Politicizing Beyoncé

I'm Kevin Allred. CNN called me the Beyoncé Professor, which I like. I created and teach "Politicizing Beyoncé." I write about Beyoncé and pop culture here. I write about other stuff too:...

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Taylor Swift is a Racist Shitfest

I wrote this piece in 2010 or so, in the aftermath of Taylor Swift being interrupted by Kanye West at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards and the events that followed. Given today’s racist response by Swift to Nicki Minaj calling out racism in the music industry, I dug it up and thought it would be the perfect moment to re-share. The original text follows… _______________________________________________________________________                

         Let me make one thing clear:  I hate Taylor Swift.  I’ve never met America’s beloved pop/country princess, but I hate her.  I hate her music.  I hate the return to conservative heterosexual fairy-tale romance values that she represents.  I just hate the hell out of her.  However, it seems that I’m mostly alone in this unbridled fury.  Taylor Swift must be the second coming of Jesus because it’s become damn near impossible to utter a critical word against her.  She has an army of defenders willing to stake their lives on the assumption that she can do no wrong and the media has latched onto her as the next (and possibly last) great white hope.  Even those few bloggers and critics out there that give Swift and her uber-hyped innocent image a hard time, most still issue the caveat that they don’t hate Swift as a person and in fact respect her talent.  But I can’t even say that much.  I don’t/won’t/can’t respect her, and let me tell you why…

         Strike 1:  Taylor Swift can’t stay in tune or strum a guitar to save her life while performing live.  I’m sorry but I expect performers to perform competently; something I have yet to see or hear Swift do.  Plus, her songwriting skills are weak at best.  Yes, they might be catchy, but there’s nothing interesting going on there.  In fact, every Taylor Swift song is the same Taylor Swift song.          Strike 2:  Taylor Swift is a feminist’s worst nightmare.  Riese over at Autostraddle.com brilliantly backs up this claim in an article titled “Why Taylor Swift Offends Little Monsters, Feminists, and Weirdos.”  Basically, Swift’s lyrics all perpetuate the heterosexual myth of the geeky/shy girl who needs her Prince Charming to swoop in and make her happy.  What year is this?  Even Disney films know that plot is old fashioned.          Strike 3:  And this is the big one.  This is the one I just can’t forgive.  Taylor Swift is a fucking racist!  You heard me.  Taylor Swift is racist…but no one is talking about it.  The way she handled the whole mess with Kanye West and Beyoncé from MTV’s 2009 Video Music Awards reeks of subtle unapologetic racism and frankly, Swift should be ashamed of herself.          Let’s rewind:  Taylor Swift is accepting the award for Best Female Video and Kanye West walks on stage, takes the microphone, apologizes to Swift, and declares that Beyoncé had one of the best videos of the year.  Then…all hell breaks loose.  Was interrupting Swift the nicest thing to do?  No.  Do I care that it happened?  No.  In fact, it was kind of awesome.  West is known for his antics and for some of the most amazing moments in the history of live TV (“George Bush doesn’t care about black people,” anyone?).  What did we expect from him at the VMA’s for crying out loud?  Let’s put this in perspective though:  Swift had just won an MTV award that amounts to nothing in terms of industry clout; it wasn’t a lifetime achievement award, it wasn’t even a Grammy (which Swift has also won).  And let’s also not forget, Beyoncé’s video was better.  Beyoncé deserved the award.  Something was unfair and West sensed it, but his douchebaggery and Swift’s country-bumpkin innocence completely overshadowed the racial politics of the incident.  Even West himself was forced to declare that it wasn’t about race, even though it most certainly was.  West’s anger (while fueled by alcohol and NEVER directed at Swift herself) over one of the best videos of the year – “Single Ladies” by Beyoncé, a black woman – being ignored was never, unfortunately, heard.          Beyoncé was put between a rock and a hard place when she actually won Video of the Year.  If she didn’t want to be associated with the backlash that was sure to hit West after the incident, she was more or less forced to invite Swift back up on stage to have her “moment.”  Swift proceeded to “oh gosh” and “awww shucks” her way through her thank yous while never mentioning once how gracious it had been of Beyoncé to give her time over to Swift completely.  To be clear, Swift had many many chances to minimize the situation:  when West first interrupted she could have held on to the microphone; she could have made a joke once West was finished; she could have agreed and said Beyoncé’s video was better and that she didn’t deserve the award; she could have addressed the issue in numerous interviews directly following the event.  Swift did none of these things.  Instead, she took a step back, cowered, put on the “poor me, small town girl in the big city, deer in headlights” act that she has perfected in both her self-presentation and songwriting (in)ability.  She looked straight into the camera and gave everyone her “please someone help the innocent white girl in distress” eyes.  She refused to answer questions about West later, sometimes being whisked from the room by her managers when the issue was raised.  She plays helpless effortlessly, even though she will be 21 at the end of the year – old enough to drink, vote, graduate college, certainly take care of herself.  To America though, she’s perpetually 15 years old and in need of constant rescue.          The whole night, and the subsequent treatment of West, was really just a lesson that our racist U.S. history is still with us.  We do not live in a post-race (or post-racist) society like many would like to believe.  A black man stood up and spoke back to the white establishment for an enormous slight of the music and accomplishments of a black woman; that same black woman then ended up having to apologize for and distance herself from the actions of said black man, instead siding with the white establishment if she didn’t want to be completely demonized; the black woman then disappears into the background and the black man is essentially lynched in the media for an entire year.  Sound familiar?  We’ve been replaying the dynamic for nearly 200 years; we white people just like to pretend that so much progress has been made because it makes us feel better.          So, what started as a somewhat innocent scene that could have faded away itself turned into big black scary rapper Kanye West inserting himself into the accomplishments (dreams) and acceptance speech of the perpetually 15 year old, innocent (read: virgin), sweet-as-pie, white girl Taylor Swift.  Oh the horror!  The media replayed it as an assault on her dreams and her innocence by an out-of-control black man.  West had to go into hiding for an entire year and issue statement after statement, apology after apology, self-help sound bite after self-help sound bite, all so the public could make sure he had paid for what he had done and Taylor Swift received justice.  Boycotts of his music were called for.  Fans denounced him for his actions.  All for doing exactly what we expect and love Kanye West to do on live television – shock us, and perhaps drop a truth bomb or two.  And instead of seeing how this was ALL about race, we flocked to Taylor Swift’s side to make sure she was going to get through this.  Oh, you might say, but that’s because she was the victim; she was an unwilling participant in all of this.  She just wanted to accept her award in peace.  Hell no!  Taylor Swift is no victim.  She chose to play the role of the white girl in distress against the big black assailant while receiving huge amounts of sympathy and probably a significant boost in record sales for doing so.  To perpetuate that dynamic is to perpetuate racism itself.  That’s where racism lives.  It’s in the interactions we have every day; it’s in the default structure of society.  If you are not actively challenging racism, you are condoning it.  Taylor Swift had a huge opportunity and she blew it.  She is in fact a racist and that should unsettle most people.  She should receive no credit or sympathy.          But did it end there?  Oh, no.  Fast forward to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards and Swift’s debut of a new song written especially for West, and also announced her official forgiveness.  The song, titled “Innocent,” sees Swift playing judge and jury, offering her verdict that West is finally off the hook.  Again, the black man on trial for a crime he was falsely accused of is a familiar occurrence in U.S. history.  She’s somewhat unsympathetic to West in the song, telling him, “I guess you really did it this time” while acknowledging that he’s “32 and still growing up,” leading her to finally declare that he’s “still an innocent.”  Are you kidding me?  Not only is Swift self-righteous here, it’s a completely paternalistic way for a white girl to speak to a black man.  Her racism, while arguably subtle before, is like a flashing neon sign here.  What I wouldn’t have given to see West interrupt her one more time…          Alas, to most of America Taylor Swift represents a return to much more conservative morals and values, an anti-feminist heterosexual romantic ideal, and a throw back to the times when paternalism and more subtle forms of racism passed as progress.  Now, we’re supposed to thank Taylor Swift for making it okay to like Kanye West’s music again, as if we need her blessing.  We’re supposed to live our lives with Taylor Swift as our moral guidepost, as the savior of America.  Forget Jesus, everyone put on your W.W.T.S.D. (what would Taylor Swift do) bracelets.

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Kevin Allred

Writer / Speaker / Teacher / Undoer Of The Status Quo

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Racism, Sexism, the Grammy's and Beyoncé

There are no more excuses; and this is nothing new. You can say Beck released an amazing album. You can even say the Grammy’s are irrelevant in regard to the pulse of music today. You might be right. But, the Grammy’s are still largely watched and discussed and that makes them relevant and political in our pop-culture obsessed contemporary world. We all choose to listen to whatever music we want on our own time, but it means something to see that music get celebrated in such a major way. As Azealia Banks said, it shows all people out there watching what/who is worthy of praise and what/who falls short. These decisions almost always represent and uphold “white supremacist capitalist [hetero]patriarchy” - a phrase bell hooks began using many years ago and remains equally relevant now.

In an industry run mainly by rich, white men, Beyoncé breaks all the rules. Even before coming out explicitly with her feminist consciousness, she was surrounding herself with women — and even more notably, other black women and women of color — in spaces where these same women were underrepresented. From dancers, band members, and business associates, Beyoncé has long celebrated powerful women of color and taken control of her own career in ways that hardly any other black female artist has been able to do while also maintaining a similar level of superstar success. And this is why she scares the Grammy’s. And that is exactly why they did not award her Album of the Year at this year’s Grammy’s. It was one of the biggest snubs of all time, but it also comes off as the Grammy Awards punishing Beyoncé for breaking all those tried-and-true rules of white supremacist capitalist heteropatriarchy. All this exposition is to say, in the clearest way possible:  Beyoncé’s snub for Album of the Year this year for BEYONCÉ is some serious racist and sexist bullshit.

Beyoncé broke every rule about what she could and was supposed to release with BEYONCÉ. She created an album with 14 songs and 17 videos in secret and gave it to the world with no press tour, endless teaser singles, or any fanfare at all. This alone is unheard of. The fact that she is a black woman doing things that would prove difficult even for white men in the music industry is truly remarkable. That alone is enough reason to award BEYONCÉ Album of the Year. Further, the album is sonically, lyrically, visually, and politically daring. Aside from 2 (possibly 3) more traditionally commercial songs, the album consisted of sounds and vocals we have never heard from Beyoncé — or anyone else for that matter — before. It drew on music and themes of the past and pushed them to places we didn’t know they could go. That’s what great art does. And Beyoncé’s spectacular art literally stopped the world. As she said on Nicki Minaj’s “Feeling Myself”: “Changed the game when that digital dropped / Know where you was when that digital popped / I stopped the world / Male or female it makes no difference / I stopped the world / World stop…Carry on.”

Unfortunately, to the Grammy’s it looks like it does make a difference. They were never going to give Beyoncé their most coveted award for an album that criticized and vilified the music industry in general (“Ghost,” “Haunted”); proclaimed unequivocal black feminism (“***Flawless”); celebrated unabashed and unashamed powerful female sexuality (“Rocket,”Blow”); exposed the racialized side of poverty in the U.S. (“No Angel”); and critiqued the audience’s own objectification of the black female body (“Partition,” “Jealous”), among many, many other things. People often tell me that when teaching “Politicizing Beyoncé” I’m reaching too far or making something out of nothing - they insist Beyoncé isn’t political. On the other hand, the Grammy’s find her album too political to award. Interesting dichotomy, but one that most black women in the U.S. are all too familiar with.

And Beck released a perfectly fine album. But at the end of the day, that is all Morning Phase was. Fine. And Beck is a white man, so that means his perfectly fine music gets elevated to savior status. That’s not to say Beck hasn’t released great music in the past - he has. But despite being lauded by pretentious music critics everywhere, Beck’s Morning Phase was kind of a mid-tempo snooze. Beyoncé makes music and historic moments that stop the world; and Beck makes music that might very well put the world to sleep.

It’s 2015, but we still live in a world where white men’s art and opinions are prized and celebrated above all else. Even when they prove quite boring. Even when Beyoncé’s name and performance was used to entice the entire viewing public into sitting through an overly tedious, nearly 3.5 hour broadcast with only a tiny handful of worthwhile performances and Prince’s exquisite cameo (“Like books and black lives, albums still matter”). In the history of the Grammy awards only 3 black women have been awarded Album of the Year (Natalie Cole, Whitney Houston, and Lauryn Hill), and that number should have jumped to 4 this year. But it didn’t - because the Grammy’s pretend to honor diversity but refuse to value black women’s art and lives in the most meaningful ways. Beyoncé didn’t need the Album of the Year Grammy; but she deserved it for releasing brave political music/videos that could not have come from any other artist. The fact that she doesn’t have it, despite having 20 other Grammy’s, tells us more about America than we would perhaps like to know: racism and sexism haven’t gone anywhere. They just work differently. They also still work the same.

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Why's Mike So Obsessed With Bey?

Beyoncé doesn’t often perform cover songs - and there’s no real reason she should. But, lately I’ve been thinking how amazing it would be if she took a page out of Mariah Carey’s book and recorded a version of “Obsessed” and dedicated it to Mike Huckabee. Hey Mike, why you so obsessed with Bey?

Or maybe someone should superimpose Huckabee’s face onto Ali Larter’s body during the infamous fight scene in Obsessed, Beyoncé’s 2009 nod to Fatal Attraction with Idris Elba. That way, Bey could overpower Huckabee in all her cinematic glory. In actually, she will not respond to Huckabee’s recent comments because they don’t warrant her time. Nothing needs to be done. His recent criticism seems so ridiculous and out-of-touch that it’s laughable.

One thing’s for sure though, Huckabee is obsessed with Beyoncé. But, we might actually learn a valuable political lesson by investigating his criticism. It actually proves, as so many other things today prove, that racism is alive and well and the attack on black women’s lives, bodies, and choices in America is just as prevalent today as it was 50 years ago, 100 years ago, ____ years ago - fill in any number; the point stands.

While mentioning Beyoncé in any capacity is a sure-fire way for Huckabee to garner attention for himself, and while his moralizing about other people’s bodies is nothing new either, he is also playing quite the racist - albeit coded - game through his criticism. And while you might have a hard time finding anyone in America (or the rest of the world) eager to take up sides against Beyoncé, there are, unfortunately, a huge number of people that will feel perfectly comfortable aligning themselves with his coded racist language. This is exactly why he quickly expanded his criticism from Beyoncé and Jay-Z to include the President of the U.S. and the entire Obama family.

Here is what’s really going on though:

First, Huckabee completely misunderstands Beyoncé’s music, performances, choreography, and politics, among other things I’m sure. Maybe he should take my course, “Politicizing Beyoncé.” I have a feeling he wouldn’t do very well though; he doesn’t seem to have an open mind or the critical thinking skills necessary for nuanced analysis. Labeling Beyoncé’s music “mental poison” is quite ironic since the real poison is the racist vitriol spewed by the likes of Huckabee and his Fox News compatriots. Beyoncé’s music is innovative, political, feminist, black-affirming, and she is probably the greatest living entertainer today. To collapse everything she does into showing a little skin and performing a few suggestive dance moves (which produce political commentary in most cases) is to miss the point entirely. 

Moreover, the language he uses to insult - through his own self-described words of caution - Beyoncé and Jay-Z is the racist language of pimps and hos.  This just doesn’t fly on any level, as if calling a woman a whore in any regard in this day and age could possibly be deemed politically correct. When race is taken into account, a white man calling a black woman a whore and blaming the black man she is married to for pimping her out is such regressive language it would actually seem like a punchline to a terrible joke if Huckabee weren’t so earnest about it. What year are we living in again?  

This whole analysis also completely erases Beyoncé’s own agency and control of her own career - Jay-Z may be powerful, but he does not decide what Beyoncé does or does not do. The move to ascribe agency only to Jay-Z and to paint Beyoncé as an unsuspecting participant in his criminal behavior speaks more to Huckabee’s own fear of a powerful black woman making her own choices than it does about anything Jay-Z and Beyoncé may be doing in their careers or personal lives. Zerlina Maxwell spoke to this same fact on Politics Nation with Al Sharpton, saying “Beyoncé scares a lot of…older white men because she is explicit about the fact that she owns her body. Her sexuality is hers and she chooses to express it and has agency in doing so. And that scares a lot of folks that don’t want women to be equal to men.”

If it wasn’t clear already, the move to the Obamas, further solidifies Huckabee’s as explicitly racist rhetoric. Because it turns into an attack on the black family in general and black women in particular, at the expense of Beyoncé - as both an artist and as a close personal friend of the Obamas. Jay-Z and Barack Obama seem to fade away and the argument becomes a critique of the job Michelle Obama (and I’m leaving aside what kind of backlash would have followed an argument like this leveled at any previous President’s children and family - which could be a whole essay unto itself) has done raising her daughters Sasha and Malia - because, after all, with Huckabee’s regressive gender politics, you know he believes the raising of the children is solely the responsibility of the woman of the household. So now we have two black women and two black girls at the center of a white man’s criticism about parenting and morality. Sound familiar? Moynihan? Reagan? So many more? Hmmmmmm…

Michelle Obama becomes the irresponsible, all-around-bad black mother for setting a terrible example by listening to Beyoncé herself, while committing the additional crime of letting her daughters listen as well. Forget that Beyoncé is producing some of the most empowering and affirming mainstream music for young black women today, because Huckabee has already missed that point. Beyoncé herself becomes the bad black influence that taints whatever she touches. And Sasha and Malia Obama become the already corrupted young black girls lost to the dark side - pun intended. They are victims but also at fault - after all, how could it have been different having come from a family that supported Beyoncé’s music?! Forget the agency and critical thinking skills of all the above involved. Huckabee certainly does.

Melissa Harris-Perry has described the world as appearing as a crooked room to black women due to the myriad stereotypes they encounter on a daily basis. She says, “One way African American women try to help their daughters stand straight in the crooked room is by telling them inspiring stories.” Sometimes these stories come through music. Perhaps Michelle Obama allows and even encourages her daughters to listen to Beyoncé because Beyoncé offers powerful and political alternatives to black women through her music - about what black women can be in a world set against them; about what black women can accomplish and achieve when they are constantly shoved down. Just because we have one black President does not mean obstacles to equality do not still exist. The Obamas know this. Perhaps Beyoncé is an inspiring story to offer their children. And maybe Beyoncé makes empowering music to pass on to her own daughter. Huckabee just doesn’t seem to have a clue.

Beyoncé has never advocated sexuality without agency or empowerment. She has never stooped to using sexuality just to sell records like most other artists today. She has never provided a bad example. She has made a career out of empowering women, creating music where she is in charge - and on the few occasions where she isn’t in charge, her lack of power serves to illuminate a political point about the current crises facing black women in the world today. And, yet, she still can’t win. She still gets criticized. It’s a double-bind; a catch-22. And it’s the political and social situation of black women in America today: damned if you; damned if you don’t. We have a powerful black woman in the White House, along with her two confident black daughters. And they are being vilified for listening to the music of another dynamic, uncompromising black woman. And people will say that racism is dead. And people will say this has nothing to do with race. Or gender.

These are rigidly-ingrained problems that so many of us are trying to negotiate and rectify.

But honestly, right now, I just want to tell Mike Huckabee to shut the fuck up.

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"I hope these words kill you..."

Text from above follows if it is too small to read:

December 4, 2014

Dear America amerikkka, 

We have a problem. You’ve been sneaky and you’ve gotten away with it for far too long. All along, in fact. You cloak your racism and bigotry in patriotism. You make it impossible for those oppressed to appeal for their rights, safety, and very lives because you are the masked force denying them in the first place. You scold us for destroying your property. We beg you for our lives. You instruct us to be patient. We plead with you for air. We can’t breathe. The air is toxic - it’s filled with the ash of our ancestors, friends, family that you stole from us. When we won’t comply, you beat us. When we question, you kill us. And that’s not enough. You pollute our memory to all within earshot once we’re gone. You blame us for our own murder. You call us thugs, no good, criminals simply for existing. This is a genocide - but we’re not surprised because you’re no stranger to genocide.

I grew up in religious, conservative Utah - white faces as far as the eye can see, including my own. I remember one black girl in my kindergarten class and I remember her name was Adejoke, but by 1st grade she had moved elsewhere - hopefully somewhere more welcoming and affirming. I’ll never know where she went or what happened to her or the story that brought her to Utah in the first place. I hope she is well. I didn’t see another black face in my town until college. Where were they? It’s easy not to think about race and racism when you only see white faces - in school, on TV, in the movies. 

There were a number of reasons I “woke up” regarding these issues - one being that even in that homogenous white environment, I was different. I’m gay. But my skin is still white and I am usually able to walk in the world unscathed. But my background taught me what privilege is. White privilege. I have lived it, benefited from it, learned to recognize and criticize it, even co-opted it for my own purposes. I’ve been disgusted by it, sick to my stomach because of it, and hopeless because it seems so pervasive. It remains unrecognized by those that need to recognize it most. And when your beloved privilege is challenged, you shoot us with tear gas. We’ve tried our best and it’s not enough. YOU ARE WHAT’S WRONG, AMERIKKKA - NOT US!!!

You have no morals or conscience to which we can appeal. You have no sense of equity or fairness that we can lean on, trust in. We have our bodies, we have our rage, we have our voices. And I hope these words kill you. I hope each syllable stops your beating heart. I hope each consonant hits you like a bullet, tearing up your insides like you have torn up countless communities and bodies. I hope each vowel is a noose around your neck. I hope every noun annihilates your existence. I hope every verb paralyzes you. I hope every adjective cuts an artery and every adverb stabs your soulless body. I hope these words haunt you each night and leave you terrified to leave the house during the day. And even if all this came to be, you’d still be getting off easy.

We cry our tears dry. We gasp for any available oxygen. We stand on soil still soft with hundreds of years of innocent blood, while evil still flows through your veins. I hope these words kill you, Amerikkka. Until you die, none of us can be free. Until you die, we simply can’t breathe.

Sweet dreams,

Kevin Allred

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We've All Been Poisoned...But Only Some Of Us Are Dead

“I was looking for a cure to pull me through

 Tried to decide which medicine to use

 And every bottle had your name on the label

 Doctor said you keep me stable

 So now, I’m taking three a day to make me smile

 They said I should wait and try it for a while

 So I’ve been ignoring my symptoms

 And the small print on the back of my prescription

 What I’m gonna do with fever over 98?

 You hold me and my body shakes

 See nobody told me, nobody told me

 The side effects include

 Losing balance falling down

 Sleepless nights whenever you’re around

 Nobody told me, nobody told me

 The side effects of you”

 -Fantasia Barrino, “Sides Effects of You” (written by Emeli Sandé)

“You’re just like poison

 Slowly moving through my system breaking all of my defenses with time

 You’re just like poison

 And I just don’t get it

 How could something so deadly feel so right?

 I’m not sure what to do

 It’s a catch-22

 Cuz the cure is found in you

 I don’t want it but I do

 You’re just like poison

 My affliction, I’m addicted, I can’t lie

 Kiss me one more time before I die”

  -Beyoncé, “Poison” (Beyoncé credited as a cowriter)  

                      —————

(What follows is a meditation on the contradictions of having to appeal to the same system that oppresses you for your rights, freedom, and basically, life itself. Inspired by current events, past events, and, sadly, probably future events, as well as the song lyrics above: “Side Effects of You,” written by Emeli Sandé, a politically-conscious Black British singer/songwriter and sung by Fantasia Barrino; and the other by Beyoncé, also co-written by her. Like Assata Shakur says in her Autobiography, “Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.” What does it mean when the remedy makes you sicker than when you started treatment? What does it mean when the cure is worse than the disease?)

—————

It was late in the evening and we all swallowed the miracle medicine; the new wonder drug. On the bottle where a skull and crossbones should have been was proudly, in bold letters: American Dream. The instructions were simple. Take once with food, before bedtime. Patient should wake up feeling stronger. Intensify your daily activities, work hard, and the world will be yours. It was up to us. No questions, please. Save them for later. Just drink this. It’s safe.

No one noticed the small-print, practically too tiny for the naked eye to make out; especially at this hour, especially with the low light. But we believed them. And why shouldn’t we? They were our neighbors, our friends, even our family. They wouldn’t lie to us (would they?!). And what’s more, they drank it too. We watched them break the seal and take a gulp. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. Which is which has yet to be determined.

(What we didn’t see: “Warning: Only compatible with whiteness, male bodies, masculinity, heterosexuality, etc. For patients exhibiting any other characteristics, side effects may include lowered job opportunities, unfair and unequal treatment, intimidation, persecution, forced coercion, police brutality, abuse, violence, and - sometimes - death.) 

It wasn’t until later that we started to feel sick. Dizziness. But maybe that was the sense of losing opportunities once considered within our grasp. Hallucinations. Or maybe that was our own sense of qualifications and experience being denied us by others. Chills. Maybe that was just us being frozen out of dialogue, conversation, society. Pain in our chests. But again, maybe it was just the pain of our hearts breaking. Headaches. Or maybe it was the pain of our dreams being ground to dust. At any rate, we hurt!

And by the time we recovered our faculties enough to venture outside and take a look around, to cry out for help, to call 911 (although we already had a slight sense of it being a joke at this point), we saw all the gold and silver, all the money, all the wealth had been snatched. There was nothing left for us. We’d been out of work for a time - no one can be sure how long even - and we’d been completely phased out. Forgotten.

We went to the hospitals and were refused treatment because we had no money. We went to the banks and were turned away because we had no capital. We went to the capitalists and our job applications were rejected because we had no work experience. We went to the workers seeking solidarity and were shunned because they wanted to keep their jobs and couldn’t upset the ranks. We were shit out of luck. We were the people of color, the queers, the feminists, the homeless, the young folks, the independent thinkers. We we were, in fact, the side effects of a system set up to oppose us. “We were never meant to survive” (Audre Lorde). They said the system couldn’t fail us, and we asked, pleaded, counted on the system to save us. But they had already developed new medicines, new remedies, new tonics to deal with these new side effects. Those side effects being us.

It wasn’t until then we realized the American system was toxic. We had taken medicine. We had drunk the kool-aid. We had all been poisoned. But some of us were lucky. “Some of us did not die” (June Jordan). And those of us who did and do not profit from the system - and many of us that did and do profit from the system alike - owe it to those that did not have our same luck (because all it is is luck anymore), that could not fight off the poison in the ways we did for whatever reason, that were in the wrong place at the wrong time, that were x, y, z, TO DO SOMETHING.

Some of us want to destroy property, and some of us have literally been property according to the Constitution of the United States of America. The Declaration of Independence only declared some of us independent. We aren’t free and we never have been. There’s no back-tracking. We can’t add in what was never there. We can’t be an afterthought - it’s been hundreds of years coming and some haven’t even reached the thought yet, let alone the afterthought. And that’s why we’re side effects and will always be within this system. We’re used to being side effects - feeling unwell has become status quo. To the point that we’ve forgotten it’s a side effect of a system hell-bent on destroying us.

The system considers us side effects. It demeans and devalues our lives. They throw us out with their trash. They consider us exceptions, but we are actually the rule. The rule of how justice is denied to those that don’t conform; denied those who have always been and will always be incompatible with the magic medicine of the American Dream. Which is why:

Marissa Alexander, a black woman, was forced into pleading to a 3-year sentence for firing a warning shot and defending herself from an abusive partner…

Michael Brown, an unarmed black boy, was murdered and there was no indictment for the cop that murdered him…

Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old black boy playing with a toy gun at a playground, was shot dead by police within 2 seconds of arriving on the scene - despite the fact that the recording of the 911 call included the language “probably fake” more than once…

CeCe McDonald, a black trans woman, served 19 months in jail for defending herself from a racist and transphobic attack, while a white accomplice in the attack was able to plead to 6 months and time served…

                              John Crawford, a young black man, was shot dead in a Wal-Mart for holding a toy gun that Wal-Mart itself stocked as an item for sale, available to all its patrons…

Eric Garner, a black man, was choked to death by police after they approached him for selling cigarettes illegally and he backed away from them attempting to de-escalate the situation…

                         Islan Nettles, a black trans woman, was beaten to death in front of a police station and no one came to here aid - in fact, the assault charges against her attacker were dropped once she died because “assualt” was no longer accurate and more than a year later no murder charges have been filed… 

                        And these stories barely touch the tip of the iceberg. We may be sinking fast, but we know how to tread water. And we’re not going anywhere. We can rewrite the prescription. And if it’s too late to spit out the “medicine,” we can at the very least not recommend that same “medicine” to our kids, our young folks. We can prescribe an indictment of the system itself. It won’t bring anyone back or undo hundreds of years worth of poison, but it’s a start.

Because rest assured, we have all been poisoned…but only some of us are dead. Some of us can still fight like hell, even if (and maybe precisely because) we might feel dead inside. We need to. We have to. We must. Because only fighting can counteract the poison that now runs through our veins. And only fighting will guarantee that those who have died didn’t die/live/fight in vain.  

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

Beyoncé's "7/11" as Self-Care

      Beyoncé’s new track “7/11” and accompanying video, dropped this weekend before the official release of BEYONCÉ (Platinum Edition) on 11/24/14, are FUN! And, moreover, they are about fun. And fun can be an important political statement too: for Beyoncé, for us (the listener/viewer), for the world.  After all, Audre Lorde – as a black lesbian poet warrior (i.e. member of many intersecting underrepresented groups) – assures us, “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” And further, Alice Walker centers the role of dancing as critical for “maintaining balance,” especially for those involved in any number of social justice struggles/movements, in much of her recent writing, but especially the poetry collection Hard Times Require Furious Dancing. Case in point: how many of us are torn up inside awaiting the verdict from the Ferguson grand jury, rumored to still be coming this weekend, and also rumored to be pointing toward no indictment for Darren Wilson for shooting and murdering Michael Brown, an unarmed black boy, from nearly 150 feet away? In these racist, sexist, homophobic, imperialist times, how good does it feel to take 5 minutes and just dance; just jump to the beat; just forget the world around you for a brief moment while your body fuses with music? This is not just fun – it is a survival strategy for many of us, a moment to recharge and continue to fight the good fight.

      In “7/11” we have a Beyoncé defying expectations, being goofy, drinking, and appearing to have a shit-ton of fun, if I may say so – in private spaces, with herself, with friends. And she is encouraging us to have fun as well – to jump, dance, run around, let loose, be free, dance in our underwear, not give a fuck. At least for a moment, albeit brief. Or, if you’re like me, you’ve had the track on repeat for most of today – but even taking a day to recharge and reconnect with whatever kind of fighting spirit is not too much. It is absolutely essential. In fact, the poems in Walker’s collection signaling us to dance are some of her most somber, most heartbreaking, most sad. And that is exactly why she remains tied to the idea of dancing – because it is exactly what carries her forward. Connecting this impulse to history, she states, “It struck me one day, while dancing, that the marvelous moves African Americans are famous for on the dance floor came about because the dancers, especially in the old days, were contorting away various knots of stress. Some of the lower-back movements handed down to us that have seemed merely sensual were no doubt created after a days’ work bending over a plow or hoe on a slave driver’s plantation.” She evens goes so far as to say it not at all easy to hold on to an ethic of dancing – that is in fact an accomplishment when those from marginalized groups and populations are able to continue to dance, to “still hold the line of beauty, form and beat – no small accomplishment in a world as challenging as this one.”

     Many folks online have noted realizing the lyrics to “7/11” were nonsense but still enjoying the song. However, I don’t think the lyrics are nonsense at all. Simple? Perhaps. But nonsense? Absolutely not. These lyrics are INSTRUCTIONS. And while they might not be that deep, they don’t need to be. Just try to enact these commands without a smile breaking out onto your face. (And let’s not even begin to discuss the number of times I have stood up from the computer to do some of the moves she is requesting as I listen to the song on repeat as inspiration for this essay!) Not since “Get Me Bodied” (later reworked to “Move Your Body” for Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” campaign to end childhood obesity) has Beyoncé given us such a full-throttle fun, instruction-based pure-dance track. And it can’t be overstated, sometimes a mindless dance track is JUST WHAT WE NEED!

     But that’s not to say the only political import of “7/11” lies in its fuck-it-all fun vibe. The song sneaks an extra message in through the final lines. While the thrust of the song encourages us to forget our problems and the sad political situation we may be in currently – to “smack that clap, clap, clap like we don’t care” – Beyoncé herself quickly realizes that we do care and that it’s OK to take a moment to relax as she immediately shouts back at us: “I know you care!” And then, as we’ve all been dancing, jumping, putting our hands up, spinning, spinning with our hands up, (possibly) drinking, not dropping our cups, and rolling dice, Beyoncé shifts the tone with the last moments of the song. While the song has been more deeply-rooted in a hip-hop aesthetic than some of Beyoncé’s other music (an aesthetic/art form created and maintained at the ground level by people of color – and impoverished Black and Latino communities specifically), for her last semi-verse, Beyoncé goes in hard with references strongly invoking black culture, and firmly tied to black feminist style.

"Rock that groovy dye dashiki

Nefertiti, edges kinky

Sweatin' out my blow out

Sweatin' out my presses

Trick about to go off

Mad cause I'm so fresh

Fresher than you

I'm fresher than you

Fresher than you"

     These lines clearly invoke/evoke Afro-centric clothing and black women’s natural hair styles. And in stereotypical hip-hop fashion, Beyoncé also presents a “beef” between her and another “trick about to go off” because she’s not as fresh as Bey herself. But beyond the simple “beef” storyline, hearing these last few lines, I can’t help but be reminded of another Alice Walker poem: “Be Nobody’s Darling” from her collection Revolutionary Petunias:

Be nobody's darling;

Be an outcast.

Take the contradictions

Of your life

And wrap around

You like a shawl,

To parry stones

To keep you warm.

Watch the people succumb

To madness

With ample cheer;

Let them look askance at you

And you askance reply.

Be an outcast;

Be pleased to walk alone

(Uncool)

Or line the crowded

River beds

With other impetuous

Fools.

  Make a merry gathering

On the bank

Where thousands perished

For brave hurt words

They said.

  But be nobody's darling;

Be an outcast.

Qualified to live

Among your dead.

      Beyoncé embodies this outcast mentality in the “7/11” video. She gives us her goofy self. She doesn’t care what anyone thinks about her. She is literally nobody’s darling here. She responds askance, “I’m fresher than you.” She embraces the contradictions of black feminism, as she has always done – contradictions that often get read by white America as not-feminist-enough, as evidenced by the recent deluge of criticism from Annie Lennox, et al. When have twerking and feminism been mutually exclusive? (Not that Beyoncé is specifically known for twerking as Lennox claims, though in this video she does give us an image of pseudo-twerkability in skin-tight white pants!) When have privileging sexuality and feminism been mutually exclusive? Beyoncé points out the inherent privilege involved with white feminists’ claims by challenging those same claims. And perhaps “white feminism” in general is the “trick” in “7/11” about to go off, mad because Beyoncé and black feminism are fresher than her tired old assertions. Maybe by dancing our asses off to this track (and trust me – I am dancing my ass off!), we are all demanding a more inclusive feminism and politics that is fresher than the current standard. Maybe we are all asserting that feminism and politics should be nobody’s darling – especially the white power structure, or “imperialist white-supremacist capitalist (hetero)patriarchy” as bell hooks has powerfully labeled it. Because, as she says, Beyoncé knows we care. We care about so many important things – we care about equality; we care about the intricacies of discussing race, gender, sexuality, class, etc.; we care about progressive politics; we care about Michael Brown’s murderer being held accountable to the legal system and the public; we CARE. And we’re with Beyoncé on this one – from another song – “Well, I care / I know you don’t care too much / but I STILL CARE!” Maybe we just need a quick dance break and then we’ll get right back to fiercely caring. Or we’ll care while fiercely dancing. Either way. Trust. 

© Kevin Allred 2014

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

On Resisting Academic Pressure...

“I decided long ago

  Never to walk in anyone’s shadow

  If I fail, If I succeed

  At least I’ll live as I believe

  No matter what they take from me

  They can’t take away my dignity”

But they will try. They will do their best. They will be covert. And the “they” could and will be absolutely anyone you come into contact with. One of my first musical memories is the above song by Whitney Houston, played on grainy vinyl in my parent’s living room while my sister and I interpretative danced/erratically ran around the room to the words in our pajamas. We thought we were brilliant. In reality, we were terrible, but still terribly brilliant. I thank whatever higher power you and/or I might believe in that this all took place before video cameras were commonplace. We called this particular version of activity “our exercises.” As in, “Hey turn that down and quit jumping all over the place;” countered with “But mom, we’re just doing our exercises!!” Can’t argue with that.

Flash forward. I grew up. All the while, I took Whitney’s words to heart. I never wanted to be the person they wanted me to be: a quiet, polite, masculine, good-natured Mormon boy that would go on to do all the things associated with quiet, polite, masculine, good-natured Mormon boys. So in any ways I could, I rebelled, I resisted, and I redefined myself. But that’s a story for another time/essay/book.

I went to college, I bummed around, I played music, I worked different jobs, I lived in different states all trying to find my “true calling,” and I eventually enrolled in graduate school – because I enjoyed learning; because I wanted to learn more about things outside my own experience; because one day I wanted to teach and inspire young people to live their best life (but not necessarily in the same metaphorically Oprah-endorsed way), and hopefully introduce them to some of the same readings/writings that saved my life (black feminist writing, LGBTQ writing, radical politics, etc.).

So that time came and went. I do teach now. I teach badass shit that I’m proud to expose young folks to – black feminism, LGBTQ studies and writers, voices of underrepresented groups, etc. But the rat-race of grad school/academia never ends. I’m in a kind of limbo state: I’m an adjunct teacher at the college level but I have yet to complete the requirements of the PhD program in which I was/am enrolled. Quite specifically, I am a PhD candidate (which means I have completed all requirements save submitting the final dissertation) in the department of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University. For all accounts, I’m disagreeable and bite the hand that feeds me. I make a living cashing (very measly) checks from Rutgers for adjunct teaching while spending most of my free time promoting and spreading the word about a course I created and teach – Politicizing Beyoncé (www.politicizingbeyonce.com - holla!) – while mainly garnering free publicity for Rutgers University and the Women’s and Gender Studies department while my own name is buried beneath the headline or not mentioned at all.

I’m not necessarily angry about all that because it’s my choice to rep my own course and spread the word. My complaint lies with the failure of Rutgers to acknowledge the unpaid work I have done and continue to do, while still refusing to pay me and all other adjunct lecturers and graduate students alike barely above a poverty-level wage while they reap the benefits of my hard work. And my complaint lies with the very nature of graduate study and what it may or may not prepare any individual student/teacher for.

Graduate school is like religion is like a cult is like the military is like…

They (and yes this is the “they” from earlier in this essay) attempt to break your bones; strip you of substance; annihilate your agency; obliterate your choice of occupation. Just so they can build you back up in their image. And despite coming from a Women’s and Gender Studies department – an interdisciplinary department founded on its own challenge to traditional power structures – I was/am expected to reiterate traditional models of knowledge in order to prove myself as valid. This call comes from white folks, women, people of color, etc. – all invested in the academic power structure while simultaneously claiming to challenge that same structure from within a “nontraditional” department.

So I’m confused. And I have no answers. Only more questions. I suppose I’m just attempting to expose this pressure piled onto my chest to the universe. If teaching has been subsumed into the academic industrial complex, what hope do we have? If I, an educated white man, have trouble navigating the toxic spaces of academia and knowledge production, what hope, if any, do we have of making any kind of revolutionary change in this world? If people from traditionally marginalized groups are joining the academy only to be incorporated into the same power structure that seeks to oppress them on the outside, what does the future look like? If we demand a certain kind of knowledge as the only kind of knowledge that “counts” (and trust me, I’ve fielded countless questions over why Beyoncé and/or Black feminism even count as sites of knowledge in the first place), what kind of world are we trying to build? Audre Lorde said “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house,” but have we EVER engaged in a discussion around what those “other” tools might look like?

Since I was young, I never respected power as power itself. I questioned. I didn’t want to walk in anyone’s shadow without knowing why that shadow was worthy of walking in. I never wanted to hide myself in those shadows. No one should. And yet power shadows all of us. And some of us like the shade. And while shade is an important mode of critique, living in the shade of power will never get us anywhere. Living in the shade will never affirm your dignity. Come out of the shade. Sweat a little. See the world for what it is – unequal, biased, fucked up, but not without hope. Shade is like silence, and Audre Lorde also cautioned us: “Your silence will not protect you.” Living in the shade will not protect you/us. You can privilege genuine independent thought and shine a light on the real issues; or else you can hide in your ivory tower, outside the sun’s reach, and hope and pray that you aren’t stuck locked inside that tower when the rest of the village wakes up and tries to burn the tower to the fucking ground.

©Kevin Allred 2014

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

Politicizing Beyoncé

Politicizing Beyoncé

NEW OFFICIAL WEBSITE!!!! Check it out!

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

This September, Sounding Out! challenged a #flawless group of scholars and critics to give Beyoncé Knowles-Carter a close listen, re-examining the complex relationship between her audio and visuals...

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

Politicizing Beyoncé

Politicizing Beyoncé is the music of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter in conversation with historical and...

COME JOIN THE CLUB!!!!

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

Politics and Beyoncé Class at Rutgers Taught by Kevin Allred

Meet the mind behind "Politicizing Beyonce", the coolest college class in the country.

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

A Few Notes on "Drunk In Love"...

                       I can’t lie: the first time I heard “Drunk In Love,” I heard Jay-Z say “Eat the cake, anime,” and I wondered what baked goods had to do with Japanese-style animation.  I quickly realized my mistake, however, and my feminist sensibilities kicked in.  Why, on the same album that Beyoncé finally openly claims feminism, is she also advocating violence against women – specifically a reference to a notorious scene in the film What’s Love Got To Do With It?,starring Angela Basset as Tina Turner (aka Anna Mae Bullock), where Ike Turner shoves a piece of cake in Tina Turner’s face; a scene that has become synonymous with the abuse Turner endured throughout her marriage?  And further, why does she seem to even celebrate the line in the video and at her more recent Grammy performance of the song, mouthing and singing along with the line with a smirk on her face?  It also can’t be denied that it is one of the catchiest moments of the song.  I’ve found myself chanting along more times than I count:  “Eat the cake, Anne Mae / Eat the cake, Anna Mae.”

              In short, I was conflicted.  I didn’t know how to make sense of the message of the song.  And the deeper I searched, the more troubling it became; but not for the most obvious reasons.  I was more troubled by the fact that Beyoncé was taking on all the negative reactions to Jay-Z’s verse.  And yes, Beyoncé is an extremely powerful woman and could, if she chose, dictate what exactly Jay-Z said in his verse on the song.  But the fact that she was being blamed for something she herself did not write didn’t sit well with me.  So I kept digging deeper, into my own assumption and into the lyrics.  Here are a few things to consider before passing judgment on “Drunk In Love:” 

            #1 – Beyoncé herself was being blamed for a man’s actions, whether she chose to reenact the line or not.  This displays one of the main contradictions in feminism today: a powerful woman is still blamed (for everything) regardless; responsibility is never attributed to a male presence.  She did not write Jay-Z’s rap and whether or not she put it on her own song, she should not take the heat for a couple of lines that people claim to be advocating or celebrating domestic violence.

              #2 – Tina Turner and Beyoncé have had beef in the past.  There was some confusion over how Beyoncé introduced Turner a few years ago when they performed together at the Grammy’s and Turner was upset about it, so this whole thing could be poking fun – albeit not in the most responsible way – at that feud.

              #3 – “Eat the cake, Anna Mae” could be more metaphor than literal.  It has been said that the scene from the movie did not actually happen in real life.  Turner’s own autobiography recounts the scene in a much different, less violent, way.  Hollywood turned it into a more pivotal and sensational scene for the movie.  Either way, the scene takes place when Tina Turner’s career is taking off and on track to eclipse that of Ike Turner’s.  In this way, the line can be read as an assertion of how Beyoncé’s own career has become so large as to overshadow that of her husband Jay-Z’s, said to be one of the most powerful men in the music industry himself.  Reading the line in this way, actually flips the power dynamic back to Beyoncé’s favor.  It is also a dynamic in which Jay-Z is not jealous of Beyoncé’s fame, as was the case in the scene from What’s Love Got To Do With It?, because he is confident in his own power and celebrity.

              #4 – Even if the line “Eat the cake, Anna Mae” is uttered with the vitriol and disrespect that it appears to contain on the surface, it is NOT the most problematic line of the song.  Why aren’t people calling out “…Catch a charge I might / Beat the box up like Mike in ’97 I bite?”  This line refers to both the fact that Mike Tyson was convicted of rape in 1992 and being disqualified from a boxing match for biting both Evander Holyfield’s ears in 1997.  While I don’t mean to quantify or judge different violent acts against each other, why is it that criticism is leveled against the use of the Tina Turner slur, while the line that contains other pretty horrendous violence perpetrated by Mike Tyson goes unnoticed?  Could it be that Tina Turner also represents a powerful woman in the music industry, and society in general, so violence against her seems to matter more than violence against Mike Tyson’s victim (Desiree Washington, a former Miss Black Rhode Island)?  What does that say about the way we are attuned to violence?  If you aren’t already important or noteworthy, then you don’t matter?

              #5 – When Jay-Z, and by extension Beyoncé, have been criticized for this song, the lyrics have been taken out of context.  It is only the lyric “Eat the cake, Anne Mae” that is singled out.  But immediately following this lyric is the assertion “I’m nice!”  From a purely analytic standpoint, that assertion cancels out the violence of the previous statements.  Jay-Z is in fact distancing himself from the acts that are explicitly contained in or implicit in the preceding lyrics.  While sexual fantasies might push the boundaries of what is safe, he recants with the confession that he is nice; something no one seems to bring up in relation to the Anne Mae line or any of the lines preceding it.

            #6 – Beyoncé, in some ways, is an album about rough sex (see especially “Haunted” which directly precedes “Drunk In Love”) and affirming a sex-positive view for black women – especially mothers and women previously not thought of as explicitly sexual.  Not that that is an excuse for abusive metaphors, but “Beat the box up” has entered common slang for sex – rough or not.  So the seemingly violent metaphors may just be the way people are talking about sex today, not intending the added baggage of dealing with abuse and violence.  Certainly, Jay-Z’s preceding lines allude to the fact that he is explicitly detailing a sex act between himself and his wife.  Additionally, the fact that the song is called “Drunk In Love” – both a metaphor for feeling intoxicated by love and literally having drunk sex – can be seen as mitigating some other problematic factors.  While intoxicated, some things may seem like more of a good idea than when sober.  We cannot and should not judge this relationship or act from the outside. 

              All these explanations are possibilities that we can never know to be true or false.  But the fact is that there are many explanations for the problematic lyrics.  And I am not ready to say that Beyoncé cannot be considered a feminist while engaging and enacting possibly problematic roles in song and in real life.  We need a more nuanced understanding of what it can – and should – mean to be a feminist and not write people off at the first instance of disagreement.  Beyoncé is, and will be, a powerful figure for young people. We cannot dictate what any other person does in their own life, and while we may not like it, Beyoncé clearly has a more nuanced relationship with Anna Mae’s cake than we may at first understand or be privy to.     

[politicizingbeyonce-blog]

Being Brave and Being Here

            I can’t remember exactly when it started, but it seems over the course of the last few years every random act of anything has been labeled “brave” – from Sara Bareilles poppily singing about expressing yourself (although disclaimer: I find her song kind of charming and it is allegedly about encouraging a close friend to come out of the closet, but the visuals in the video just link the idea of being brave to dancing in public, which is kind of a snooze for me because after all, I’ve danced in public a few times and been called a lot of things – none of which was brave!) to Anne Hathaway being paid millions of dollars to cut her hair and lose weight for a role in Les Misérables (and another disclaimer: I find Anne Hathaway charming and think she gets a bad rap).  At any rate, it seems the word “brave” has been emptied of all political efficacy and import.  What happened to major political statements like All the Women are White, All the Blacks are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave?! Brave is now every actress who decides to cut her hair and lose stupid amounts of weight for a role – or on the flipside, gain weight and make herself less attractive.  Brave is every musician that takes a risk and makes music that doesn’t completely resemble – to the point of imitation – their previous efforts.  To hear the media tell/sell it, every single non-celebrity that appears in a reality TV show is the epitome of brave for baring their soul (read: mundane life) on camera for all the world to see, damn the consequences (although paradoxically those consequences usually equal a catapult into fame).  Well, I’m fucking sick of the co-optation of the word “brave.”  Some of us really want – and NEED – it to mean something.

               Not all of us have the choice to be brave.  For some of us, simply opening our eyes every motherfucking morning (or any point in the day) is an act of bravery.  For those of us who face the world and society every day as an oppositional force, bravery isn’t a conscious decision.  Courage is the clothes we put on before we leave the house; and sometimes courage is what we clothe ourselves in as we step through the spaces we call home.  Our survival is steeped in bravery.  Our survival includes but also obscures and eclipses bravery.  If we choose to live, we must wade through the muddy swamp of public opinion; we find ourselves mired in the muck of moral indignation; we must bear the brunt of your jokes.  And to be sure, not all of us ultimately choose to live.  But that refusal to live is also brave.  After all, as Audre Lorde taught us, “we were never meant to survive,” and some of us simply can’t make sense of a world that was set up to oppose us every step of the way.  But some of us do survive.  And all of us are brave.

              To leave our mark on history is not something most of us believe possible.  Hell, to be remembered beyond our time is such a pipe dream for the majority of the population – especially when race, gender, class, and sexuality mark our lives and render them more and more unlivable in a world that embraces only the most normative bodies.  To stake a claim to our own lives and existence is truly a revolutionary act.  When Beyoncé sings “I wanna leave my footprints on the sands of time / Know there was something that meant something that I left behind” in the opening lines of “I Was Here,” she perfectly articulates the desperate need many of us have to believe that we matter and that the fact that we have lived matters.  To someone.  Somewhere.  For those of us that are marginalized, to tell our stories – in our own words – is the greatest act of defiance to a world and system that would rather we wallow in silence.  Janet Mock’s “Redefining Realness” is my favorite very recent example of this kind of bravery; this kind of “transforming silence into language and action,” as Audre Lorde would say.  In the press tour for her book, she fiercely and fervently affirms her own existence and space, and her right to determine how she is treated in that space (which is not a luxury most of us have).

              Beyoncé’s “I Was Here” resonates with me for these reasons and so many more.  The refrain of “I was here” projects the claim of mattering into the future to speak of the present.  “I was here” – the claim itself is constructed in the past tense, yet speaks of the present moment.  This kind of multi-temporal claim simultaneously demands space for us in the present moment and ensures that we will matter in the future.  This is exactly the kind of message that those of us who have been beaten down by society time and time again crave and deserve.  It may not change material conditions in the world; but it certainly demands a higher sense of self-worth from ourselves, and in turn from others.  To be able to claim “I was here” is to be able to not just live and survive, but thrive and perhaps make a difference, no matter how small.

              For those of us that do endure, I want to re-claim BRAVE.  It’s a word I’ve recently incorporated into my identity based on my experiences growing up gay/queer in the ultra-conservative and Mormon enclave of Utah, while rejecting their conventional beliefs and finding a passion and commitment to justice and equality for ALL people.  But still, I’ve never been in a Hollywood movie.  I’ve never taken a risk that has been deemed important enough to warrant national attention.  So I’m not sure I fall into the mainstream definition of brave these days.  But I am here.  And I will be here.  And even though I feel brave is a word that has been co-opted and taken away from me, it’s a word I have tattooed on my chest – where I can see it every day – along with Audre Lorde’s words:  “we were never meant to survive.”  These words remind me always that being brave is a constant, continuous struggle.  It is not a default position – it is a fight.  And some of us have no choice but to brutally fight that fight.  Etymologically, the word “brave” can be traced back to Medieval Latin meaning “wild and savage.”  I suggest we reclaim these wild and savage aspects of “brave.”   Because we are wild and we are savage – we will relentlessly ensure our own survival, and it may very well be at your expense if you oppose us.  We will not be swept aside.  We are brilliant.  We are bold.  We are brave.  And we are here.