Black Girls Have Quvenzhane’s Back, Plus: Michelle Obama’s Mom Dancing, Daddy’s Money Sneaks & More

I promise you this: the backlash The Onion faced after calling Best Actress Oscar nominee Quvenzhané Wallis the “c” word was swift and severe, but it was black voices—those of us women—that led the charge. I saw some really beautiful posts written in support of our favorite 9-year-old big screen star blazing the internet, including the fiery “Where Were White Feminists Speaking Out For Quvenzhané Wallis?” on Clutch and “A Love Letter to Quvenzhané Wallis,” from the sisters at Crunk Feminist Collective. But the one that absolutely captured my heart—and nailed why we all were right to have this little girl’s back as she was cruelly attacked on one of the biggest nights of her young life—was “The Thing About Being A Black Girl In the World,” by Black Girl Dangerous. I’m so printing out this beautiful paean to little girls of color and giving it to my girlpies. Witness:

“The thing about being a little black girl in the world is that even when you are the youngest person ever to be nominated for an Academy Award, many people will use the occasion not to hold you up for all of the amazing things you obviously are, but to tear you down for the ways you don’t look like them, the ways your name isn’t their kind of right, the ways you don’t remind them of themselves, the ways you are not blonde or blue-eyed, as if those things could possibly matter when set against the otherwordly talent and beauty and brilliance you possess.​

The thing about being a little black girl in the world is that you come into it already expected to be less than you almost certainly are, the genius and radiant darkness you possess already set up to be overlooked, dismissed or erased by almost everyone you will ever meet.

The thing about being a little black girl in the world is that even when you are everything, some people will want you to be nothing. They will look at you through the nothing-colored glasses they will put on every time you enter a room. And the bigness of you, the outstandingness, the giftedness, will be invisible to them…”

Click HERE to read the rest of “The Thing About Being A Black Girl” at Black Girl Dangerous. 

And other MyBrownBaby Fresh Links we liked this week:

1. Family Medical Leave Act At 20: Needs Work (Ebony)
2. John Lewis to Scalia: The right to vote is ‘what people died for, bled for’ (TheGriot)
3. First Listen: Jimi Hendrix, ‘People, Hell And Angels’ (NPR)
4, Baltimore Gynecologist Accused Of Videotaping Exams With Hidden Camera Pen Commits Suicide (MadameNoire)
5. The Miami Heat Gets In On the Harlem Shake. LeBron James Is A FOOL. (YouTube)
6. Cutie Alert: Obama, Young Rosa Parks Relative Take Adorable Photo (HuffPoBlack)
7. 13 Blog Posts Celebrating Black Women for Black History Month (ForHarriet)
8. House passes Violence Against Women Act after GOP version defeated (CNN)
9. Daddy’$ Money Sneakers Are For Your Teen Who Loves Swag And Sexism! (Mommyish)
10. Great, Now Schools Are Sending Letters Home With Fat Kids (Jezebel)

And I just could not resist leaving you with the hysterical video, “The Evolution Of Mom Dancing,” featuring First Lady Michelle Obama and late night talk show host Jimmy Fallon. In honor of Mrs. Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign to end childhood obesity, the two worked it all the way out on Fallon’s show earlier this week, doing all the stereotypical moves we moms bring to the dance floor. Shelly O told Fallon she embarrasses the mess out of Sasha and Malia by dancing as often as possible; then she and Fallon did, among many others dances, the Pulp Fiction boogie, the “Where’s Your Father?” and the “Raise the Roof,” “The Bump,” and “The Sprinkler.” Then she hit her Dougie. Which pretty much makes Michelle Obama the coolest First Lady, like, ever. Enjoy the video—and have a fab weekend!