black women: too loud to ride the train, too black to sip wine

loud. mean. angry. all words embodied by the fire-spitting, gun-totting sapphire stereotype often used to describe black women. captured in blaxploitation films, tyler perry movies and ratchet reality tv, images of angry black women (abw) are abundant.

we were sitting in our high school math class the first time my friends and i were derided for our abw tendencies. we were the only black students enrolled in a mostly white accelerated academic program and frequently navigated prejudice and low expectations. while engaging in our usual banter of shade throwing and quick witted humor, our white-substitute teacher asked: “why do all you black girls act like this? you know…every school i go to y’all are all the same. mean and loud.”

we were confused and upset. not only was his statement a generalization about black students’ behavior, but it was also an ignorant critique of our actions. no one was angry. we were communicating in a way that he didn’t understand, and he used a prevalent stereotype to condemn.

racist and sexist tropes narrate much of black women’s lives. when coupled with other forms of discrimination, few positive images are allowed to exist that challenge the negative narratives. it’s no surprise then that my substitute teacher labeled all black girls as mean and loud or that black girls are suspended at high rates nationally for being loud and “un-lady like.”

the sapphire stereotype should be front and center of a national conversation about 12 black women who were kicked off a napa valley wine train last weekend for laughing loudly.

if the accusation of laughing too loudly isn’t absurd enough, the group is actually a bookclub (i can’t think of a quieter hobby) whose members include an 83-year old woman. this humiliating experience was prompted by what some say was a white customer’s complaint that they were treating the train like a bar. shortly afterwards, the group was met by police who shuttled them back to their cars.

not only did one person’s privilege trump the positive interactions between 12 paying customers, but the company thought a bookclub was intimidating enough to require a police escort.  it’s hard to imagine a group of white customers being treated this way, especially when white women are not stereotyped as loud, un-lady like or aggressive.

it’s undeniable that racism and sexism conflated to categorize the bookclub’s harmless recreation as problematic, even unlawful.  invisible borders outline the truly safe spaces where black women can be ourselves — the napa valley wine train was not one of them. we’re too loud to ride the train and too black to sip wine.

black girls are suspended for being “loud”

“why do all you black girls act like this?”  my friends and i stared at our substitute teacher with looks of confusion on our faces. “you know…every school i go to y’all are all the same.  mean and loud.”

this was my experience as a high school student in a majority white accelerated academic program.  my friends and i were throwing shade and making jokes at each other’s expense, all from a place of love of course.  this was the way we related to one another, anything else would have been deemed inauthentic; however, for our white teacher, our behavior was problematic and  pathological.

black women being labeled as loud and angry is embodied in moments like the one i experienced as a teenager.  for some, this may have been harmless, but for us it was a person with power and privilege misunderstanding and condemning our behavior — he quickly used a negative stereotype to explain actions that he didn’t understand.  i had forgotten about this experience until reading “pushed out of school, black girls lose huge ground,” an article published yesterday by WeNews.

the article cites research by monique morris that “black girls are getting into trouble at school just for being who they have to be.”  monique’s research discovered that the majority of black girls who have been suspended were kicked out of school for being “loud” and engaging in behaviors that are prompted by a need to defend themselves or that have cultural roots.  WeNews also cites a 2007 study by edward morris that black girls were most likely to be punished by schools for being more “unlady-like” than white girls and were seen by teachers as “loud, defiant and precocious.”

while much attention has been given to black males and the barriers to their safety, achievement and well-being, we must not forget that black women are also suffering at the hands of racist and sexist systems.  we too need interventions that speak to our poor educational outcomes and address the insidious practices that work to condemn our identities.