Intersectionality and Kobe Bryant
“Intersectional awareness is, literally, being aware of the way that issues intersect across marginalized identities. It's noticing that issues both impact and are impacted by different locations on this web - and it's a web, not a ladder - of marginalization, this system of oppression called kyriarchy.”
Let's chat.
We need to talk about "intersectional analysis" and how it plays out in our social media discussions.
Intersectional awareness is, literally, being aware of the way that issues intersect across marginalized identities. It's noticing that issues both impact and are impacted by different locations on this web - and it's a web, not a ladder - of marginalization, this system of oppression called kyriarchy. Intersectional awareness analyzes an issue - a concept, a theme - from one particular position on the web, noticing how all of the other threads on the web are impacted by that same issue. Intersectional analysis recognizes that privilege is interwoven through the web, that we all have places and positions where we are privileged, and it seeks to mitigate for that privilege by centering the identities - locations on the web - that are impacted most by any given issue. Intersectional awareness is not about parsing out which places a person sits at on the web as much as it's about noticing that oppression is systematic and every instance of marginalization reverberates throughout the system. It's the *why* of the quote y'all love to throw around: injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. An intersectional analysis sees *how* that's true.
An intersectional analysis holds in tension the privilege of the speaker, the thinker, the one analyzing and the impact of marginalization that they will never feel.
An intersectional analysis, for example, notices how accessibility is also an issue of class and is complicated by gender identity. Another example: an intersectional analysis of power in the Black church looks at how race, gender, sexuality, and class are levied in, through, and against religious spaces.
It's not easy work. It requires consciously centering the other. And accountability.
And, so, Kobe.
I ain't never been a Kobe Bryant fan. Won't never be.
But if we're going to tell the truth about who he was, we need to tell the whole truth.
He raped her.
Dassit. End of discussion. He raped her.
And like 99% of rapists, he was never convicted. He paid his victim restitution. Literally.
Restitution doesn't make her whole. It doesn't unrape her. But restitution is also justice.
And then? Then he grew up.
He advocated for women athletes. (And y'all know that advocating for professional women athletes is also advocating for Queer Black Women and that's where *my* priority is. Be clear where *I* stand.)
He built institutions to serve marginalized children.
He meant hope and promise to Black people. He meant hope and promise to poor people. He meant hope and. promise to people of color.
Worldwide.
If your position on the web doesn't allow you to see Kobe Bryant's impact on the rest of the web: your analysis is flawed.
I have seen lots of middle class women analyzing Kobe's impact on - mostly white - women. It's a gross oversimplification of Kobe's life. It's a flawed analysis of rape culture. It's a demonstrated lack of intersectional awareness. It's what white feminism does: ignore everyone but themselves for the sake of their own pain.
No one can afford that.
I cried.
My kids hugged me and gave me space.
No one is asking you to cry. I am asking, though, that as you move through these eStreetz, trumpeting your wokeness, gloating in being wokier than thou (tm, Heidi Lewis) that you use an appropriate analysis of who and what Kobe Bryant was to, in, and for people throughout this web of oppression.
Because "he was a rich rapist" is lazy and intellectually dishonest.
ETA: If you're centering white women in *any* discussion of Black men that includes sexual assault, Imma just block you on general principle. You can't freely lack both intersectional AND historical awareness. Not and run free in my space.
