Sensitivity Argument.
“People need to learn how to read/listen.” When they say this, they aren’t talking about people, they’re talking about you. This one is the best, because if they make it seem like you haven’t read or aren’t listening or that you’re hearing what you want to hear, then they think they win by discrediting you. Reacting defensively, its the last thing they can think of to say in their frustration.
Unsolicited Advice or Guidance. As if they’re giving you something to think about. To make themselves seem like experts, they’ll try to give you personal advice. If this person has done all of the above or at two, you should ALWAYS think, “Why am I listening to this idiot?”, and move on.

The issue in all these examples is that the attacker always tries to make it about you, because you are doing something wrong. Which is a lie, especially if you’re saying something that needs to be said in the midst of bigots and pretenders. I wish people could talk with compassion and thoughtfulness and just be able to acknowledge when they’ve said something wrong or hypocritical. Bitches used to piss me off, but now I’m getting used to it and recognizing it for what it is.

It is what it is.

For real,

Ms. Queenly

Posted by Taviante Queens in True Story, Writings to.... Tags: assholes on the web, Ms. Queenly, social commentary

1 comment

You and Your Non-Profit

September 24, 2010

There seems to be a lot of money involved, contrary to the fact that its termed “non-profit”.

All the white kids that I went to college with said so proudly, “I’m doing a good thing because I’m working with this non-profit that’s helping starving children in Africa and Central America!” They think that they are doing something so good.

What these “well-meaning”, generally white students/volunteers don’t want to admit is that they are doing it to make themselves feel better because they know that they’re not really solving any problems in a lasting sort of way. They prefer band aid fixes and Christian ego boosts as opposed to real and lasting change. Some people are actually addicted to service work.

The Non Profit Industrial Complex is a shadow government that works together with capitalism inside of it and with the Prison Industrial Complex. Societal problems are not solved. They are only medicated and given bandages. In a capitalist system, no one on top is willing to make the cure, so the NIC treats symptoms…poorly. They don’t make the cure because they get rich off treating the symptoms and making you pay for it.

It isn’t as if there aren’t non-profits that are aware of their role in the system and actively resist and educate others–there just aren’t enough.

Other read(s):

America is F*ed Up: Things America Needs to Work On

Posted by Taviante Queens in News Flash!, Reflections, True Story, Writings to.... Tags: capitalism, Ms. Queenly, Non Profit Industrial Complex, non-profits, white guilt

sigh Laptop out of commission again

September 23, 2010

My laptop’s out of commission again (power adapter from Targus are PoS, second time I’ve had to buy one in the last few years). I’ll be on now and again and I’ll try to update.

*sigh again*

Ms. Queenly

Posted by Taviante Queens in News Flash!

how women play into oppression

September 23, 2010

Natasha W:

Also Witchsistah,

“As for an exercize in accepting unearned privilege. I know one of the reasons my husband found/finds me attractive is that I am relatively thin… I’m not fooling myself into thinking that if I were 300 lbs. he’d.be attracted to me no matter how stunning my personality.”

Same. But mine isn’t unearned. I put in long, hard hours at the gym, thankyouverymuch.

But would you have been interested in your husband if he were 300 lbs? I can’t say that I would have noticed my SO if he hadn’t met my (very lax!) criteria.

–comment from abagond.wordpress.com, “black women”

What’s funny in the quote above is that most women don’t realize that no privilege is “earned”. This comment really got me thinking so I went ahead and finished this up….

Privilege is something that certain people have whether they earned it not, whether they asked for it or not. Being born weathly, white or blond or blue-eyed, having a disposition towards thinness, being raised to speak English and/or being born in an English-speaking country, having a disposition toward heterosexuality, being someone granted the opportunity to receive a college education (or education, period), being able, fitting an industry’s latest fashion trend or standard of beauty–on this planet, especially in America, those things are privileges.

Privilege is completely and utterly socially constructed and upheld by the few to be inflicted upon and forced down the throats of the many. You conform or you don’t conform. Some people work to get a certain privilege and inevitably, unless they are aware actively fighting against it, they become those who also oppress.

What happens when most women get any amount of privilege in a world that oppresses them, they become oppressors. I am a people watcher. Being so unusual in the communities I’ve found myself in, I’m often put in the position of watching people, just watching: I’ve seen mothers treat their little boys like shit just because they are the parent (therefore in a position of power over a male body that they can control substantially). I’ve seen women abuse their daughters, female family and friends, just because they are in positions of power or privilege. because they have something that the other female does not have. I’ve seen hypocritical women claim that they support other women and are feminist, but brag about their privilege because they “earned” it. I’ve seen women intentionally tear apart relationship between intimate partners because another women had something or someone that they wanted. I’ve seen women stay with men who abuse their children just to make themselves happy; they knew no one was going to stop or question them.

Nowadays, now that I’m older, I don’t watch so much as I speak out against situations and institutions. Still, I’m never more shocked and disencouraged than when I come across hypocritical, backstabbing women who think that they’ve “earned” privilege and that gives them license to say or do whatever they want as long as no one criticizes them. Black or white or Mexican, Chican@, indigenous–doesn’t matter.

I try to keep myself in check, I’m human. Can’t say the same for some other folks,

Ms. Queenly

Interested? Other reads:

Using the Word ‘Bitch’ & ‘Bitch Feminism’

strong Black women

Erasing Black Women’s Labors & Trials

Why Race Will ALWAYS Matter Especially in the U.S.

The Black Gurrlfriend Character

Is Race Consciousness an Option?

[Another Social Experiment] Ms. Queenly’s Response to “black women (via Abagond)”

Posted by Taviante Queens in Reflections, True Story, Writings to....

5 comments

Black Writer’s Market

September 23, 2010

I’m afraid to even look really. Whenever I step into a major bookstore chain, like Borders or (heaven forbid) Barnes & Noble, I see it.

The ‘African-American Interest’ section. Along with it, the ‘African-American Interest’ table is conveniently located nearby when you enter, at least here in Georgia. Who decides what goes on these tables and in these sections? I’ve seen a book that’s about a Black women and written by a white man. I keep seeing it in all the grocery stores even though the only person I’ve seen with this book in public is a white woman but I’m assuming it isn’t an unpopular text. On principle, no matter what this book is about, I’m going to have to disagree with its existence.

But what else is new–a white man making money off Black women? It’s been done, over and over again, before I was ever born.

This is why I write–because the vastness of the market is not geared towards my interests; this is kind of similar to how I feel about not voting. I think its sad that Black people need a little section to themselves because nearly the rest of the store is for whites obviously.

What pisses me off even more is what’s in these sections and on these tables at the store. What the hell are the majority of Black writers even writing! The covers are very telling.

I’ll be the first to admit that I was a Zane fan for a while in high school, since I was already reading erotic romance and other “mature” subjects anyway. The primary focus of many heteresexual Black female (and male) writers in their work is sex, clothes and cars, occupation, a healthy dose of drama, and man-troubles. Very typical things.

I don’t read it anymore. I gave it up. So I can’t comment specifically on recent writings and publications.

The writer’s market is like a television show, somebody just rearranged the set and the order of things, but the plot is exactly the same; everything happens the same with the same elements and the same kinds of people. Very seldomly does anything original make the cut for agents and publishing companies. I was once a very voracious reader until I started catching on to how things work. Then I stopped wasting my money.

There is an emptiness in the market geared towards Black readers which is filled with the same formulaic shit over and over again. This is true because it is true of the writer’s market in general, but even more so true for a minority such as the Black community.

Read also (mostly all coming soon):

Recent Book Store Trip

Capitalism & Creative Writing–Connection?

Dreaded Formulaic Romance Novels

Faithless but Invested Reader: A Reflection

Posted by Taviante Queens in Literature, Popular Media, Reflections, Writings to.... Tags: Black culture, Black feminist critique, Black writers, Ms. Queenly, social commentary, writer's market

1 comment

France and Haiti, Reading @ the Purple House

September 20, 2010

In addition to writing literary fiction and poetry, I am a spoken word artist. At Sunset House in Seattle last winter, I performed a spoken word piece criticizing America’s news coverage and treatment of Haitians after the last major earthquake there. The spoken word piece/poem also criticized France’s oppressive history and present with Haiti. I drew connections between America’s treatment of the Black communities of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, slavery/Jim Crow, and Haiti.

A white woman approached me during the intermission after I performed. She was at least two feet taller than me and she identified herself as a French native, saying she had been living in the U.S. for a few years.

“I am from France. The country that colonized Haiti,” she said proudly, tossing her head. Her accent was very distinct. I had no reason to believe she was lying about being French, although she could have been pretending. The French woman continued, “And I have a problem with what you performed in there.”

I politely tried to address her concerns, not really giving two shits if she had issues with what I read because that didn’t make it any less true in my book.

She said, “Poetry is supposed to be pleasant. Its supposed to make you feel good. Your poem didn’t make me feel good.” She continued, “You are probably no different than the white kid coming out of the Starbucks here”. Then proceeded to light a cigarette and smoke it down into my face. “You mixed too many things together that you cannot compare.” So I can’t lay out the similarities between Haiti and New Orleans, both which have suffered two terrible major disasters, both of which have been failed and oppressed by France and the United States? Why? Because it offends her white European sensibilities to racism?

At most, seven of my friends and guests were with me. I wanted to look PC and polite. One Latino/Chican@. All the rest were white. I wanted to cuss this woman out for sounding so arrogant about the actions of her country. I also wanted to make a good impression on my guests since we were all in a social justice organization together. In short, I didn’t want to look like a rude, profanity-slinging, ghetto Black woman.

Later, I found out from them that they totally expected me to verbally rip that woman’s head off for everything she said to me. A missed opportunity.

I pretty much suggested that she school herself on Black history. Though I said it much more politely.

Maybe I will record this piece and post the audio if I get the time…..

–Ms. Queenly

Also Read:

Le Cliche au France (This is not the piece I read at the open mike but it is related)

Posted by Taviante Queens in Reflections, True Story, Writings to.... Tags: France, Haiti, Ms. Queenly, spoken word, Sunset House

14 comments

strong Black women

September 20, 2010

Some say black women are “strong”. You hear people in America saying that. In some sense, because so many find themselves raising a family without a husband, they have to act strong. But it becomes a vicious circle: by acting so strong, it drives away men who would have otherwise settled down with them. Four black women in ten have never been married! –abagond.wordpress.com

Whats marriage got to do with it? Is this a religious perspective talking here? Most Black women don’t marry because they know hell is coming. If you want to talk statistics, we all know how many marriages end in divorce and I’m sure people are finally understanding that many heterosexual people in particular do not get married for romantic reasons. (I wonder how many parents have thought or said to a child, “Oh, well, we got stuck with you and that’s why we married/stayed married”. Many people get married for religious reasons. Some people think that’s just what they ought do because its “natural”. And we all know that if you’re going to spend the rest of your life with someone, money or lust is no the reason to do it. Some people simply want companionship and they choose each other or choose a person that they think is best suited for this…but you don’t need marriage to stick together with someone/people although certain privileges come with marriage by law.)

So why are so many people concerned then with how many Black women are getting married? How is the marriage rate a marker or indicator of personal and/or intimate relationships among Black women? Especially considering the divorce rate in America which is very well known. In a public forum, I can only speculate (statics are the only thing that some people listen to). Everything in a woman’s life should not be contingent upon her ability to date and marry.

I hope that’s common sense knowledge for everybody.

Personally I find solace in a legacy of strong Black women. I’ve been through a lot, usually without anyone to help me, and I had to get through it. Many Black women have to go through a lot and they have to learn how to live in a world that hates Blackness and hates women. So try to imagine how hard it to be Black and a female-identified person. The mentality of being “STRONG” is a survival mechanism.

As Zora Neale Hurston wrote in Their Eyes Were Watching God, “Black women are the mules of the world”; they bear the brunt of so much violence and degradation and pain and psychological twisting. As a English Creative Writing /Sociology major, I read countless scores of the racist American and European literature that attempts to vindicate notions that Black people are of the lowest race on the face of the planet. People fail to realize how these racist and misogynistic literatures whether, scholarly or creative, are part of the very foundations of a racist capitalist and misogynistic America and Europe.

Black + Female = Lowest Creature on the Face of the Planet.

Its not as if men don’t benefit from oppressing women. With that said, there should be no question as to why Black women need to be (not act) “STRONG”.

Of course, there are drawbacks to “being STRONG” or “acting STRONG”. People have objectified, commodified, and stereotyped the “STRONG Black woman” as an idea. Some women do “act” the part. They believe that Black women–who are constantly disrespected, underrepresented, exotified, dehumanized, miseducated, misrepresented, commodifed, stereotyped hated defiled ignored labeled–can handle anything. They think its just in our blood. That’s the myth. Let’s break that myth: Black women are human. We are not “light and breezy” and we’re not stone walls either. We are not weak. We are not impervious to pain. And furthermore many Black women have learned from their own lives, from their mothers and sisters (and sometimes from their fathers and brothers), about certain situations in life and they can see bad shit situations coming from a couple of miles away.

I have been called a hostile, angry, aggressive Black woman by Black men and white women and white men. The same way I’ve been called a “bitter big girl” by thin women who don’t want to take me seriously. All because I stood up for myself, stood up for somebody else, or called somebody out for hypocritical bigotry. If I’m so STRONG, then I hope that one day I’ll get used to it so it doesn’t shock me anymore but also so that I’m not desensitized to it. It will always be the people who say or think these things that have the most issues and are the most defensive.

Woman: “I can do bad all by myself”.

Man: “Well you’re going to be all by yourself”.

I hate when men say this. With no respect for women’s autonomy. As if her whole existence is contingent upon his ability to date and marry her and possibly produce children. There are women who are just being antagonistic towards men when they say “I can do bad all by myself”. But many women are not; the real issue is that the male ego is a fragile and overly gratified thing. To the men that it applies to, that saying should really be this: “I’ll do worse if I’m with you because you cannot fulfill my needs wanted or desires.You’re a bad situation and I see you”. Its implied–even if men are abusing this phrase and using it against women to make women feel and think that they are “acting STRONG” or “being irrational”. Most of the time, men are just trying to hide their bruised egos.

I don’t have to “act” STRONG. I am STRONG. I have long legacy of women behind me who have survived and loved so much; they are all around me. I’m proud of that.

True story,

Ms. Queenly

Interested? Other reads:

Using the Word ‘Bitch’ & ‘Bitch Feminism’

Sorry Ass Man Syndrome: Black Female R&B Singers and their Issues (coming soon)

how women play into oppression

Erasing Black Women’s Labors & Trials

Why Race Will ALWAYS Matter Especially in the U.S.

The Black Gurrlfriend Character

Is Race Consciousness an Option?

[Another Social Experiment] Ms. Queenly’s Response to “black women (via Abagond)”

Posted by Taviante Queens in Ms. Queenly's Response to..., Reflections, True Story, Writings to.... Tags: Black feminism, Black feminist critique, Black women, Ms. Queenly, stereotypes, strong Black women

2 comments

I Am Queen: fat {does not equal} ugly

September 19, 2010

A stylist cut my hair short without asking. I wasn't paying attention to what she was doing until it was too late. I look unhappy because I knew what my mom was going to say. I came home for my brother's funeral and her response as we picked out a coffin was this: "If you cut your hair again we gone be having another funeral". I must present an image of femininity because my weight compromises perceptions of my beauty.

In elementary school, I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism. I may even have endometriosis, which I will be going to the hospital to be checked for. In addition, on both sides of my family, there is a history of high blood pressure and diabetes. My older brother (who was two years older than me and my twin) died very suddenly, falling into a diabetic coma and going into cardiac arrest and dying soon after. I was away, my first year in college. He was twenty-one. R.I.P. Big Brother.

I do not have high blood pressure or diabetes, but living with hypothyroidism isn’t easy either. Sometimes, I can’t afford my medication and can go weeks to a month without it. I become lethargic, depressed, lusterless, and tired, barely able to stay awake or concentrate. I become bloated and gain weight easily. I do not and did not eat or drink more than my sister or my brother, but because I was struggling with hypothyroidism and thought it was my fault, I learned to turn down food even when I was hungry and to eat very, very slowly so I don’t look like a pig. I still do. People at my university who had lunch with me thought it was a “Southern delicateness”.

Growing up, my mama and grandmama were happy that I wasn’t just a fatty. I had a disease, right? My sister was thinner, taller, ”science-smart” (like my mama), attractive, and quieter, but her skin is browner. I am the light-skinned one, the pretty one, the “arts-smart” and clever one, but the fat one in their eyes.

“Aw, baby, you’re so pretty but you’re so fat.”

In one heartbeat, I am called pretty, beautiful even, and, in the same, heartbeat, I am fat. And fat is ugly. How sadly contradictory.

So I got to be the ugly-pretty daughter.

I never thought that there was anything wrong with me. I was overweight, but I was a bright, intelligent, dignified, compassionate, and creative child. I had dreams. I wrote poetry and stories. I still do. It was snide remarks, a disgusted glance, a passover for an opportunity that I was clearly eager and qualified for, the laughter, the jabbing, the fights, the boys, the mean backstabbing girls–that all made me realize that I wasn’t the problem.

Even today, I have guys (and girls) from high school looking me up and telling me they had a crush on me back then, they were intimidated by me and afraid of what people would say if they looked at me seriously. I’m not interested in cowards or hypocritical bigots. Sorry.

What I want most is for people to stop telling me that the solution is losing weight. Stop trying to convince themselves that I have a problem or that I’m bitter. Stop telling me that thin women are victimized, too, and are therefore qualified to give me advice. Stop telling me that I can find happiness and enjoy life if I change my attitude. Stop suggesting that I get surgery, put a band on my stomach. Stop pretending you don’t have a problem with your views on weight and “fatness” and that you’re on my side (to those that this applies). Stop labeling me as sensitive, as if its a disease, and as if nothing I say politically is valid. Stop trying to justify your hatred and the hatred perpetuated by the system and its media at the every turn.

Stop calling my talents, face, and skin tone beautiful while all the time thinking to yourself that I am ugly.

I still struggle with perceptions of my body today. I work out. I force myself to eat. I try to make sure I have my meds the best I can. Only now I am learning that what I really want isn’t to lose weight and join the Thin-is-In Club or get a man. I enjoy a certain range of flexibility, so I work out to maintain what I’ve gained.

What I really want is to be embraced for who I am and not wholly for what I look like. I want other people who hunger for it to have that. Sometimes I think its a good thing that my face contradicts my body type: People show their true colors a lot around me even when they think they are not.

True story.

Hmm… What else to say? Maybe more later…?

Keeping it real, all day, everyday,

Ms. Queenly

Monthly Archives: September 2010

Resident Evil: Afterlife

Hancock, Will Smith, white girl, rolls eyes

You and Your Non-Profit

sigh Laptop out of commission again

how women play into oppression

France and Haiti, Reading @ the Purple House

strong Black women

I Am Queen: fat {does not equal} ugly

Ms. Queenly’s Blog

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Copyright

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