#gradient lair

[ahistoryofanxietyandanxietyand]

Towards The Human: On Loving&Killing Black Women

What doesn’t kill her

maims her, makes her superwo’

                  man (!) to be studied.

from A Swarm Of Bees in High Court by Tonya M Foster

Black women receive the kind of compliments that end up with maimed souls, depleted bodies, and a mind that might as well no longer be their own; and still, that’s called love. What Black women are loved for is what kills them, precisely because it was never about them as much as it was about what they represent. 

Worship does not matter much when all that is left is exhaustion, and it matters even less when what they adore is the corpse they sucked dry to make the altar. It is a bold (and controversial) proposition to call those effusive public love letters deadly; it can even be called crass ingratitude. Though the question remains: what does it mean to only love the mother/daughter/sister/nursemaid/sex provider/lifeline, that is, a role, and not the bare, real, flawed, flesh bearing humanity of Black women?

Black women draw the superhuman-ess they are so praised for from the unnecessary but continuous pain that surrounds their existence: it’s not that all they do is suffer, it’s that all they are deemed to be worthy of by the world at large (and that world is large) is suffering. A certain dose of inhumanity accompanies Godliness, and in the case of Black womanhood, there is more than enough inhumanity to go around. What resides at the core of much of the love that is doled out to Black women (expressive, even loud love) is awe at how bravely, how deeply they endure. Which doesn’t mean much without the complete eradication of the conditions that create their suffering

This where we arrive at what Trudy (the creator, curator, and writer of Gradient Lair) terms a love that is really violence; a love whose mealy mouthed flatness disguises the fact that it ends up much the same way as with outright hatred, with the kind of living death that can only be described in those words (again!):

What doesn’t kill her

maims her, makes her superwo’

                 man (!) to be studied.

from A Swarm Of Bees in High Court by Tonya M Foster

[reverseracism]

I wish @gradientlair would become active again... It's been 2 years and they're literally the blog that set me on my path to discovering myself and disowning my ignorance. I miss them so much :( - Susie The Moderator

[meeresbande]

oppressors decide that they’re “oppressed” when how they oppress is critiqued

Trudy @Gradient Lair

[constant-evolution]

this is off Gradient Lair's blog. James Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry dancing!!!!!!! My two fave niggas in the world. My two fave flesh beings and souls in the world!!!! (come to think of it the way James is watching Ms. Hansberry- looks like he was questioning his sexuality for a sec.)

[kick-neckbeard-ass]

https://twitter.com/GradientLair/status/438453663468892160

Purple Tinker's racism raises its ugly head again!

(Protip, speaking over black women is generally pretty racist! What was that you were saying about armchair activism...?)

I feel sorry for Gradient Lair. "Leave me alone" doesn't compute for Tinker.

[dynamofire]

According to the latest U.S. Census Bureau data, women in the United States are paid just 77 cents for every dollar paid to men on average. But a closer look reveals that for African-American women, this disparity is much worse, with women of color earning just 70 cents for every dollar paid to men and just 64 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men.

i saw trudy (i think it was trudy?) retweet someone clarifying this VERY IMPORTANT fact last night during the state of the union address that really needs to be illuminated better, especially by the president, who mentioned the 77-cent-to-every-dollar number and not the others. the wage gap is wayyyyy more fucked up than you think.

[battymamzelle]

"Beyoncé does more for intersectional feminist perspective than any of the aforementioned examples. She chose a female lead guitarist (so rare) and musical director Bibi McGill, an all woman band, The Sugar Mamas, a size diverse stage presence, a sexual orientation diverse choreography/support crew, has spoken out in support of marriage equality, she speaks out for women globally with Chime For Change, she’s deliberate with song choice to convey multiple experiences of women, she openly supports other powerful Black women (i.e. her handwritten notes), she consistently publicly rejects sexist and racist norms for her daughter, she’s spoken of how meaningful relationships with women are to her, she’s empowered and embraces the position of sexual freedom (in her music/performances) and sexual traditionalism (though she’s often called “slut,” she’s in a marriage that if she were White would be socially approved of; even heterosexual Black women who are married face sexual deviance stereotypes), revealing that women can be empowered to choose, and she conveyed a compelling and empowering message with her Super Bowl performance." "While Beyoncé is certainly not perfect, the criticisms people make of her are often steeped in White supremacy, racism, misogynoir and the politics of respectability, and this is not progressive. Nicki Minaj is doing a better job at intersectional feminist perspective than any of the aforementioned White celebrities, in terms of publicly conveyed messages."

Feminism Is Already Valid (Gradient Lair)