Testing 123 testing 123
Hey, this is Mollena Williams,
and I have a blog called The Perverted Negress,
and that's because I am kinky and perverted and as well a brown person, as you can see.
Right now I have no particular outline for what I'm about to say,so I'm kinda wingin' it here,
so forgive me if it rambles.
Yesterday, um, I uh logged onto facebook
because I had received an event invitation from another person of facebook.
And I cannot tell you how many times I read the event invitation,
because I was so stunned at what I was seeing.
and I will put a link so that you can take a look and see what I'm talking about,
um, below the video or whatever, to the website and/or to the video of the comedian
and I use the word loosely and in quotes,
who was booked by a gay leather bar in Portland [Oregon], Portland Eagle.
and the Eagle is a well known uh name for gay leather bars across the country.
I've been to many Eagles in america in my travels as a leather woman
and the Portland Eagle, I do not believe I have visited myself personally,
but when I saw the invitation,
I saw that the Portland Eagle had booked an act
that was shockingly reprehensible, I was really taken aback,
first and foremost because I have this idea, um, I had this idea
that gay leather folk would be aware of the flagrant bigotry and racism of booking an act
that is a white man in "drag" wearing blackface.
and for those of you who might not be familiar with the term,
it is an old old tradition, uh, whereby white people, or people who identify as white people of european descent
don makeup to make them look like black people,
and then mock and parody black people.
And this is a fashion in terms of entertainment that has been dead for awhile
because it is derogatory, racist, and insulting.
Uh, there is however someone who keeps this tradition alive,
they use the stage name Shirley Q Liquor,
And the assumption is that this man has put on makeup of a skin tone not dissimilar to mine,
with big sloppy lipstick and big popping eyes with horrible eyeshadow and a big afro wig and a housedress.
And stands there, doing a whole diatribe in a "ghetto accent", for what that's worth.
If you're unclear on what I mean by this particular situation, go ahead and watch the video.
Now some of you will say "oh my god it's too horrible, I can't watch it",
Y'know what? Sit and fuckin' watch it.
because I've watched it, and I've watched a great deal of his other work over the years,
as I have in my own way protested, uh, his performance.
The link I'm going to put below the video is of a show that he did
coincidentally on my birthday in 2009...
so the uh year I was turning 41 I guess, no, 40, that would be my 40th birthday...
This person was in Guerneville, California, not far from where I was living at the time in SanFransisco,
in blackface, amusing a bunch of folks who, uh, themselves were marginalized in our society,
that being homosexuals, gay people, queers, however you want to identify, right?
[takes deep breath]
Here's the thing.
I somewhat foolishly had this idea that being associated myself as a bisexual woman,
myself as a leather woman,
that I had found company and space where I would be respected,
where people who understood what it means to be marginalized,
what it is to be abused because of who you are,
or to run the risk of being rejected by part of society,
would respect those differences
and boy was I wrong.
When I was in the midst of of understanding the breadth of what was happening yesterday,
I started writing to other people of colour and other black women specifically,
and what was horrifying to me was how many of us
[voice breaking]
just shrugged our shoulders and said "well that's how it is".
And it's horrifying that that's how it is.
And it's horrifying to me that I for a day tempered my rage
because I was too worried about being accused, of being pointed at, as the angry black woman.
The stereotype that somehow because of who we are, we are oversensitive, that we are over reacting,
and that we just need to, know the irony, lighten up
and fucking relax because it's a joke.
Allow me to clarify this in case you missed it:
blackface is not fucking funny.
Alright?
It is racist.
And once something is racist
if you support it
you are supporting racism.
What was horrible about this situation is not just that the fucking Eagle booked it.
It's that people supported it,
and then when those of us with a soul and a conscience and a goddamn brain in our head
said "hey man, that shit is not ok",
hundreds of people felt free to step up and say
"what's the big deal? it's just a joke. you're too sensitive. why don't you relax? it's funny."
It's not fucking funny.
And then when people were called on their racism
they said "well, that's your opinion".
Look up the definition of racism, ok?
Mocking someone because of their skin colour is part of what belittling someone because of their race means.
You don't get to pick and choose how racism is.
It's not my fucking opinion that that's racist.
It's racist.
Period.
For fuck sake.
Why am I having to explain this in goddamn 2 thousand... 2013 whatever the fuck year it is?
OK?
Why am I having this talk on the first day of goddamn Black History Month, will someone explain to me,
why I am sitting in front of my computer because white people seem to think it was goddamn ok,
alright?
To have a man, a white man, dress up and mock me.
Me, my sisters, my aunts, my grandmothers, my mom, all of that.
If I step on someones foot
and they say "ow! you stepped on my foot!"
and I say "well fuck you, that wasn't that hard, why don't you just goddamn relax and get your foot from under my foot
while I'm conducting my business?"
That would be seen as rude.
And yet, people feel free to tell me,
first of all, what is or is not racist.
what is or is not acceptable and how I should react to it.
alright?
not only do we have a situation that's racist,
it's also incredibly sexist.
And there were certainly people who surprised and startled me by explaining to me online,
and I mean me as in the larger "we", as another black woman,
why we were wrong about our feelings, alright?
Let me be clear when I say that I'm not speaking for all black women,
you can sign on or you cannot.
but the fact of the matter is
enough people who look like me, and enough people who don't look like me
are aware that this is some crazy fucked up shit,
and each and every one of you who supported this act
and then who puled and moaned about the "caving in to political correctness" when the act was canceled,
--and I'm guaranteeing not becuase they suddenly saw the light
about how incredibly rude, insensitive and racist they were for booking it in the first goddamn place,
but because probably it was too much of a pain in the ass
for them to deal with the bitching and moaning from those of us with souls and brains.
ok?
So those of you who supported it?
Are equally supporting racism.
Those of you who passively sat by and said "well this is not my fight"?
It is your fight.
Come get your people.
And come talk to them,
because if you really are an ally, you are in it to win it, and you are in it with us, alright?
For those of you who think that we are living in a post racial society, that race doesn't matter, etc, etc,
come and live in my body,
come and live in a world where I get followed around stores because of my skin colour.
Come and live in a world where I was sexually assaulted by a police officer in Los Angeles county in 1992
and had no recource because as a black woman in Los Angeles what the fuck was I going to do about it?
Come and live in a world where I am profiled and pulled over again and again and again
for being a sex worker, even though I am wearing a 3-piece suit and standing at a bus stop
in a metropolitan area,
because the only people in the neighbourhood are prostitutes,
and therefore, because I look like them, I must be one.
Come and live in a world where someone on the street calls me a nigger and other people turn away.
That is the fucking reality.
Come and live in a world where people feel free to joke about how funny it is
that black people are on welfare and have 42 children,
and my! what silly wacky names they give them!
and oh! we just mean it as a joke!
It is not a joke.
And I will go so far as to say that not only are the people who are supporting this supporting a racist act,
in their hearts, they are well aware that it's not ok,
and they just don't give a fuck.
So all the screenshots that people took of this discussion
with all the names of the people who were flagrantly racist?
I hope will live on somewhere in the unconscious,
I hope those words will come back to haunt them.
I hope that people are aware of what sick, and terrible terrible hearts they hold inside.
I don't know what else to say.
[sigh]
I wish I still felt safe.
I tend to live sometimes with my head in the sand
because otherwise I can't fucking deal with life.
I can't fucking deal with the reality of racism,
and sexism, and sizeism, and bigotry, and all of that.
so I smile and I create my bubble of people who treat me well, and with respect,
and I try to ignore this bullshit.
And now it's at the heart of one of the communities that I call home.
And sure, I've read that some people said "well it's not really an Eagle, they only have a leather night twice a week"
Then why the fuck does it have the name "Eagle"?
What the hell are you doing, leather folks, for letting that name remain on the bar?
If it's not a leather bar, petition to have them change the goddamn name.
Because to me, what Leather is about is about honesty and integrity and respect.
And no integrity and zero respect is demonstrated in this situation.
We need to do better.
We need to fucking do better.
There needs to be a world in which children, little girls, are not mocked by other people,
[voice breaking] and then told that they need to laugh at it,
it's not fucking funny.
You wonder why we don't live as long as white people [laughing]
It's probably because our blood pressure is spiking every other day because of shit like this.
You know why I'm laughing?
Not because its funny.
But because it hurts so badly
that I don't know what else to do.
[sigh]
This is the first day of Black History Month,
and if anyone has any doubt or question as to why we need to talk about this forever and ever and ever amen,
let that be answered now.
Those of you who wish to erase,
those of you who say "we can't move on from history until you let go and forget it",
I cannot let go and forget it when it echos every day.
Every day.
I slept for about 2 hours last night because of this shit.
I'm fuckin' tired.
Probably not making much sense.
But please, think about, think about racism, think about sexism, think about hatred and ignorance,
think about the fact that people you call friends very well may think that its hilarious to put on blackface.
because it's just a joke.
That joke actually causes physical pain to people who see it.
And it's not funny.
And it's racist.
And if you think it's funny,
you're being racist.
And if you think racism is cool,
I'll pray for you.