Gaining the Whole World and Losing Our Souls

I cannot let this day pass without opening up about a truth that I've been too afraid to share.  The black brand has been divided, skewed, and re-sold at a profit to everyone else but blacks.  And it happened on our watch.

Branding is the act if imprinting or engraving a brand name or symbol onto a product.  It is also the act of making a permanent mark by heat upon an object to show ownership or belonging.

In the midst of the assault on black lives, the Internet universe has been set aflame with talk about forcing America to deal with the surviving vestiges of institutional racism which disproportionately impact black America.  I am tired of having to always react to injustice when there was something we should have done to get in front of it.  Sometimes we're just too busy.  Other times, we're too scared to stand alone.

I had the extreme displeasure of witnessing the latest nadir in reality television by way of a show named, "Sorority Sisters."  I recall there being some early buzz about it, but I also thought that the show had been canned due to overwhelming objection from black Greek letter organizations (hereinafter BLGO).  I was wrong.  

We were introduced to post-graduate women who all claimed to be members of historically black sororities.   Despite the disclaimer disassociating the show from any national organization or its intellectual property, I was unsettled at how immediately they besieged viewers with calls and hand symbols denoting each cast member's affiliation.  Overwhelmingly, the majority of the cast members were members of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated, an organization to which I belong as a dues paying member.  There was at least one member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated, one member of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Incorporated, and one member of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Incorporated to "balance out" the cast.

It was very clear from the outset, that this show wasn't designed to show the world the beauty of sorority life or the lifetime commitment we have to community service past our college years.  Instead, the producers of the show treated us to a boughetto ratchettatouille. (Yes, you can laugh.)  The first character we met was a burlesque dancer named...I'll just say Persimmon because I don't feel like using her real name.  Her introduction was spliced with footage of her practicing stripping, er I mean, burlesque dancing.  When she threw up a hand symbol and did a call, I all but fell off the bed.  We meet the other cast members in similar fashion, but one thing is consistent:  a need for attention  None of what I saw bears any similarity to any of the sister Greeks or sorors I know.  

At one point in the show, one of the Deltas (I'll call her Pandora) goes to a boutique of an AKA (I'll call her Dolly) and throws so much shade she might as well have been a cloud.  Poor form.  Later on in the episode, Dolly shows up at Pandora's shop and tries to throw some shade before upping the ante and (gasp) knocking over a display.   In another segment, Persimmon the Delta questions Pandora about whether or not she's really a Delta.  Persimmon then goes on camera and calls Pandora a bitch as she relays her feelings about their first meeting.  My head snapped so quickly last night, I had to wear a neck brace to work this morning in a neck brace.  

Then to add gasoline to the explosion, the producers introduce us to the white Delta, presumably to set the stage for conflict and "out the side of the neck" comments from the rest of the cast members.  The dancer/ stylist Zeta's face was priceless when the woman indicated that she was a Delta. (It's 2014.  Our members are multi-racial and multi-ethnic.)

I don't know what hurt me more, the off-handed way that many of the Deltas spoke about our beloved sisterhood or the fact that this show is indistinguishable from Love and Hip Hop: Pick a City.  Without ever having to watch another episode of this trash, I already know what is coming.  Thrown drinks.  Fighting.  Insults.  Fighting.  Crying.  Thrown drinks.  And the season finale after show where wigs will be ripped off and women will be on the floor.  

Therein lies the problem.  The American demand for slap a b-/ choke a b-/ talk about a b- television is at an all time high.  Keep it real.  Can you count the number of women on Instagram who were someone's unknown ex-girlfriend until they got into a fight while a camera was pointed at them?

 Evelyn.  Kimbella.  Erica.  Chrissy.  Tammi.  Shaunie.  Suzy.

I'm sure the list gets longer.  A lot of people watch these shows because they are "entertainment", never mind the fact that they put women, particularly women of color, in a bad light.  Of course my opinion is countered with assertions like, "They paid though!" and "Don't be mad because they on they hustle making money." [Vernacular and poor grammar were intentional.]

Is it any surprise that now the ratchet chickens have come home to roost?  In making reality television shows a cash cow for networks, black reality stars and their antics have also contributed to the decline of the black brand.  It's cheaper to put an athlete's Brazilian-haired ex-wife on television to fight with another woman than produce a scripted television show.  People watch Evelyn take off her $2,000 shoes to pounce over a marble counter and beat the snot out of another woman. (She's destructive that one.)  Or maybe Tammi Roman decides to pop off in Italy by getting into a fight that leaves her weave cockeyed and her breasts hanging out of her blouse.  Long gone are the days of classy entertainment.  Reality television shows are one or two miles away from ancient Romes' coliseum.  We need only add some lions and condemned Christians to the mix.  In ancient Rome, the blood was real, but spectators didn't care whose blood lay in the sand so long as they were entertained.

The blood being spilled in the reality television coliseum is killing our community and  therefore shaping perception of our community.  People have realized advertisers are getting rich and what it means to be a black woman is being devalued and disrespected.

Black women aren't really getting the chance to show how diverse, classy, edgy, educated, nerdy, and grounded we really are, but that's because there are women willing to accept pennies on the dollar to sell someone else's perception of our reality. We have more sides than the Hope Diamond, but the networks will pay for the narrative that will draw the most viewers and garner advertiser dollars. For real.  Reality television allows you to go from obscurity to celebrity by just selling your soul.  Fair exchange is no robbery when you're likely to be ignored.  You can gain the whole world at the mere price of your soul.

While it may not bother you (because you don't watch it), its impact is dangerous.  These shows show one side of what is a multi-faceted community of women.   Think about it this way.   If the only Asian food you ever eat is Chinese, you will assume that all Asian food is like Chinese food.  If the only black women you see are the ones you see on reality television, you will assume they are all that way.  It's obvious that this can affect how we're viewed by non-blacks, but it also has an effect on how our children see one another.

But is it worth it?  How many little girls will grow up thinking that being a bully or a loudmouth is acceptable behavior?  How many young girls will engage in pack mentality behavior because a peer refuses to follow the worn path?  How many workplaces have been polluted by behavior copycatted from the Real Housewives (no housewives though) of "Pick a Place"?  How many women have to spend their work days destroying stereotypes and the ignorance perpetuated by these shows?  We're the only ones selling ourselves for the almighty dollar, and I am not entertained.  I'd rather see a scripted show about a group of coily haired women lawyers who spend their late nights discussing Guillermo del Toro's The Strain  over bottles of Moscato.  Perhaps viewers would be enthralled by a reality show about a policewoman trying to do right by the rough neighborhood from which she arose.

Because of those who came before me, I can. But those who have forgotten our interconnection for the sake of making money will be the death of all that we can be, and an already hard job of being a black woman will get harder as if that's even possible.  It's time to end the entertainment of "ratchet reality television", all of it. 

We need to take back the brand.  We are queens not clowns.  We are sophisticated not savage.  We are whole, natural, and fulfilled not empty, artificial, and lacking.  Do not stand idly by while the roar of the crowds renders you mute for the sake of entertainment.