It's open season on black women, but this glut of negative press smacks of ignorance and inequality
Hannah Pool
Sometimes it is indeed hard to be a woman. Right now, however, it is doubly hard to be a black woman, especially one who reads newspapers or, heaven forbid, happens to be remotely newsworthy.
In the past week, I've had to watch the Jack and Condi show (most of it from behind my hands), take in the news that Naomi Campbell is facing seven years in prison for allegedly assaulting her maid, learned that former Big Brother contestant Makosi Musambasi had sex with a stranger for money, and read several angry attacks on Yolande Beckles, the educational consultant whose methods are the subject of the BBC programme, Don't Mess With Miss Beckles.
Article continues
Individually, these stories aren't so remarkable, but the glut makes it feel that this spring is open season on black women. It's not so much the behaviour of these women, but the tone with which their stories are reported. While no one goes so far as to actually say it - they don't need to - Campbell, Beckles and Musambasi are all presented as black women who have got ideas above their station and need taking down a peg or two.
Even Condoleezza Rice, arguably the world's most dangerous woman, doesn't escape being patronised and reduced to some sort of sex object. I'm as embarrassed as the next person by Jack Straw's labrador act, but what's really behind all this talk of their oh-so-very-special relationship? The implication is this: he's a white man, she's a black woman, how could he possibly not fall under her spell? It's about the sexualisation of black women as "exotic" that's as old as colonialism itself. Although, by the way, while everyone else was busy wondering what the sleeping arrangements on the plane were (she is reported to have given up her bed for him and slept on the aisle floor) I was worrying about whether or not he'd caught a glimpse of her with a pair of old tights on her head (the best way to prevent chemically-straightened Afro hair from getting frizzy).
From the powerful to the powerless: "TV star paid me £3,000 for kinky orgy with girl" screamed that bastion of family values and respectability, the Sunday People, the week before last. According to the People's exclusive interview, Musambasi, a Zimbabwean ex-nurse who came third in last summer's Big Brother, is now living in "a shabbily furnished one-bed council flat" and in debt to the tune of £55,000. (Incidentally, the story was written by one Alice Walker, which just made it seem even more troubling, to me at least.)
Musambasi's story makes for grim and distressing reading. She talks of being paid £1,500 twice to have sex ("violent and rough") with a well-known TV presenter, and of feeling suicidal since. She told the paper: "All that kept coming into my mind was, 'How have I got here? How has it come to this?'"
Since the story broke, commentators have queued up to tell Musambasi it's all her own fault. My favourite was Mirror columnist Sue Carroll, who - if you want a measure of her sensitivity - once referred to Naomi Campbell as a "chocolate soldier". Carroll's response to Musambasi blaming Big Brother for ruining her life was: "No, Makosi, you did that yourself." I sure hope none of her friends ever fall on hard times if that's her idea of advice to the suicidal.
OK, Musambasi had sex on camera in the Big Brother house. But was she in that Jacuzzi alone?
By Wednesday, it was the turn of a different black woman to be put through the ringer. Things started relatively well for educational entrepreneur Yolande Beckles. The previews of her TV show were fairly good, with the Mail, the Sunday Times and the Independent all deigning Beckles good enough to be their pick of the day - a broad church indeed.
After the first programme had appeared, however, the gloves came off. Tales of exploited children and angry parents were rife, although, if you bother to read the story carefully, you'll find that only one of the participating parents complained (Carolyn Tristram, mother of Luke), something she apparently didn't bother to do when she viewed the show along with the rest of the participants before it aired. Educational psychologists, life coaches, random north London parents and teachers unconnected with the school weighed in.
Whatever you may think of Beckles' motivational style or, for that matter, her dedication to the colour purple (very in this season, since you ask ... but right now, it's more of a lilac you should be wearing, Yo) - surely I can't be the only one who found the manner in which the army of white, middle-class liberals came forward to criticise her a little uncomfortable?
A great week was rounded off with reports that Naomi Campbell had been arrested and charged for allegedly assaulting her maid with a mobile phone. Campbell claims that her former maid, Ana Scolavino, stole various items from the model, including a pair of jeans that Campbell wanted to wear on the Oprah Winfrey Show (of all places). Now, the only thing more notorious than Campbell's "notorious" temper, is everyone's obsession with said temper. And while I'm not condoning bullying, it's worth noting that while the press and the public seem to have an insatiable appetite for forgiveness when it comes to Kate Moss, Campbell gets a very different treatment. I wonder why that could be?
The trouble isn't really what these women have done. It's that their actions are invariably reported by people who have no idea what it's like to be a black women in today's society - there are a few of us around if they bothered to ask and find out.
I am not suggesting that black women be given an easier time of it than their white counterparts, but equal treatment would be nice. Of course you are allowed to criticise us, but just take a moment to question where your critique is coming from and then I'm sure we'll get along fine.
This week Hannah watched Sarah Beeny's Streets Ahead. "It was filmed near my house, so I'm tempted to knock on a couple of doors to see if anyone will sell me a couple of strands of Beeny's hair." Hannah listened to The Dusty Foot Philospher by K'naan. "He's a new Canadian/Somalian hip-hop artist a friend put me on to, and I'll be ever thankful to her."
guardian
LOL at this smilie!! perfect.
