When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost

by Joan Morgan

  Marc Christian was right. Cojónes became a necessary part of my feminist armature—but not for the reasons I would have suspected back then. I used to fear the constant accusations—career opportunism, race treason, collusion with “The Man,” lesbianism—a lifetime of explaining what I am not. I dreaded the long, tedious conversations spent exorcising others of the stereotypes that tend to haunt the collective consciousness when we think of black women and the f-word—male basher, radical literary/academic black women in their forties and fifties who are pathetically separated from real life, burly dreadlocked/crew cut dykes, sexually adventurous lipstick-wearing bisexuals, victims. Even more frightening were the frequent solo conversations I spent exorcising them from my own head.

  In time, however, all of that would roll off my back like water.

  Cojónes became necessary once I discovered that mine was not a feminism that existed comfortably in the black and white of things. The precarious nature of my career’s origins was the first indication. I got my start as a writer because I captured the sexual attention of a man who could make me one. It was not the first time my externals would bestow me with such favors. It certainly would not be the last.

  My growing fatigue with talking about “the men” was the second. Just once, I didn’t want to have to talk about “the brothers,” “male domination,” or “the patriarchy.” I wanted a feminism that would allow me to explore who we are as women—not victims. One that claimed the powerful richness and delicious complexities inherent in being black girls now—sistas of the post–Civil Rights, post-feminist, post soul, hip-hop generation.

  I was also looking for permission to ask some decidedly un-P.C. but very real questions:

  Can you be a good feminist and admit out loud that there are things you kinda dig about patriarchy?

  Would I be forced to turn in my “feminist membership card” if I confessed that suddenly waking up in a world free of gender inequities or expectations just might bug me out a little?

  Suppose you don’t want to pay for your own dinner, hold the door open, fix things, move furniture, or get intimate with whatever’s under the hood of a car?

  Is it foul to say that imagining a world where you could paint your big brown lips in the most decadent of shades, pile your phat ass into your fave micromini, slip your freshly manicured toes into four-inch fuck-me sandals and have not one single solitary man objectify—I mean roam his eyes longingly over all the intended places—is, like, a total drag for you?

  Am I no longer down for the cause if I admit that while total gender equality is an interesting intellectual concept, it doesn’t do a damn thing for me erotically? That, truth be told, men with too many “feminist” sensibilities have never made my panties wet, at least not like that reformed thug nigga who can make even the most chauvinistic of “wassup, baby” feel like a sweet, wet tongue darting in and out of your ear.

  And how come no one ever admits that part of the reason women love hip-hop—as sexist as it is— is ’cuz all that in-yo-face testosterone makes our nipples hard?

  Are we no longer good feminists, not to mention nineties supersistas, if the A.M.’s wee hours sometimes leave us tearful and frightened that achieving all our mothers wanted us to—great educations, careers, financial and emotional independence— has made us wholly undesirable to the men who are supposed to be our counterparts? Men whose fascination with chickenheads leave us convinced they have no interest in dating, let alone marrying, their equals?

  And when one accuses you of being completely indecipherable there’s really nothing to say ’cuz even you’re not sure how you can be a feminist and insist he “respect you as a woman, treat you like a lady, and make you feel safe—like a li’l girl.”

  In short, I needed a feminism brave enough to fuck with the grays. And this was not my foremothers’ feminism.

  Ironically, reaping the benefits of our foremothers’ struggle is precisely what makes their brand of feminism so hard to embrace. The “victim” (read women) “oppressor” (read men) model that seems to dominate so much of contemporary discourse (both black and white), denies the very essence of who we are.

  We are the daughters of feminist privilege. The gains of the Feminist Movement (the efforts of black, white, Latin, Asian, and Native American women) had a tremendous impact on our lives—so much we often take it for granted. We walk through the world with a sense of entitlement that women of our mothers’ generation could not begin to fathom. Most of us can’t imagine our lives without access to birth control, legalized abortions, the right to vote, or many of the same educational and job opportunities available to men. Sexism may be a very real part of my life but so is the unwavering belief that there is no dream I can’t pursue and achieve simply because “I’m a woman.”

  Rejecting the wildly popular notion that embracing the f-word entails nothing more than articulating victimization, for me, is a matter of personal and spiritual survival. Surviving the combined impact of racism and sexism on the daily means never allowing my writing to suggest that black women aren’t more than a bunch of bad memories. We are more than the rapes survived by the slave masters, the illicit familial touches accompanied by whiskey-soured breath, or the acts of violence endured by the fists, knives, and guns of strangers. We are more than the black eyes and heart bruises from those we believed were friends.

  Black women can no more be defined by the cumulative sum of our pain than blackness can be defined solely by the transgenerational atrocities delivered at the hands of American racism. Because black folks are more than the stench of the slave ship, the bite of the dogs, or the smoldering of freshly lynched flesh. In both cases, defining ourselves solely by our oppression denies us the very magic of who we are. My feminism simply refuses to give sexism or racism that much power.

  Holding on to that protective mantle of victimization requires a hypocrisy and self-censorship I’m no longer willing to give. Calling rappers out for their sexism without mentioning the complicity of the 100 or so video-hos that turned up—G-string in hand—for the shoot; or defending women’s reproductive rights without examining the very complicated issue of male choice—specifically the inherent unfairness in denying men the right to choose whether or not they want to parent; or discussing the physical and emotional damage of sexism without examining the utterly foul and unloving ways black women treat each other ultimately means fronting like the shit brothers have with them is any less complex, difficult, or painful than the shit we have with ourselves. I am down, however, for a feminism that demands we assume responsibility for our lives.

  In my quest to find a functional feminism for myself and my sistas—one that seeks empowerment on spiritual, material, physical, and emotional levels—I draw heavily on the cultural movement that defines my generation. As post–Civil Rights, post-feminist, post-soul children of hip-hop we have a dire need for the truth.

  We have little faith in inherited illusions and idealism. We are the first generation to grow up with all the benefits of Civil Rights (i.e., Affirmative Action, government-subsidized educational and social programs) and the first to lose them. The first to have the devastation of AIDS, crack, and black-on-black violence makes it feel like a blessing to reach twenty-five. Love no longer presents itself wrapped in the romance of basement blue lights, lifetime commitments, or the sweet harmonies of The Stylistics and The Chi-Lites. Love for us is raw like sushi, served up on sex platters from R. Kelly and Jodeci. Even our existences can’t be defined in the past’s simple terms: house nigga vs. field nigga, ghetto vs. bourgie, BAP vs. boho because our lives are usually some complicated combination of all of the above.

  More than any other generation before us, we need a feminism committed to “keeping it real.” We need a voice like our music—one that samples and layers many voices, injects its sensibilities into the old and flips it into something new, provocative, and powerful. And one whose occasional hypocrisy, contradictions, and trifeness guarantee us at least a few trips to the
terror-dome, forcing us to finally confront what we’d all rather hide from.

  We need a feminism that possesses the same fundamental understanding held by any true student of hiphop. Truth can’t be found in the voice of any one rapper but in the juxtaposition of many. The keys that unlock the riches of contemporary black female identity lie not in choosing Latifah over Lil’ Kim, or even Foxy Brown over Salt-N-Pepa. They lie at the magical intersection where those contrary voices meet—the juncture where “truth” is no longer black and white but subtle, intriguing shades of gray.

  from fly-girls

  to bitches and hos

  Feminist criticism, like many other forms of social analysis, is widely considered part of a hostile white culture. For a black feminist to chastise misogyny in rap publicly would be viewed as divisive and counterproductive. There is a widespread perception in the black community that public criticism of black men constitutes collaborating with a racist society. . . .

  Michele Wallace, “When Black Feminism Faces the Music, and the Music Is Rap” The New York Times1

  Lord knows our love jones for hip-hop is understandable. Props given to rap music’s artistic merits, its irrefutable impact on pop culture, its ability to be alternately beautiful, poignant, powerful, strong, irreverent, visceral, and mesmerizing—homeboy’s clearly got it like that. But in between the beats, booty shaking, and hedonistic abandon, I have to wonder if there isn’t something inherently unfeminist in supporting a music that repeatedly reduces me to tits and ass and encourages pimping on the regular. While it’s human to occasionally fall deep into the love thang with people or situations that simply aren’t good for you, feminism alerted me long ago to the dangers of romancing a misogynist (and ridiculously fine, brilliant ones with gangsta leans are no exception). Perhaps the non-believers were right, maybe what I’d been mistaking for love and commitment for the last twenty years was really nothing but a self-destructive obsession that made a mockery of my feminism.

  I needed to know, once and for all, if it was in the best interests of me and my sistas to stay in what was—admittedly—a strange and often painful relationship. The time had come for a little heart-to-heart, so I started by writing my homeboy this letter:

  You know, Boo,

  It’s been six years since I’ve been writing about hip-hop on the womanist tip and I’m still getting asked the same questions. At work, the intelligentsia types want to know if “Given the undeniably high content of sexism and misogyny in rap music, isn’t a declared commitment to both, well, incongruous?” And my girls, they just come right out, “You still wit that nigga?”

  So I tell them how good you do that thing you do. Laugh and say I’m just a slave to your rhythms. Then I wax poetic about your artistic brilliance and the voice (albeit predominantly male) you give an embattled, pained nation. And then I assure them that I call you out on all of your sexism on the regular. That works until someone, usually a sista-friend, calls me out and says that while all of that was valid, none of it explains why I stayed in an obviously abusive relationship. And I can’t lie, Boo, that would stress me. ’Cuz my answers would start sounding like those battered women I write about.

  Sure, I’d say (all defensive). It’s easy to judge—to wonder what any woman in her right mind would be doing with that wack motherfucka if you’re entering now, before the sweet times. But the sweetness was there in the beginning of this on-again, off-again love affair. It started almost twenty years ago, around the time when Tony Boyd all mocked-neck and fine gave me my first tongue kiss in the back of I.S. 148 and the South Bronx gave birth to a culture.

  The old-school deejays and M.C.’s performed community service at those schoolyard jams. Intoxicating the crowd with beats and rhymes, they were like shamans sent to provide us with temporary relief from the ghetto’s blues. As for sistas, we donned our flare-leg Lees and medallions, became fly-girls, and gave up the love. Nobody even talked about sexism in hip-hop back in the day. All an M.C. wanted then was to be the baddest in battle, have a fly-girl, and take rides in his fresh O.J. If we were being objectified (and I guess we were) nobody cared. At the time, there seemed to be greater sins than being called “ladies” as in “All the ladies in the house, say, Oww!”

  Or “fly-girls” as in “what you gonna do?” Perhaps it was because we were being acknowledged as a complementary part of a whole.

  But girlfriend’s got a point, Boo. We haven’t been fly-girls for a very long time. And all the love in the world does not erase the stinging impact of the new invectives and brutal imagery—ugly imprints left on cheeks that have turned the other way too many times. The abuse is undeniable. Dre, Short, Snoop, Scarface, I give them all their due but the mid school’s increasing use of violence, straight-up selfish individualism, and woman-hating (half of them act like it wasn’t a woman who clothed and fed their black asses—and I don’t care if Mama was Crackhead Annie, then there was probably a grandmother who kept them alive) masks the essence of what I fell in love with even from my own eyes.

  Things were easier when your only enemies were white racism and middle-class black folk who didn’t want all that jungle music reminding them they had kinky roots. Now your anger is turned inward. And I’ve spent too much time in the crossfire, trying to explain why you find it necessary to hurt even those who look like you. Not to mention a habit called commercialism and multiple performance failures and I got to tell you, at times I’ve found myself scrounging for reasons to stay. Something more than twenty years being a long-ass time, and not quite knowing how to walk away from a nigga whose growth process has helped define your existence.

  So here I am, Boo, lovin’ you, myself, my sistas, my brothers with loyalties that are as fierce as they are divided. One thing I know for certain is that if you really are who I believe you to be, the voice of a nation, in pain and insane, then any thinking black woman’s relationship with you is going to be as complicated as her love for black men.

  Whether I like it or not, you play a critical part in defining my feminism. Only you can give me the answer to the question so many of us are afraid to ask, “How did we go from fly-girls to bitches and hos in our brothers’ eyes?”

  You are my key to the locker room. And while it’s true that your music holds some of fifteen- to thirty-year-old black men’s ugliest thoughts about me, it is the only place where I can challenge them. You are also the mirror in which we can see ourselves. And there’s nothing like spending time in the locker room to bring sistas face-to-face with the ways we straight-up play ourselves. Those are flesh-and-blood women who put their titties on the glass. Real-life ones who make their livings by waiting backstage and slingin’ price tags on the punanny. And if our feminism is ever going to mean anything, theirs are the lives you can help us to save. As for the abuse, the process is painful, yes, but wars are not won by soldiers who are afraid to go to the battleground.

  So, Boo, I’ve finally got an answer to everybody that wants to talk about the incongruity of our relationship. Hip-hop and my feminism are not at war but my community is. And you are critical to our survival.

  I’m yours, Boo. From cradle to the grave.

  I guess it all depends on how you define the f-word. My feminism places the welfare of black women and the black community on its list of priorities. It also maintains that black-on-black love is essential to the survival of both.

  We have come to a point in our history, however, when black-on-black love—a love that’s survived slavery, lynching, segregation, poverty, and racism—is in serious danger. The stats usher in this reality like taps before the death march: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of black two-parent households has decreased from 74 percent to 48 percent since 1960. The leading cause of death among black men ages fifteen to twenty-four is homicide. The majority of them will die at the hands of other black men.2

  Women are the unsung victims of black-on-black crime. A while back, a friend of mine, a single mother of a newborn (her “babyfather”—
a brother—abdicated responsibility before their child was born) was attacked by a pit bull while walking her dog in the park. The owner (a brother) trained the animal to prey on other dogs and the flesh of his fellow community members.

  A few weeks later my moms called, upset, to tell me about the murder of a family friend. She was a troubled young woman with a history of substance abuse, aggravated by her son’s murder two years ago. She was found beaten and burned beyond recognition. Her murderers were not “skinheads,” “The Man,” or “the racist white power structure.” More likely than not, they were brown men whose faces resembled her own.

  Clearly, we are having a very difficult time loving one another.

  Any feminism that fails to acknowledge that black folks in nineties America are living and trying to love in a war zone is useless to our struggle against sexism. Though it’s often portrayed as part of the problem, rap music is essential to that struggle because it takes us straight to the battlefield.

  My decision to expose myself to the sexism of Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, or the Notorious B.I.G. is really my plea to my brothers to tell me who they are. I need to know why they are so angry at me. Why is disrespecting me one of the few things that make them feel like men? What’s the haps, what are you going through on the daily that’s got you acting so foul?

  As a black woman and a feminist I listen to the music with a willingness to see past the machismo in order to be clear about what I’m really dealing with. What I hear frightens me. On booming track after booming track, I hear brothers talking about spending each day high as hell on malt liquor and Chronic. Don’t sleep. What passes for “40 and a blunt” good times in most of hip-hop is really alcoholism, substance abuse, and chemical dependency. When brothers can talk so cavalierly about killing each other and then reveal that they have no expectation to see their twenty-first birthday, that is straight-up depression masquerading as machismo.