No. 6 - The Messenger BEYONCÉ
Beyoncé makes the TIME Shortlist as runner up to the Person of the Year, alongside world leaders. Legends only.
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Having problems is the human condition. But there is a particular complication that comes with being black in America. “Between me and the other world there is ever an unasked question,” W.E.B. Du Bois wrote in his classic The Souls of Black Folk. “How does it feel to be a problem?” In 2016, Beyoncé, a pop star, chose to be a problem.
This could not have been a light decision. An artist who rose to fame in the late 1990s as lead singer of the teen girl group Destiny’s Child, she has since rocketed to the sort of first-name-only global superstardom that theoretically relieves her of the heaviest burdens of being a problem. Her brand seemed carefully crafted to speak to girl power more than to black power. Four years ago, sociologist Ellis Cashmore identified Beyoncé as “beyond black,” describing her flamboyant individualism as a commodity sold to Middle America as evidence the nation’s racial dilemma had ended. So much for that.
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From the moment its first single, “Formation,” dropped in February, Lemonade was a phenomenon. Rolling Stone described it as “her most powerful, ambitious statement yet” and later named it best album of the year. A spate of other music awards followed, along with nominations in the upcoming Grammys, including Album of the Year. Lemonade provided raw material for a breathtaking, $256 million–grossing world tour in which the choreography featured a cadre of natural-haired black women led by Beyoncé, barefoot, in ankle-deep water performing a fierce kinetic dance as she proclaimed, “Freedom! Freedom! Where are you? ‘Cause I need freedom too! I break chains all by myself.” Typical arena fare it was not.
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At the video’s close, Beyoncé returns to a wide-brimmed hat she wore earlier to defiantly raise both middle fingers. Now she mouths the lyrics, “You know you that bitch when you cause all this conversation.”She is fully aware of what she has done.
The backlash began the next day, when she and her dancers performed at the Super Bowl in outfits that paid homage to the Black Panthers. Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani called the show “outrageous” and “ridiculous.” Law enforcement criticized what they said was Beyoncé’s anticop message, and police unions around the nation encouraged members not to work security at her upcoming tour.
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Beyoncé’s call for women to stay prepared, to rise above the fray and to remember that they will ultimately triumph may prove her most prescient lesson yet.
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At the first encounter, this is a personal story.
In this tabloid light, Lemonade would explain Solange’s motives. Even while showing the reconciliation of her marriage, it offers an explanation and justification for rage.
Spend more time, and Lemonade is a political allegory.
Black women have spent much of American history laboring at the margins to ensure the future of black families and communities. The work of black women in social and political organizing has often been thankless, unacknowledged. “What a wicked way to treat the girl that loves you,” Beyoncé sings in “Hold Up,” aptly describing how America has treated black women whose labor helped build the nation. “When you hurt me, you hurt yourself,” she roars in “Don’t Hurt Yourself,” speaking to the interconnectedness of citizens in a democracy. “Daddy Lessons” reminds black women of their Second Amendment rights. “Freedom” declares black women’s ability to carve out spaces of liberation for themselves even in the most constrained and oppressive circumstances.
Du Bois asserted that to be black is to be a problem. Feminist activists have long insisted the personal is political. For Lemonade, Beyoncé used personal resilience and political resistance to transform the sour into something sustaining.
“What a wicked way to treat the girl that loves you,” Beyoncé sings in “Hold Up,” aptly describing how America has treated black women whose labor helped build the nation
Lol.. trying to put meaning to it that's not there
But I digress, congrats to her for keeping up this powerful queen image in the public eye for yet another year
“What a wicked way to treat the girl that loves you,” Beyoncé sings in “Hold Up,” aptly describing how America has treated black women whose labor helped build the nation.
