#Dear Erica Mena | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

reasoningdaily · 8 months

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On a recent episode of Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta, Dominican-Puerto Rican reality TV star Erica Mena screamed “You monkey, you blue monkey” to Jamaican dancehall singer, songwriter, and actor Spice. The animalized anti-Black slur never seems too far from the lips of racially ambiguous, mestiza, mixed-race, and other non-Black Latinas who find success ironically because of Black women. Many people of alleged color use their proximity to Blackness as a ruse to gain success while harboring anti-Black values.

This isn’t the first time we have seen non-Black Latinas, who may claim Afro-Latinidad at convenience, call dark-skinned unambiguously Black women an anti-Black slur in a public forum. It’s a signature and age-old move. In 2015, Mena herself reportedly called club promoters “Black monkeys” after not showing up to a scheduled nightclub appearance. Similarly, in 2019, self-professed Afro-Latina Evelyn Lozada did something similar to her Basketball Wives castmate, athlete Ogom “OG” Chijindu, using a monkey GIF to describe her on Instagram and repeatedly referring negatively to her looks.

In many of these public displays of anti-Blackness, the conflict is centered on a Black man “picking” the unambiguously Black woman over the so-called “exotic” non-Black woman. These are common tactics that I and many other unambiguous Black women have experienced at the hands of non-Black Latinas, including mestizas and light-skinned, racially ambiguous, self-proclaimed Afro-Latinas. And many of these non-Black Latinas use the categorization of Afrolatinidad as a get-out-of-jail card when they co-opt Blackness.

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"Many people of alleged color use their proximity to Blackness as a ruse to gain success while fostering anti-Black values. "

dash harris

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In 2019,Love and Hip Hop cast member Cyn Santana appeared on Angela Yee's Lip Service podcast controversially saying she prefers Black men and Black men prefer Latina women. “Y’all can keep the Puerto Rican men. I’m good,” she said, assuming she was referring to non-Black Puerto Rican men. She added: “I do Black guys all day. Black men cater to us Spanish [sic: Latina] girls especially.” When Yee suggested she would “get in trouble with the Black girls,” Santana, a mestiza of mixed Dominican and Salvadoran descent, said, “I didn’t mean it like that, but Black girls gonna take it personal and be like, uh-uh,” inserting just enough mockery to ensure the audience that her worldview is steeped in anti-Black tropes.

Even more to that point of wide-spread misogynoir stereotyping, Santana later apologized on the talk show The Real, saying she “irresponsibly repeated something that I heard my entire life.” I believe her. I've long seen and heard this messaging in Latine communities. The truth Santana pointed to cannot be glossed over. These women date and procreate with Black men and, in turn, raise Black children, as Mena is doing, and I wonder how they treat those children through their lens of depreciating Blackness. One way is by treating them as a shield to claim they are not anti-Black.

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"In many of these public displays of anti-Blackness, the conflict is centered on a Black man “picking” the unambiguously Black woman over the so-called “exotic” non-Black woman."

dash harris

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This is tied to the misogynoir phenomena of Black men who put non-Black women on pedestals, prizing, pursuing, and “preferring” non-Black Latinas and white women and even defending them when they do dehumanize Black women in public media forums. This “preference” cannot be divorced from its anti-Black power dynamics and its cishetero white-centering patriarchy that Black men, among people in general, have been indoctrinated under and in turn perpetuate and harm Black women with. Black women seem to be where their targets intersect and lock in as their punching bag.

Mena’s chagrin, and subsequent table-flipping that caused the melee, was because Safaree, a rapper and Mena’s ex-husband and father to her children, “chose” to care more about a woman who indeed is not his wife nor his children’s mother. But what really got Mena to reveal herself was that it was a dark-skinned Black woman, someone who in her eyes was undeserving of the adoration and worship she, a non-Black woman, is entitled to, so she had been taught. This subverted social order infraction could not go by Mena without a slur to bring Black women back to the intended subalterned place. She wanted the guarantee of preference that she was promised.

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"Non-Black women like her have been promised their whole lives that they deserve love and respect, withheld from Black women and over Black women in favor of women who look like her."

dash harris

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It is a privileged position where Mena is most comfortable because she believes in the zero-sum game of anti-Black hierarchy. This hierarchy keeps her lights on. Mena’s social currency rides in her non-Blackness and her proximity to whiteness relative to Black women. Non-Black women like her have been promised their whole lives that they deserve love and respect, withheld from Black women and over Black women in favor of women who look like her. She clamors for and is enabled by the male gaze and, furthermore, is emboldened and protected by Black men who seek refuge from their own internalized anti-Blackness in the arms of women “with less baggage and attitude” than “the Black girls.” But, as the routine racialized aggressions these women create show, even this is a myth. Together, the bond of Black men who “prefer” non-Black women and non-Black women who revel this preference replicates white pathology and notions that Black women should remain subjugated under them both.

So many non-Black Latinas, including mestizas, mixed-race, and racially ambiguous women, have launched and sustained their careers from Black media and specifically because of Black women, like Mona Scott-Young, the creator of the Love and Hip-Hop franchise, and Shaunie O’Neal, creator of Basketball Wives. Black media gives them access into Black spaces by their “POC” proximity for them to inevitably expose their anti-Blackness, because you can only hide your ideologies for so long. Now many are calling for Mena to finally be fired from the TV series.

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"Unambiguously Black women, whether Latina or not, are racialized as Black wherever we go and do not have the escape-hatch of racial ambiguity that other non-Black Afro-Latinas do."

dash harris

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Recently, reality TV star Joseline Hernandez called out her College Hill classmate Amber Rose for building her career from Black media but “catering to white people.” Hernandez, who is of Puerto Rican descent, identifies as a Black woman and not Afro-Latina, a distinction that seems to be even more necessary with each passing day. Unambiguously Black women, whether Latina or not, are racialized as Black wherever we go and do not have the escape-hatch of racial ambiguity that other non-Black Afro-Latinas do.

Hemispherically, Black women are the butts of “jokes” for non-Black, mixed-race, bi-racial, and racially ambiguous women. In 2016, Geisha Montes de Oca (who was 2008's Miss World Dominican Republic) mocked Black Dominican singer Amara La Negra on a popular variety show by wearing an Afro wig, butt pads, and blackface. In 2013, Black Brazilian actor Nayara Justino was dethroned from her title of Miss Globaleza carnival queen in favor of a light-skinned bi-racial woman after public outcry of Justino being “too Black.” She was also subjected to violent anti-Black attacks online that negatively impacted her health.

These viral reality TV moments unveil how anti-Blackness and misogyny are like a rite of passage for many non-Black Latinas. And these are only the recorded examples. As Santana noted on The Real, oftentimes, these are the messages non-Black Latinas were raised with and didn’t question or resist because they benefited from them. She noted that when she made her own viral anti-Black comments she was in her early 20s and that now, “27 with a son,” she knows better. But does age and motherhood disentangle anti-Blackness from someone’s core? It does not. Mena and Lozado are proof-positive it does not, because it takes a process of birthing yourself anew to address and eradicate this structural ill.

#Dear Erica Mena #You Can’t Co-Opt Black Culture & Hate Black Women #anti blackness #white washing #latinex lies #white privilege #white skin convenience

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xltribe · 5 years

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XL Trailblazers Mario Reed

1.How did you get the connect to Fashion Nova Men? My connect at Fashion Nova is a dear friend and fellow photographer who I have learned a lot from over the years. He started out doing club photography and portraits for local models in Boston and Rhode Island. He took the leap of faith and moved here to Los Angeles where he built a very respectable clientele, including models like Amber Rose and Erica Mena. He then started shooting for Fashion Nova and is now one of their leading content producers. Being a friend, he recognized the work I’ve been putting in over the years and when Fashion Nova asked for Plus Size models, he brought my Instagram to their attention. The rest was history.

2.How long did it take you to plan your engagement photos? Lol you might not believe this, but my engagement photos were planned in a matter of 24 hours. My fiancé knew she wanted a “City Scene” for the photos as our wedding is on a rooftop in LA. From there, I reached out to a contact I’d previously met through Peerspace, which is an amazing tool if you are looking for reasonable locations to do your shooting or any kind of event for that matter. Peerspace is that Sweetspot just below Airbnb for your hourly projects or meetings, that you don’t need for days at a time. From there, I booked the space for $50 in Downtown LA, and my roommate, another fellow photographer and good friend was more than willing to help us out. The next day, we got our Sunday Best outfits, hopped in my car and headed to the studio. We were in and out in about 30 minutes. It’s a beautiful thing when the photographer is a friend. My roommate has seen our relationship from almost start to present and knows us both very well. The chemistry is just seamless and I think that shows, in the end, resulted photos.

3.What inspired you to start a couples YouTube channel? Mannn…my fiancé and I are both avid Youtube watchers. I watch Youtube more than anything on TV other than sports games. She actually had her own channel for years and then life happens and she stepped away for a while. Us being together and realizing how goofy, quirky, but also insightful we are made us ask ourselves, why not? We’d often post our adventures on our Instagram stories and would get responses asking us for more information or input on whatever matter we were discussing. Even on the chill days, people seemed to just want to know more about our lives because we seemed to be “interesting people” I guess…I’m being modest….we dope as fuck. But anyways, I had told years ago about the financial potential that Youtube provides, but never did my own research. Then to be honest, I began watching more of her YouTube families, how they acted, got their start, and how they were currently living – and it was a no brainer. ReedBetweenTheLines was born #RBTL. Make sure you go subscribe lol

4.Tell us how the Percxption clothing Brand was created? Percxption began Spring of 2013 in my college apartment. I’d previously been asked to help design for a friends clothing line, and ultimately become a partner. Being young, we didn’t know what we were doing and that quickly dissolved. That period of time definitely sparked something in me that made me feel I had every resource to start a clothing line and ultimately design company on my own. Percxption is more than just clothing, its a symbol. The logo is an Iceberg. 90% of it’s mass is beneath the surface, and beneath the surface of the logo is a crown. Deeper than that, not everyone sees the iceberg when looking at the image. Some see a pyramid, some see a crown flipped upside down, other see a random shape, either way no one’s perception is wrong, hence the name Percxption. Own whatever is unique to you. There are no right or wrong answers, as long as you are true to yourself. I’ve always been into Fashion and Design, but never once considered being a fashion designer. Percxption to me is a brand that allows me to check as many boxes as I want without fear of becoming a Jack of all trades, but master of none. Percxption offers Photography, as I am a photographer, Styling, as I am a stylist, Graphic Design, as I am a graphic designer, Interior Design, Consultations…you get the point. My long term dream is to turn Percxption into a non-profit that will have creative centers and workspaces for youth to attend and learn that creativity, and ultimately creative thinking, is the key to innovation, innovation is the key to our future. It breaks my heart to hear a child say they can’t “draw” or are not creative. I understand that not everyone is given the skill of Picasso, but there are even people who’s perception of his work are extremely negative…and they wouldn’t be wrong. Creativity is about challenging your mind, challenging conformity, confidently. And if there was ever an impact I want Percxption to leave it would be that. Just be your dope self.

XL Trailblazers Mario Reed XL Trailblazers Mario Reed 1.How did you get the connect to Fashion Nova Men? My connect at Fashion Nova is a dear friend and fellow photographer who I have learned a lot from over the years. 859 more words

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