Lorde’s Use of Anger Response

In Audre Lorde 1981 keynote speech, “The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism”, her central argument is as women, specifically women of color, is to use anger as the powerhouse tool to promote justice against racism. She explains that our fear of releasing anger has been boiled up inside of us for years; the anger of having to deal with racism on an everyday basis. Although typically, anger brings out negative consequences, in this case, it can bring out positive effects if we do allow that fear to be terminated. Lorde says, “We cannot allow our fear of anger to deflect us nor seduce us into settling for anything less…”

Further into her speech, Audre Lorde includes bullet points of scenarios in relations to women of color facing racism. Scenarios including white women assumed comprehension of racism, which in my opinion, is very little; an experience where a little white girl refers to a little colored girl as a “baby maid” and her mother refusing to correct her and instead tells her to hush. These scenarios make her argument even stronger and addresses her white female audience to acknowledge that they’re experience with sexism is twice as different as colored sexism. In addition, Lorde wants them to “[recognize] the needs and living contexts of other women.”

In conclusion, I am heavily persuaded by her argument because, sadly, it appeals to us women of color to this day in America. Valid points she addressed nearly thirty years ago still haven’t been recovered as of 2020. I like how she described women of color as her “sisters”, allowing an even stronger connection with her audience. She does have a valid argument; using anger can be productive, since anger, at times, does promote change, although some opposers would disagree with Lorde. Think about in other parts of the world, China, for example, where the citizens have used anger to influence their government to enforce democracy.

Christopher Lebron’s “Black Panthers” Response

The Boston Review article, “Black Panther Is Not the Movie We Deserve”, Christopher Lebron tackles his opinion of the popular film of 2018 and in my belief, it’s not you would expect to be. He gives his point of view through the use of the racial lens, of which Black Panther storyline is really a disgrace to the black community but the media and the fans are too obsessed on how it uplifts black power and how good it feels to be black. He says that “they go to the heart of the mistaken perception that Black Panther is a movie about black liberation.” I remember when the film was released, a lot of people gave the movie a 10/10 review and felt like they didn’t waste their money after watching the film. Marvel movies and their graphic designs, on that note, were always looking fantastic and the audience would feel hyped watching a combat battle. Two months later, I had watched the movie and I was experiencing the same joy everyone else had.

The exigency of this article, is not entirely about the movie itself, but how it tries to downplay racism. He also points out the characters’ behaviors such as selfishness and dominance. Lebron points out differences from the comic book and the movie. Killmonger, the so- called villain for example, is a very intelligent individual studying at MIT to further understand vibranium whose intentions was to support financially, the black community, to whom were living in poverty. The film, in contrast, portrays him as a cold- blooded killer who also wants to help his community back home. The movie doesn’t pay too much to Klaue, the real supervillain, who just wants Wankanda’s treasures for nothing but profit. Klaue, a white man, had the same mentality as every European during imperialism and colonization era, who would steal African, Native American treasures and artifacts as dollar signs. Klaue and Killmonger had two different purposes in the movie.  

The genre of the article was in the form of an opinion editorial. He provides the title and a subtitle, although the subtitle grasps the audience’s attention even more.

Christopher Lebron’s targeted audience were for people of maturity and has felt deeply impacted by racism. His goal is to change our view of how in modern times, racism still exist and it can hit us so low that we do not even notice that especially in the filming industry. Putting blacks against each other, no matter what diaspora one is from is very common. The media would play a huge role in this. At times I remember Africans and African- Americans didn’t like each other for no apparent reason. From the American point of view, Africans were portrayed as poor, “booty- scratchers”, superior, whereas from the African point of view, African Americans were viewed as gangster, thieves, low- lives as well. I think Lebron did a well job presenting this piece of writing because it had changed my point of view about the movie.