Worth a Click
bella | Apr 20, 2007 | Comments 61
Heavy sigh. Here we go again…
Oh Akon.
I was so happy and proud when you incorporated Trinidadian rhythms into your video for “Don’t Matter.” So you can imagine how disappointed and disgusted I was to see this article in the Trinidad Express. And then the video of you practically mauling a fourteen year old girl before a cheering crowd at a Trinidadian nightclub made the rounds of the blogosphere. And then the comments began. Let me backtrack for a second here.
I was already mulling over a post about blog comments, partly fueled by the casual racism I’ve noticed on celebrity blogs. The truly offensive Jennifer Hudson chicken post on That Other Blog has now been edited to remove the tastelessly captioned photo, but it is forever comemmorated here at one of my fave new blogs, The World Around Us. Said site also made the unnecessary and stereotypical joke about e mail fraud when posting about Nigeria’s Next Top Model. But I was pleasantly surprised that the commenters to the site were rightfully outraged by their use of negative stereotypes.
Not so much the readers of Perez Hilton, who left me open-mouthed at the racist statements made on his post about the same show. Seriously, scroll down and read the comments if you want to be depressed about the state of racism in America today.
So then this Akon thing happens, and I can’t look away from the comments pages. And I find the same ignorant beliefs being spouted again and again. “This is a part of Caribbean culture, get over it.” “That’s how they dance in Trini.” “Those Caribbean girls get down like that.” And all of the old school disses delivered to dark skinned people that you might expect. Allusions to African jungle beasts and all sorts of phrases and images you’d be more likely to expect in ancient documents from an English plantation owner, than you would from the people you sit across from in your office cubicles today.
As a Trinidadian blogger, I feel obligated to respond.
Yes, suggestive dancing (better known as wining) is a part of Trinidadian culture. Yes, at Caribbean fetes and at Carnival, you will find legions of men and women grinding sexily on each other. Yes, scandalous dancing is celebrated throughout the Caribbean, all you need to do is do a You Tube search for “dutty wine” or “dancehall queen” to find an array of NSFW videos of women getting down on all fours to degrade themselves. But Akon took it to a whole ‘nother level.
First of all, that girl is 14. In all my years as a proud Trini, I have never seen anything like that, and I say with confidence — that kind of behavior is NOT representative of my culture. Regardless of age, Akon’s treatment of that girl was shocking and reprehensible. Perhaps I shouldn’t have expected much from the guy who sang these songs.
I have dismissed the brief thought I’d entertained of going to see Gwen Stefani in Miami, seeing as Akon will be one of her opening acts. But I have a strong feeling that Akon keeps the blatant, unrepentant misogyny and adults-only antics to international performances and urban nightclub acts. He wouldn’t dare bring shame to Ms. Stefani’s Sweet Escape Tour, would he?
The women who participated in Akon’s dance contest are culpable in the sense that they sought his attention. They clamored to get on stage, to prove their sexual prowess by dancing for a screaming crowd. If you’re the kind of lady who takes it off for beads at Mardi Gras, is an expert booty clapper, or thinks nothing of dropping it like it’s hot, then you might understand where they were coming from. I personally do not. But to say “she looked for that” as some of the commenters have said, is completely wrong. And now her preacher father has come forth to defend his 14 year old daughter’s sullied honor.
Akon’s behavior was shocking, abhorrent, and completely unacceptable. No wonder his record label is desperately trying to remove this video from You Tube, and limit the downward media spiral of their blossoming star. Not that I ever bought his CDs before, but having seen this video, I can no longer support anything that Akon does. He’s been officially banished from my playlist, along with R. Kelly. If you want to learn more and read other intelligent (and differing) perspectives from Caribbean bloggers, please visit Karel McIntosh’s Caribbean PR blog, What Crazy Looks Like, The Mad Bull’s Blog, The Manicou Report, Attilah’s Four Fingers and a Thumb, and Elspeth Duncan’s Now is Wow.
Go Shorty, It’s Your Earth Day!
This weekend, there’s bound to be an Earth Day event near you. I’m gonna try to make it out to Earth Fest 2007, here in Key Biscayne. But if you can’t make it, then you can support Earth Day and environmentally friendly initaitives by — you guessed it — buying beauty products!
CARGO PlantLove lipstick has hit store shelves just in time for the green celebration. The lipstick case is made from a polymer derived from corn, and it’s biodegradable. $2 from your $20 purchase goes to St. Jude’s, and best of all, if you plant the outer casing into the ground, it grows wild flowers! LOVE that. Click here to check out the variety of shades, some of which were designed by celebs. Of the celeb-designed shades, Mariska Hargitay’s my favorite. I’ll do a big post about environmentally friendly makeup next week. For now, if you want a big tease for next week’s product reviews and interviews… click here. All of your questions will be answered!
Disco was Made for Afrobellas
So Lauren, one of my bestest BFFs is in town for a gigantic birthday weekend! She’ll be crashing at Casa Afrobella this weekend, but last night we did it up on South Beach with dinner at Cafeteria and a jaunt down a typically overcrowded Ocean Drive (Ugh, I hate driving on Ocean Drive). And I noticed an undeniable theme — disco is BACK. Did it ever go away?
But seriously, at the restaurant it was non-stop disco, and all along Ocean Drive it was like a disco classics CD was on. Wet Willie’s. The Clevelander. All of the usual sidewalk cafe suspects were blaring bubblicious beats and female singers, not Latin music or hip hop as I usually expect. But then, this was late on a Thursday night. I’m sure the weekend will find us back at Crime Mob and Trick Daddy.
But all that disco fabulousness got me thinking about that era, when it was all about the afrobellas in spangly clothes, under strobe lights. I’ll be writing a lot more about forgotten afrobellas from the Seventies in weeks to come, but for now, I’m ending the week on an up note with one of my favorite disco jams.
We gonna boogie oogie oogie till we just can’t boogie no more!
What’s your favorite disco song, and who’s your favorite disco era afrobella? Happy weekend to you all!
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If this young girl was 21 or 31, I would have been equally outraged.The fact that she is only 14, makes it worse. NO WOMAN SHOULD BE SUBJECTED TO THAT TYPE OF ABUSE. That was not simply dancing or wining. We all do thatand enjoy it. What was done to this impressionable child, in my humble view , was tantamount to physical (and yes) sexual abuse. The only thing missing was actual penetration on stage.The young man was physically abusive to a child and all women should be anoyed.
Now to the other part of the equation. Young girls unfortunately look up to these talented thugs as if they are gods and leave themselves open to the type of behaviour we saw. They all need help and they must learn to respect themselves first. Episodes like these never leave you and she will be reminded about this for the rest of her life.
Thanks Patrice for giving me an insight into your rebellous years. Indeed, parents never really know what some childen may be up to. For all we know, she left home properly dressed for a ”sleep-over”So while I may be inclined to lay some blame at the parents door, it is not always what it seems.They would have never known, had this not been given the wide coverage it has.
I also have an issue with the club owners, who did not insist in an ID and indeed, the ”friends” who went with her.Perhaps it was to late for some sort of intervention, but the way she was being tossed around and abused, perhaps the music should have been stopped.
Just imagine your 14 year old daughter,sister or close friend being abused like that, how will you feel.
Did she look for it because she was dressed in a revealing outfit?
I do not think so.Hopefully there will be lessons learned for all of this.
Afrobella, I see where you’re coming from, but I just feel that you’re not placing enough blame on this girl and her family. You can’t say on one hand that today’s 14 year-olds are different, then say it isn’t fair to totally blame this girl. I’m still in my twenties so I’m not that far removed from the teenage years myself. I had a few wild experiences, but when my parents found out they disciplined me and didn’t point the finger elsewhere. At 14,15, and 16 I obviously knew right from wrong if I had to lie to my parents in the first place. It seems as if our generation and the ones coming after us live by the “NOT ME” code of ethics. Blame someone or something else, but “NOT ME”. Sure today’s kids are different, that’s definitely you need to keep your eyes on them.
Ok, I finally got to watch the video and Afrobella, I agree with every single word you say! Even though the girl should not have been there and acting the way she did, she is still a little girl!! Who would want a grown man grinding on their little sister/ cousin/ daughter like that? And she was literally dragged across the floor and the stage like a ragdoll! That’s a little overboard don’t you think? It’s so sad that our society has reached this point where a 14 year old being sexually explicit AND a grown man taking advantage of it is A-ok!
For all of us who are past (or well past) fourteen, think about who you were at that time. Did you always make the best decisions for yourself? Did you ever make a decision that you regretted? I mean really regretted and luckily it didn’t end up on YouTube. And you told your parents everything that you did? Everything?
I just can’t hold a fourteen child to an adult standard, regardless of how adult she looks. Like most teenage girls, she just discovering who she is (physically, mentally, etc.). Sometimes, bad decisions are made during this process and I think she realizes that now. She will recover from this incident and hopefully be a better person because of it.
But even it she had been twenty-four, that video is just disturbing. She was flung around like a piece of trash — like she wasn’t even human. Even if she was totally nude, I couldn’t find a good justification for Akon’s behavior. Not so much as a “thank you” at the end of it — unless it’s on a part of the video that we didn’t see. He didn’t help her up off the floor. He just walked away from her like she was the dirt on the bottom of his shoe.
I think this man should be held accountable for treating a woman in that manner. I really lost respect for him.
After reading several comments on the perezhilton and dlisted websites I have decided to become more selective about the blogs I visit. I think the racist comments are caused by the combination of anonymity that web surfing provides and are also fueled by a constant pandering to negative stereotypes that are all too often embodied in the mainstream media. I’ve noticed that when celebrity bloggers try to feature black entertainers it is often in a negative or hyper-critical light which makes visitors feel more comfortable leaving degrading racist remarks. In the case of the Jennifer Hudson post I think it was almost too blatantly racist to be ignored. The best way to resolve this issue is for us to stop providing these columnists with the web traffic they need to keep going..hit ‘em where it hurts.
Nice that you gave links to sites with differing opinions. Big up for that.
I must be getting old because I thought the whole performance was too explicit for words. I found it disturbing and it made me feel like some kind of pervert watching it. But from what I’ve seen of her pictures on mediatakeout and the video, she looks like she enjoys looking provacative and “sexy”. She’s a very pretty girl, but it’s so sad that she seems to be more focused on attracting men than gaining knowledge.
I forgot to mention what else bothered me about the video: afterwards he got up, walked off like she wasn’t ISH! And didn’t even look back. We women have got to stop letting men look at us and treat us as sexual objects and “just something to do”.
[...] Afrobella is also disturbed by the racial implications: “So then this Akon thing happens, and I can’t look away from the comments pages. And I find the same ignorant beliefs being spouted again and again. ‘This is a part of Caribbean culture, get over it.’ ‘That’s how they dance in Trini.’ ‘Those Caribbean girls get down like that.’ And all of the old school disses delivered to dark skinned people that you might expect…Yes, scandalous dancing is celebrated throughout the Caribbean, all you need to do is do a You Tube search for ‘dutty wine’ or ‘dancehall queen’ to find an array of NSFW videos of women getting down on all fours to degrade themselves. But Akon took it to a whole ‘nother level.” [...]
The little girl lied to her parents and went to a club. She shouldn’t have gotten into the club because she is not 18. She shouldn’t have gotten into the vip section where the dance contest was held because you have to be 21. Now think to yourself, your in the club having a good time dancing are you really thinking hhmm I wonder if this is just a little girl who smooth talked her way into the club. NO!! especially when she’s dancing like that. She looks like she knows what she’s doing. Akon is not to blame, if you want to blame someone blame her, her parents, maybe the bouncer at the club, the security of the vip section maybe? Point is she shouldnt have been there, she knew that, Akon didn’t
I think this is crap that you Dis Akon for this, She is the lil tramp that went into the night club that night and she is the one that went up on the stage herself!!! looks like she knew what she was doing! why is it that he’s flat on his back why she is moving from one position to another? She is all at fault she never should have went to that club in the first place watch the clips and see how she gets up there and starts rubbing herself against him. the night club should be doing there job she had no business being there!!!!