After years of skirting questions and discussions about white supremacy, anti-Blackness, and race, Tina Fey decided to nip some shit in the bud and avoid a reckoning.
By Lara Witt and Da’Shaun Harrison
Another week, another mess. Here is Wear Your Voice’s “hint of anger” news round-up just in case you did the right thing and logged the fuck off for most of it:
1. There Were Almost More Blackface Episodes in 30 Rock Than Black Actors:
Earlier this week, NBCU and Tina Fey requested that 4(!) 30 Rock episodes be pulled from streaming for featuring blackface. After spending years avoiding any discussions about race, white supremacy, and anti-Blackness prevalent in her writing, Fey issued a statement apologizing “for the pain” the episodes caused. Rather than taking steps towards accountability, Fey’s letter avoided calling blackface, blackface, opting instead to whitewash her wrongdoings by calling it “race-changing make-up”.
In their 2017 article, “All White People Are Socialized To Be Racist & Tina Fey Made That Clear”, Wear Your Voice’s Managing Editor, Sherronda J. Brown said this of Tina Fey and white people:
“All white people are socialized to be racist. Many of the white people who stay silent in the face of white terrorism consider themselves to be “non-racist.” They’re wrong. Tina Fey, a comedian who encouraged audiences to laugh at the rape of Sally Hemings with a tasteless joke, considers herself to be “non-racist.” She’s wrong.”
2. Breaking News: Media Companies Are Rife With Oppression!
After a reckoning amongst publications like Refinery 29, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The New York Times, and like, all of Condé Nast, Okayplayer/OkayAfrica, and Complex join the headlines this week for being media companies that thrive on perpetuating oppressive politics.
We would like to say that all of this is surprising, but it isn’t. White supremacy, misogyny, queerphobia, ableism, fatphobia — all of it is baked into the foundations of the nation, and as a result, across industries as well. As we stated in our very own manifesto:
“Mainstream western news sources have been adept at remaining centrist—supporting white supremacy, colonialism, capitalism, and patriarchy—and ensuring that the necessary groundwork for fascism was solidified, keeping BIPOC out of their newsrooms. They betrayed us and themselves by doing so.”
3. National Guard to provide “unarmed” security for monuments in DC:
Because of course. This week, it was announced that DC’s National Guard would be deploying “unarmed” troops to protect the historical monuments in the district, following the recent protests around the country that have resulted in the rightful destruction of racist monuments. This is, of course, a surprise to no one who understands that the police and the military both are supposed to protect property. While protestors are out in the streets fighting against state violence—and risking contracting COVID-19—the government is attempting to make sure statues that symbolize the racist history of America is properly cared for instead; emblematic of exactly what America is and who it stands for.
4. The officer who murdered Breonna Taylor is fired:
On March 13, Breonna Taylor was murdered by Louisville police after three officers entered into her home with a “no-knock” warrant as part of an ongoing drug investigation. Three months later, following the overwhelming public calls for accountability, the officer who shot her has finally been fired.
5. A grand jury indicted three men arrested for the murder of Ahmaud Arbery:
Four months after Arbery was killed by white supremacists while he was on his daily jog, a Georgia grand jury indicted the three men who were arrested and charged for his murder. In a statement to the press, the attorney to the Arbery family, Ben Crump stated, “This confirms what Ahmaud’s father has been saying for months — that this was a lynching.”