Everyone should know about Guiliana Rancic's comment on Zendaya's faux-locs (fake dreadlocks in case you don't know). Most of the people who were angry did not watch the full episode. They did not see how the whole cast had their moments of being cruel to a whole lot of people, many of whom weren't Black. They did not see how Kathy Griffin knew they might have gone too far with some comments, so she gave a disclaimer at the end of the episode. Zendaya didn't even watch the episode. She was just informed. This is what they do on Fashion Police. Guiliana has definitely had her moments and this was disrespectful, but it was not racist. It was just a joke that went too far.
However, what do we want them to do? We already complain about not being recognized enough during the Academy Awards, Grammy's, American Music Awards, MTV Awards, etc. Do we want to be left out of Fashion Police? What will happen if we get ignored on shows like this is they won't recognize our pretty moments either. After every awards show all of the co-stars of Fashion Police have been praising Lupita Nyong'o for her beautiful styles and flawless skin. Do we want them to become so fearful of being attacked by us for a bad opinion that they stop mentioning when we're absolutely beautiful?
We have to start using the words racists and racism in the correct context.
Sunday immediately after the Academy Awards, some women started to get angry over comments Patricia Arquette made during and after her acceptance speech. During the speech said she some stuff about women needing equal pay and equal treatment in the workplace. She mentioned how as women get older, the jobs are harder to come by. Her speech seemed full of meaning if you leave out the part of how wealthy she and other women celebrities that cheered her on are. Supposedly right afterwards, she was so hyped up that she made some comments saying people of color, Gay people, and men should now start supporting women. That is problematic.
However, the initial Black women I saw on twitter could not contain their anger to the celebrity. One of them got into a conversation with a non-Black woman that could not understand what was wrong with Miss Patty's comments. They then began to tweet her several more times trying to get her to think like them. Then another woman jumped in and tried to convince this non-Black woman why those comments were problematic. Afterwards they were all so mad because this woman would not agree with them and had her own come-backs to their attacks.
Who knows why that one woman would not agree with the others? Maybe she didn't care about the comments off stage and only wanted to hold onto what she heard the celebrity say on stage. That is her right as a person.
Everyone will not think like us. We also can't disrespect them because they won't think exactly like us.
Someone got mad at me on Facebook because I said Guiliana's comment was ignorant and not racist. I also mentioned that Miss Lawrence (an man on a show called Fashion Queens) absolutely hates natural hair and says it every time he's judging someone with a natural hairstyle on the show. This woman's reply went something like, "We're focusing on one racist white woman today, not what anyone else has done." Does this mean that we are becoming so close-minded that we all have to think, feel, and act alike? Can we not have differences in opinion anymore? Can we not teach each other anything new by widening our discussions?
