Angelina’s Next Big Adoption!

so I had no clue blackface was making a comeback in the twenty-first century or that Angelina’s been hoping to evoke the ghost of Bert Williams. Jolie is playing Mariane Pearl in the upcoming “A Mighty Heart.” The film is based on a memoir by Pearl about the execution of her journalist husband at the hands of terrorists. Pearl is of Afro-Cuban and Dutch descent. She’s born, raised, lives in Pareeeeee, France. In France, et.al, she’s perhaps considered French, European, or mixed. Over here in these parts, bitch is black.

So that’s why yes I take issue with Angie’s lil-white ass portraying Pearl in the movie. This is a film that’s been long in the making. Initially Brad Pitt and his then wife Jennifer Aniston were going to produce the film, and Aniston was going to play Pearl! But then we all know what happened and Aniston gave up her rights to the production company and Pitt classily gave the part to Angie.

All I can say for Pearl’s lack of conflict with white women playing her is that she is not American and does not grasp the unfortunate lenses us Yanks wear regarding race and ethnicity. But Aniston, Pitt, and Jolie come from this side of the ocean and damn sure know what’s white and what ain’t.

Over here, when I walk into a room, I’m not someone who’s Afro-Irish-French-Greek, my ass is the black person in the room. And I’m ok with that, in fact, proud. I’m American and that’s how I was informed. Nobody gives a shit what fraction of what I am because we still have the one-drop rule going on underneath the radar.

But more important than my own personal kerfuffle, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle before I believe that Halle Berry (white mother, identifies as black because..well..duh), Vanessa Williams, Rosario Dawson (who publicly identifies as fractionary), or any other mixed-race American actresses weren’t available for this role. The story goes that Angie wanted the role, anyway: “Slap some cork on me and call me Bessie!”

So my question now is, “Who’s white ass can I pretend to be?”

Pass me that cork, Brad…

So I guess I missed the memo on the return of blackface?

Silence = Death

(There would be a pic here but Blogger and I are having some technical difficulties)

While the idea-turned-reality of a woman with two cooters is jaw-dropping and the not-so-new-news not to marry a whoa-man if you want to be happy for the rest of your life is, well, not really shocking so much as annoying, it’s really a shame what ABC News highlighted this week and even bigger shame how little it’s been profiled.

Last night I watched ABC’s “AIDS in Black America: Out of Control” (I’m not too hot on that title, I think it steps too close to certain implications) where I learned that I am 23 times more more likely to be diagnosed with AIDS than white women; that the infection rate is 8 times the rate of whites; that of all women with in the States with HIV, 68% are black; that while I and my fellow black folk make up 13% of the U.S. population, we account for over 50% of all new cases of HIV; and almost 70% of all newly diagnosed HIV-positive women in the United States are black women.

Those are just a few stats but they barely touch the surface of this segment, inspired by the 25th anniversary of the first reported cases of AIDS. There are some significant causes behind this clearly emergency situation such as black men who have sex with men not telling their female partners, and those same men not using protection with either partner (because to pull out a condom perhaps acknowledges what’s not being said), black women not using protection with their black male partners many of whom have just been released from prison (where a disproportionate number of black men reside, where AIDS infection rates are 5 times higher, and where there are no comprehensive national testing, prevention, or treatment programs), and a gaping wide hole in the mostly conservative black community where a discussion of sexuality in all its orientations and practices should occur.

Aids in Black America – ABC

– BB