FORMED FROM RAGE I
t’s a feeling we are all familiar with. A pit in your stomach, a bubble in your throat, your head fills with warm blood suddenly rushing to your cheeks: Rage. Triggering a fight or flight response, rage is a powerful emotion that compels even more powerful results. For centuries, men have used their rage as a driving factor in decision making., tearing down nations, starting wars and exploiting innocence. Conversely, women have been told to compose themselves, not to be too brash all at the risk of seeming “unlady-like.” You feel it again ;the pit, the bubble, the rush of heat to your face. Now stop; It’s not ladylike. The power of female rage has been building for centuries, decades of emotional neglect is finally proving to be enough. Further, it is women of color who are especially subjected to society’s fear of female rage, staining powerful emotion with racist apprehension. We observe this societal fear of “angry” women and its manifestations in art, music, film, and other entertainment media. The power of feminine rage has molded culture for centuries. It is our time now to listen to the stories of these women and feel the magnitude of their intensity, of their rage. White women have historically been praised for their participation in emotional disobedience, claiming them as heroes, revolutionaries, and pioneers of freedom. The women’s liberation movement throughout the 1920’s advocated for white women’s right to vote and the bodily freedom of white women. Awarded for their efforts white women were in turn free to participate in elections and women’s liberation had begun, or so it is taught. Similar sentiments from women of color in the 1960’s and 70’s were met with systematic and societal dissonance, claiming “anger is never the answer”, and advocacy in the form of protest and marches
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were almost immediately deemed threatening by white onlookers. It returns, that feeling, the chasm growing in your stomach, feeling like you’ve swallowed an apple, your blood is now at a rolling boil. The feeling of screaming but no noise ever escapes your lips. Observed in the popularization of emotional art, this movement has begun to gain platforms, igniting the spark revolutionaries have been guiding on the perception of collective rage. Beyoncés award winning “Lemonade” album, released in April of 2016, depicts the story of her husband’s infidelity in their marriage. Struck with fear and sadness, Beyoncé does what women have always been told to avoid, she gets angry. Critics of her work, like Fox News reporter Keith Ablow, ridiculed the blatant displays of anger towards her husband, rapper Jay-z, claiming it drained the message from the story and only highlighted violence. It is remarks such as these that have fueled the racist stereotypes surrounding Black women. These same rageful sentiments have been displayed in music for decades by white women. Claiming their stake as strong bootstomping women who aren’t afraid to resort to violence in a vendetta, and in turn praised for their unyielding lyrics. Carrie Underwood’s “Before He Cheats” shares the same sentiments as Beyoncés “Lemonade,” public response, however, could not have been more contradicting. This is not the first instance of the repression of women of color’s emotions, artists like Erykah Badu and Lauryn Hill have been speaking on this discrimination for decades, yet little has seemed to change. With the rise of the “Riot Grrl” in the late 80’s and early 90’s female rage was no foreign concept to the pop music scene. Met with its own unique form of sexism, the “Riot Grrl” movement aimed for the liberation of women’s bodily autonomy and freedoms, led almost exclusively by white women. Asking the same questions and screaming