A long time ago I read somewhere that you should romanticize your life. As if you were living in a teen movie where you’re the main character, music plays in the background, following your interior monologue narrating the events as they occur. I love rom coms, coming of age movies, all that teen mushy crap that we soak up, so of course I took this advice.
I made a movie out of everything I did, playing a sad melody in my head when something bad happened or playing a joyful chorus when something good happened. Just think of any hannah montana soundtrack, lol. I recently started taking walks with my mom in a predominantly white neighborhood. There are so few black people omg it was a culture shock. So today I was sitting in the car waiting for my mom to finish up another lap around the park, I can barely do 2, and I saw this group of white girls. There was the Victoria Justice type, hispanic, but barely, the emo one, the fat one, and the Emma Chamberlain type. All in a circle sitting and laughing, with their perfect picnic. My first thought was, aww how cute friends hanging out in the summer. There they were living out their movie fantasy enjoying a scene from any teen movie. It came to me that in the movie I saw myself living I would never be the main character, hell I might not even have a role. Representation.
I watched outer banks the other day. It was a great show, better than I thought it would be. However, the major flaw was that there wasn’t anyone who looked like me. That show was whiteee! Capital WHITE. It prevented me from submerging into the show. I liked it but I felt guilty watching it, guilty because I found myself trying to see myself in Kiara and Sarah’s characters. It would be so easy for any average white girl to see themselves in Sarah’s character...I mean she was your everyday white female protagonist—the bitch who’s in reality not such a bitch. I’ve seen the character so many times.
White people can see themselves on the tv and have hopes, they can romanticize their own lives because the examples of it are right there on the tv. While they have this privilege black girls like me, especially darkskin (god knows netflix hires any ambiguous woman to play the black friend), can’t see themselves in every day media. Still till this day! I’m no longer asking to see one token black girl, devouring the scraps these shows give us. I want more black stories, of everyday life. I’m tired of watching black shows where there is so much trauma and just basic stereotypes. My life isn’t trauma-filled, especially not on a day to day basis. Black girls ( black people in general) deserve to see themselves represented when they turn on the tv, they deserve to be able to like a character not because they’re black, but simply because the character is deserving of acclaim.
Where’s my Betty Cooper? My Blair Waldorf? My Callie Foster? Fuck, my Hannah Baker? I wanna see a black girl in anime (I know...the scandal! *gasps*) We haven't seen a darkskin main girl since Moesha.
We've seen instances where this was done correctly-- Pose, Black Lightning, How to Get Away with Murder, Insecure, Orange is the New Black (it does it well actually, in a show that could've relied on black sterotypes it diverged from them so claps for that) and Greenleaf. All these shows give examples of black people just existing or having engaging drama where the threat is't just the police. It can be done, and well at that. However those shows don't target teenagers really, and that's what I'm really critiquing. Young black teenagers girls who are at the peak of their development stages don't see themselves on tv. Their favorite shows are filled with white people, white latinos or mixed/ambigious lightskin girls.
You may say, oh there's BET or shows on Urban network...(ummm ok.) I'm sorry but black people need to be intergrated into popular teenage dramas. All American does this well though, I have to give credit to them. However, we still need more. Even worse is that most of the black targeted shows that do exists have mainly white writers rooms. This is way the lack of representation is still happening, they can't even diversify their writers rooms. To reiterate, representation does not mean an all black cast (that is phenomenal) but rather different groups of people seeing people who look like them in mainstream media--you know the one that's pretty white-washed? I take representation to be synomynous with equal; I feel people take represention to mean segregation and that's not what I want. I just want to see black women who look like me in my favorite teen dramas that I love.
If we want to start steps in correcting white privilege we can start with the media. Everyone seems to want to amplify black voices and tell their stories? Well, stop painting the picture that every aspect of the everyday black experience is trauma-filled or filled with run ins with the police. My life is complex, good days and bad, normal sometimes, and besides obvious aspects easily similar to the white narratives that are written and welcomed by the media. I shouldn’t have to force myself into a box to fit in the shoes of a white female character. During this urgency for change to large-scale systems , white people in charge need to realize the enormous impact true representation would have. Hopefully, this problem will not persist by the time I'm in my twenties but if it does I will do everything I can to make sure the little brown girl watching tv sees just as many black characters that look liker her, as the little white girl across the street does.
Me and black girls who look like me will be the main characters in our own movies. Its about seeing black girls getting the same roles that ordinarily would be given to a white girl and tweaked accordingly.
We have stories and experiences that need to be told, they love our culture but hate to see us in it. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.
In the meantime, there has obviously been more black representaion over the last ten years and a sprinkle beyond that so here are some great watches:
SHOWS:
All American (Netflix)*
The Last O.G (Netflix)*
Black Lightning (Netflix)*
Blood and Water (Netflix)*
She's Gotta Have It (Netflix)*
Dear White People (Netflix)
Good Girls (Netflix)*
Family Reunion (Netflix)
Insecure (HBO)*
Being Mary Jane (Netflix)*
Good Trouble*
Craig of the Creek (Cartoon Network)**
A Different World (Free with Amazon Prime)
MOVIES:
Selah and the Spades (Free with Amazon Prime)*
American Honey (Netflix)*
Moonlight (Netflix)*
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Netflix)*
Home (the animated film with Rihanna)
See You Yesterday (Netflix)*
Roxanne Roxanne (Netflix)*
Dreamgirls <3 I love this movie*
Beyond the Lights*
The Bodyguard*
**= A show/movie I feel showcases the kind of representation I want to continue to see, specifically complex black characters just existing and their race is not the focus of the film. Basically all of them on the list, lol.I think if you watch this, you'll get an example of what I define representation as, addressing how being black affects them because it does, but not making that the focal point of the film.
If you made it this far thank you for reading! This was my response to everything that is going on in the world right now with the black lives matter movement. I didn't want to reiterate information you probably already know, and I instead wanted to provide an action step because I've been feeling pretty useless. I literally thought of this while staring at some white teenage girls LMAO, because I felt like I was watching a tv show--isn't that crazy. Anyways, I hope we get the accurate representation we deserve because I know that if I was younger and saw a black girl who I could really relate to--despite the basic similarity of her being black, then I could have had a lot more confidence. I can't wait to see what we come up with. Thank you again for spending 5 minutes reading this, you deserve a snack! Message me with any comments, ily.
P.S never ever in your life watch #BlackAF, that is everything we want to avoid!! The complete opposite of representation, jeez.
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