Image
First this.
There are countless photos of Stacey Abrams and her glorious smile.
Axios must have had to search to find an image to fit the “angry black woman” trope. pic.twitter.com/NvH5HrVOlV
— Leah McElrath (@leahmcelrath) January 29, 2019
Textbook: https://t.co/FSi0PmF4pZ
— Rebecca Traister (@rtraister) January 29, 2019
And then an update.
https://twitter.com/leahmcelrath/status/1090353193731661828
I’m not sure what I think about it. There is more than one trope, and another trope is “women must not ever look angry or determined or authoritative or anything other than sweet.” To be honest in the first picture she doesn’t really look angry, to me, so much as…well, serious. Serious while talking. Do we want to flinch away from that?
I don’t think I do.
I think I agree. I understand the urge to present black women not in a stereotyped manner, but in the end, that’s what they did anyway. They presented her in the preferred woman mode rather than in the strong woman mode.
Is it any wonder we can’t have nice things?
I think she looks angry, but so what? This is about her responding to Trump, so anger is appropriate.