Everyone loses their shit. No human is perfect, everyone experiences a variety of emotions in reaction to events.
At the 2009 Women's US Open semifinal, Serena Williams had "lost her shit". Claudia Rankine's Citizen explains, "Serena's behavior, on this particular Sunday afternoon, suggests that all the injustice she has played through all the years of her illustrious career flashes before her and she decides finally to respond to all of it with a string of invectives" (25).
Williams losing her shit was portrayed negatively through the media and received by her white background on the court, as a detrimental outburst that was violent and unnecessary. They jumped to judge her and make a skeptical of her words, instead of thinking about the important what and why had caused her ice burg of anger to tip.
I youtubed, "2009 Women's US Open semifinal Serena Williams" and the first video to pop up was entitled, "Serena Williams goes crazy vs. Kim Clijisters". The media took advantage of Williams' race, their audience, and the fact there would be a significant profit off an embellished story. Flamboyant media is misleading and spreads dramatized news that then spreads a false knowledge on a subject. It is frustrating seeing articles and video titles like Williams', because everyone loses their shit! The media is making it seem like Williams is the sole person who has ever lost her shit before, and therefore is "crazy" and "extremely violent".
It is unfortunate the majority of our world feeds off gossip. This is something I feel has only grown with time, and all I can hope is that there is a downfall somewhere in the near future for the stability of our civilization.
I think that the reason people saw it as Serena going crazy has more to do with the fact that they didn't understand why she had the outburst. Your criticism of the media and gossip is absolutely correct. People learned about the part where she lost her shit, but they didn't learn about the context. Nobody wants to have a dialogue about racism within the tennis community, about the build up of black rage. Why would they when they could just laugh at Serena Williams and pretend that her anger came out of nowhere?
ReplyDeleteThe line judge made a much bigger deal out of the threat that Serena had originally given her. Serena threatened to shove a tennis ball down the line judges throat out of anger. Most people would have said the same thing. Although, the line judge took this and then proceeded to tell the umpire that Serena threatened to kill her. Racism is everywhere in our sports world. Due to tennis being such a "white" sport, it is much easier to see the instances that take place. It is pretty unbelievable. We never hear many stories of line judges doing this to white players. Very eye-opening.
ReplyDeleteI agree. When I first saw the Serena Williams clip, I wondered, why is this such a big deal? Athletes get frustrated all the time by unfair calls, as they should. It is so sad that media perpetuates such double standards. I bet if a white athlete had the same outburst, no one would even notice or make it some big thing. If they did, all the media outlets would quickly try to justify the athlete's reaction. The headline "Serena goes crazy vs. Kim Clijisters" is ridiculous: dehumanizing Serena into making it seem like she's an animal.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the double standards are ridiculous. Like the whole thing with the "Crip Walk". If it had been a white person I seriously doubt that anyone would have accused them of being a gangster. In fact, people would've probably eaten it up. Gentrify the dance and name it something else. Smh.
ReplyDeleteTotally agree here, this is one of the stories from the book that stuck with me. The double standards are ridiculous, dehumanizing, and unjust. I think it's great that Rankine has used her platform as a writer to highlight issues like these. It makes me sad to think that the only reason I know about what happened to Serena is because she is a big-name athlete, I can't even imagine what other horrible things have happened that no one has payed attention to yet.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with what you wrote. After reading Rankine's story about Serena allegedly losing her shit I decided to check it out on youtube. What I found was that Serena's outburst was a lot smaller than I would have expected it to be given the absurdity of the call and the media's portrayal. I think it is also important to recognize how much harder people of color are scrutinized by the media and how much more often they are placed into stereotypes.
ReplyDeleteIf Serena was white, no one would have called her celebration dance a "crip walk". If Serena was white, the commentator wouldn't said that she looks like a gangster. If Serena was white, very few would have referred to her valid reaction in the 2009 US Open as "crazy". The media took advantage of Serena Williams' actions, but American media profits off of caricatures of black bodies all the time-- Claudia Rankine simply brought it to our attention.
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