What Stereotype Should Meghan Markle Discuss on Her Podcast Archetypes When She Resumes Production After Mourning Queen Elizabeth?
MEGHAN MARKLE IS NOT "BLACK" AND SHE SHOULD NOT BE FORCED TO DESCRIBE HERSELF WITH FALSE COLOR CODES
Duchess Meghan Markle's podcast Archetypes was ranked No. 1 in the United States, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand before she was forced to pause production to honor Queen Elizabeth's demise. The juggernaut royalebrity was riding high with these great ratings and seductive guests when, while off in Europe promoting her husband's Invictus Games and making speeches for other causes, she and Harry received a telegram that the Queen was near death. They dropped everything, canceled the outstanding engagements, and hightailed it on a jet to Balmoral to pay their last respects.
The Duchess' podcast which debuted just last month, in August, was part of a $25 million dollar pluri-annual deal with Spotify and their production company Archewell to create content that "uplifts and entertains audiences around the world; spotlights diverse perspectives and voices; and builds community through shared experience, narratives, and values."
So far, the podcast has already featured three very exciting guests: Serena Williams, Mariah Carey, and Mindy Kaling. The Duchess had indicated in a press release prior to the debut of the podcast that her intention is to “investigate[s] the labels that try to hold women back" and “uncover the origin of these stereotypes and have uncensored conversations with women who know all too well how these typecasts shape narratives.”
The Duchess of Sussex explained that women and girls are being disparaged in society, and by the media. She said “This is how we talk about women, the words that raise our girls, and how the media reflects women back to us. But where do these stereotypes come from? And how do they keep showing up and defining our lives?”
Obviously, a part of the reason she has decided to do Archetypes is because of her own experience. No one hates the Duchess more than other women. No one slings more mud, insults, disses, and disrespect towards the Duchess (with the possible exception of Piers Morgan) than other women. Among numerous all-female, online cliques, she is despised with a vengeance and is harassed, ridiculed, and bullied by resident online mean girls to a level that defies human comprehension. After all, Harry was single when she met him. She did not break up another woman's home to get him. So why all this hate?
It begs the question what did she do to all these women? Why do they hate her as much as they do? Where did they learn to hate other women in this way? Who taught them how to do it? Is the media or men really to blame for women hating on women? Or do women hate women simply because women hate women? Is it nature?
It is not that the Duchess is perfect. She made one comment when speaking with Mariah Carey (was it?) that "I have always been treated like a mixed woman and only after I married my husband did everyone start to treat me like a black woman." Even fans of the Duchess were nonplussed by this statement. What did she mean by that? How, in her view were "mixed race" women treated? And how are "black women" treated? And for that matter how are "white women" treated? And if the treatment is different in her view, had she ever objected when she was being treated presumably "better" than "black" women? Or did she accept her so-called privilege of being a "mixed woman"?
Moreover, and more importantly, why does she even subscribe to this "black women" "white women" and "mixed women" discourse? Why isn't she correcting this narrative and objecting to the colorization of human beings in this toxic way? Because the truth is, this binary and dichotomous way of describing people of African descent and people of European descent is passé and needs to be abolished.
There is no monolithic color that describes all people in either of these two groups. And the only thing that is "white" on the human body is teeth. That is to say that there are no "white women" on the planet. This is a myth. There are women of myriad skin colors that are coded "white" even though many have a darker complexion than the Duchess who is coded "black. " In fact, she is "peach" like a lot of people who are described as "white."
It is troubling that since the 17th Century Englishmen coded Africans and Europeans with these two oppositional colors so many centuries ago, that modern society is still mired in, and defined by, these toxic color codes, and worse, still enforce these codes against un-monolithic individuals.
This is something the Duchess needs to address on her podcast urgently. She needs to ask why are only two groups of human beings on the planet (lately they have been "browning" another group) relegated to a color that just happens to be "opposites"? What was the intention? Why is it rude to call Asians "yellow" and native Americans "red" but perfectly fine to call all people with African roots "black"? Conversely, why is it practically an insult to tell someone who does not have "white" skin complexion that he or she is not "white"? Why can't you tell someone they are actually peach, pink, salmon, beige, light brown, red, or even orange? Indeed, it might be the height to disrespectful to suggest to someone coded as "white" that they are not.
This is colorism. Or miscolorism and it is not healthy. It is toxic. The intentions are bad. They lead to labels and stereotypes that harm people in the end.
These are very damaging stereotypes that continue to separate and discriminate against millions of people on the planet. It is environmentally unhealthy to keep up this dichotomous and binary relationship between these two groups of human beings on the planet. These color codes are constructs that served their purpose in the 17th Century and beyond because people needed to justify racial supremacy and they did it with these color codes. But the time has come that this construct is no longer appropriate because we live in a world where there are no supreme human beings.
The Duchess' ostracism in the global society after she married Prince Harry is a real case in point about how toxic this binary relationship between two groups of people on the planet is. Here is a woman whose skin is as "white" as anyone else who calls themselves "white" but because she has a parent coded as "black" she is required to describe herself by a color code that completely misrepresents what she actually is.
The Duchess is not "black" and should not be forced to describe herself as "black." In fact, perhaps as many as 90 percent of people on the Earth who are forced to check the "black" box on official documents have some shade of "brown" not "black" skin color. This "black people" "white people" dichotomy is a big, toxic lie. It is the ultimate stereotype and the ultimate label that holds people back.
So what the heck?
Why doesn't the Duchess talk about that on her podcast?
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