8 Black Bodies Through a Black Lens: How Megan Thee Stallion’s Shooting Reflects Colonial Perceptions

Alyssa Coleman

Introduction

I am a Black Woman. A proud Black woman, who was raised, solely, by other Black women. I love to tell the stories of my childhood, showing how strong, independent, and self-sufficient the women that raised me were. My mother was my sole financial provider, and I would rarely see her as she was always working to provide me the shoes on my feet, the food in my mouth, and the books I read. As for my aunts, they were all either single or just dating, either way still living on their own, off their own money. As I got older, I began to see the public pushback on Black women being called strong and how it was not a good thing. I began to see how it wasn’t good: how my mother was worked to the bone as a single mother and how my aunts always instilled in me that life isn’t easy, that, in life, there are no breaks. I saw my mother cry about 5 times in my life and that’s because, I think, crying cuts into the time we could be figuring out what to do next. For the sake of myself and the women in my family, I wanted to investigate why Black women are expected to be so strong, why our pain expected to be endured in silence, and why our sexualities are never “ours” but, rather, everyone else’s.

With this case study, I want to investigate the European gaze and how the white colonizer perspective delimits Black women, their bodily autonomy, and the right to seek justice. opposition to the European Gaze, which I deem the perception of Black bodies through the colonization and enslaved peoples, I used these two readings to push the term ‘Black Gaze’, which is the critique and analyzation of the European gaze and the affect is has on Black bodies. Historically, the European eye created clear social and biological distinctions between the White and non-white. In “Mama’s baby, Papa’s Maybe,” Spillers argues:

“Three genetic distinctions are available to the Portuguese eye, all along the riffs of melanin in the skin: in a field of captives, some of the observed are ‘white enough, fair to look upon, and well-proportioned.’ Others are less ‘white like mulattoes,’ and still others ‘black as Ethiops, and so ugly, both in features and in body, as almost to appear (to those who saw them) the images of a lower hemisphere’(Spillers, 1987).”

In recognizing that Megan Thee Stallion is not a ‘strong Black woman’ that survived a minor shooting, I want to use the Black gaze to view her as a traumatized victim seeking justice from the abuse of another person. Lorde, in “The Master’s Tools Never Dismantle the Master’s House, asserts the value of a non-colonial gaze when in search for change. She said, “What does it mean when the tools of a racist patriarchy are used to examine the fruits of that same patriarchy? It means that only the most narrow perimeters of change are possible and allowable (Lorde, 1979)” It is through the Black lens that genuine support and understanding can rise in order to analyze the misogynoir that plagues the lives of Black women.

 

Theoretical Framework: Dissecting the European Gaze

I analyze the humiliation and the public scrutiny of Megan the Stallion’s shooting, using numerous sources on intersectionality and coloniality. I use “Coloniality of Gender” by Maria Lugones to exemplify the ways in which Black bodies are placed in opposition to white bodies as their subordinates, a justification for their lack of protection and consistent association with harmful stereotypical tropes to support abuse. A significant excerpt from the text is where this intersectional opposition is explained:
“Crenshaw and other women of color feminists have argued that the categories have been understood as homogenous and as picking out the dominant in the group as the norm, thus “women” picks out white bourgeois women, “men” picks out white bourgeois men, “black” picks out black heterosexual men, and so on. It becomes logically clear then that the logic of categorial separation distorts what exists at the intersection, such as violence against women of color. Given the construction of the categories, the intersection misconstrues women of color. So, once intersectionality shows us what is missing, we have ahead of us the task of reconceptualizing the logic of the “intersection” so as to avoid separability. It is only when we perceive gender and race as intermeshed or fused that we actually see women of color. (Lugones, 2008)”

I go on to use “Ain’t I a Woman” by Sojourner Truth to highlight the parallels between the treatment of enslaved Black women who were ungendered, defeminized, and not protected, and the Black woman today, who suffers the same treatment. Truth’s questioning of why she is not allowed the same access to what was womanhood, at that time, is reflective of the ways Black women exist at the intersection today, deemed invisible and along with their problems.

A lot of Megan’s case was used to expose her sexual life and, with “Thinking Sex” by Gayle Rubin, I reveal how sex is socially policied and the ways in which colonial, heteronormative ideals are forced onto non-normative sexual characters. In Megan’s case, her receiving justice was contingent upon her sex life being deeply investigated and publicized, allowing her misalignment with European standards to be judged through the European gaze.

Lastly, I use the Black Feminist Statement, by the Combahee River Collective, and the Master’s Tools Never Dismantle the Master’s House, by Audre Lorde, to outline the way in which digital spaces are not limited just to misogynoir and abuse of Black women, but also for the creation of safe spaces where Black women can come together and support one another through the Black lens, a critical lens that pushes for change and removal of colonial perceptions on Black bodies.

 

The Case: A Black Woman is Shot, But Who Cares?

Megan Thee Stallion, legally known as Megan Pete, a three-time Grammy winner, has created countless popular songs from Realer in 2019 to Cobra in 2023. She is known for her entertaining performances, sexual music, and vibrant persona. On July 12, 2020, a wave of shock spread on the internet when Megan was shot in the foot. In the article “What to Know about Megan Thee Stallion’s Shooting Case”, the author gives an overview of what happened. Megan was taken to the hospital, where she lied about where her injuries came from, due to feeling scared of the police department in a high police brutality time period, since it occurred around the time of George Floyd and many other victims (Lamantia, Mzezewa, Truffaut-Wong, 2023). Initially, when media did not know who the perpetrator was, there were many tweets in support of Megan under the #whoshotmeg tweets accompanied by memes, like “When the Hot Girls Found out Megan got Shot” and “me and my friends pulling up on #whoshotmeg (Kyiah, 2020).”

After some time, Megan told the truth, specifically to social media, saying the shooter was, fellow rapper, Tory Lanez. However, Lanez: “cast doubt on whether Megan had even been shot in the first place. He also suggested that if she had been shot, she couldn’t have seen who was shooting if she were walking away from the car at the time she sustained her injuries (Lamantia, Mzezewa, Truffaut-Wong, 2023).” With Lanez being a well-known rapper, there was a change in heart as to the support she received. Along with the perpetrator, countless social media users accused her of not telling the truth. The major dimensions that onlookers focused on was if Lanez was the perpetrator, whether Lanez Lanez and Megan Pete had a sexual relationship to cause the shooting, and whether Megan was even shot at all. I theorize that Megan’s race, gender, and confident sexuality allowed the public to feel justified in scrutinizing her.

In “Megan Thee Stallion Says She Doesn’t ‘Want to Live’ While Testifying against Tory Lanez” by Chelsea Sanchez, a quote from the courtroom: “’Every man in a position of power in the music industry has taken his side,’ Megan said. ‘Not a day goes by without being called a liar. This whole thing is about who I was having sex with, not who shot me, and I don’t know why.’ (Sanchez, 2022)” An example of other music artists, allegedly, taking Lanez’s side is Drake, who in his song “Circo Loco”, says, “This bitch lie ’bout getting shots, but she still a stallion / She don’t even get the joke but she still smiling.” The value placed on Megan’s life and mental/physical health, was determined on who shot her. Many people and institutions, including the legal system, made a mockery of Megan at a time when all she needed was a support system, and it was justified for deeply rooted misogynistic and racist reasons.

Another important person in the case was Megan Pete’s former best friend, Kelsey Harris. The “What to Know about the Megan Thee Stallion Shooting” article reported that the defense used the tense relationship between Megan and Harris to create the basis for their case, saying that Harris actually shot Megan: “The defense attorney reportedly alleged that Megan and Harris previously argued over romantic entanglements with Da Baby and Ben Simmons, and claimed that Megan and Harris had a physical fight at the scene of the shooting (Lamantia, Mzezewa, Truffaut-Wong, 2023).”

I want to use the way Megan was treated (not being believed, being mocked, and having her life completely exposed) to highlight the ways in which the abuse and mistreatment of Black women is founded on the continued colonization of Black bodies and lives. Additionally, I want to investigate what support was in place during this time, and on social media generally, for Black women by Black women.

 

The European Eye is Always Watching

“Megan Thee Stallions ‘shot girl summer’(hoodangel, 2020) ”

“Megan thee Stallion out here getting shot, call it a shot girl summer (veto, 2020)”

“I don’t know if people don’t take it seriously because I seem strong. I wonder if it’s because of the way I look,” [Megan] said. “Is it because I’m not light enough? Is it that I’m not white enough? Am I not the shape? The height? Because I’m not petite? Do I not seem like I’m worth being treated like a woman?” (Lamantia, Mzezewa, Truffaut-Wong, 2023)

—

Black women are expected to be and are, outright, labelled as ‘strong’, a word with the historical connotation to Black women as masculinization to justify their abuse and mistreatment. The ‘ungendering’ of Black women in enslavement, such as through the strenuous labor, facilitated and supported ‘strong’ stereotype based on their ability to fulfill the tasks. In the Coloniality of Gender, Lugones presents an excerpt:

“First came, led by an old driver carrying a whip, forty of the largest and strongest women I ever saw together; they were all in a simple uniform dress of a bluish check stuff, the skirts reaching little below the knee; their legs and feet were bare; they carried themselves loftily, each having a hoe over the shoulder, and walking with a free, powerful swing, like chasseurs on the march (Lugones, 2008).”

Black women are described as being so ‘strong’ in this admiring excerpt feeding the notion that Black women are not in need of protection or support. This ‘strength’ is a product of conditioning and psychological and physical torture, not a genetic quality. This torture and the expectation of enduring strength in Black women still prevail today, especially with Megan’s case, because, even though she was the victim, the European gaze people held, knew she could ‘handle’ it. This is similar to the ungendering Sojourner Truth spoke of in her Ain’t I Woman speech: “I could work as much and eat as much as a man – when I could get it – and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman (Truth, 1851)?” The lives that Black women were forced to live while enslaved were what was used to justify their ostracization from the category ‘women’.

In her victim impact statement, Megan says, “… I spiraled into a dark and angry place where I thought my life was worthless and I felt loneliness and shame (Pete, 2023).” Through the tribulations of the trial, Lanez mocking her, and speculator scrutiny, Megan experienced an intense mental health decline. Through the European eye, Black women are not supposed to feel pain, or to be hurt by something, especially not words. When this occurs, and they survive it, it is deemed an event that makes them stronger, or even to make them learn in a lesson, rather than a time of pain and trauma.

The endless forms of digital misogynoir, in forms of jokes, direct criticisms, and hateful jargon, directed toward Megan reject the notion that she could experience trauma from this situation, continuing the dehumanization of Black women in America. The uses of the term “Shot Girl Summer” in media, a play on words with Megan’s phrase “Hot Girl Summer,” were one of the many jokes used to poke at her injury. From pictured memes to just people laughing at the name, this is enough to depict the tip of the iceberg known as ‘Digital Misogynoir’. In the Digital Misogynoir Report, “Digital misogynoir is the continued, unchecked, and often violent dehumanization of Black women on social media, as well as through other forms such as algorithmic discrimination (Glitch, 2023) .” The digital Misogynoir that occurred was the constant disregard for the feelings and pain that Megan was sure to be harboring. The initial tweets, like in the #whoshotmeg threads, were very protective of Megan and proved to be ready to defend her, but once the person that shot Megan was revealed, this unity disappeared. The lack of protection of Black women is greatly evident online, where freedom of speech can go to far. Through a European lens, the same lens that governs what is allowed to be said online and what isn’t, the emotional abuse Megan suffered went severely unchecked, and it cost her the peace that should have accompanied her justice.

The reason that Megan was mocked in such a way can be traced to the lack of respect people and for her during the case. The Digital Misogynoir Report speaks on how Black women are meant to earn respect through their adherence to European ideals:

“There is a long-standing tradition within misogynoir abuse of using masculinisation as a way to denigrate and dehumanise Black women, creating a division between ‘women’ and ‘Black women’ who are othered as not fitting into society’s definitions of womanhood…A woman must have the body of a Black woman but the face of a European woman. Otherwise, her femininity and beauty are brought into question and scrutinized. Black women who do not adhere to this beauty standard are often masculinized and stripped of their femininity. Once a woman does not fit within the standard set to her, she is denied her femininity or respect.(Glitch, 2023)”

Megan’s existence is a direct confrontation to the idea that Black women’s value is placed in their respectability, since she is a tall, Black, and sexually explicit woman. In the “Master’s Tools Can Never Dismantle the Master’s House,” Audre Lorde discusses respectable women, as those who have not been: “forged in the crucibles of difference — those of us who are poor, who are lesbians, who are Black, who are older…(Lorde, 1979) ” Being respectable, through the European eye, is to not have an intersection of identities, or to be as close to Europeanness as possible.

Spillers shows how being beast-like applied to non-European lifestyles: “…for they had no knowledge of bread and wine, and they were without covering of clothes, or the lodgment of houses; and worse than all, through the great ignorance that was in them, in that they had no understanding of good, but only knew how to live in bestial sloth.(Spillers, 1987)” The terms for respectability, exclusive to European or European-adjacent bodies, is what determined Megan not being believed, being mocked in the media, and not being protected against the violence in the first place. Along similar lines, in Thinking Sex: Radical Thought Sex: Notes for Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality, Rubin states, “Most people mistake their sexual preferences for a universal system that will or should work for everyone.” (Rubin, 1984) Though it is talking about sexual nature, sexual nature is political and social, inherently. Through European colonization, European ideals and laws were forced onto non-European lives, especially the notion that non-European women are not respectable unless they assimilated to European culture, whether physically or mentally. For Megan, a tall, dark skinned, sexual, Black woman, she is not given respect. Megan, an abused and injured body, was a victim and deserved to be protected and uplifted during the time of her trial. Instead, she was cut down, questioned, and mocked because the public could not respect her enough. The strength that Black women were forced to acquire through enslavement was used against them as a way to portray them as masculinized and not respectable, since ‘women’ are meant to be the opposite.

However, social media was still used to defend Megan and call out the mockery that followed the shooting. One twitter user said, “Somebody referred to Megan as having a ‘shot girl summer’ and if you don’t get why we said protect Black women more a couple of weeks ago do you get it now? She could have died. (Amaya, 2020)” The ability to call out this misuse of media, of which was being used as a way as to degrade an injured Black woman, started conversation within the Black community to enact change. Lorde’s perspective on enacting change outside the means of “The Master’s Tools” was enacted in this way, by highlighting the harmful remarks of a Black woman and the emotional abuse that was being allowed to continue, as if it were not happening at all, a repercussion of Megan being at an intersection of identities.

In Coloniality of Gender, Lugones dissects how the Intersectionality of Black women’s identity allows the ignorance of their problems and their continued abuse:

“It becomes logically clear then that the logic of categorial separation distorts what exists at the intersection, such as violence against women of color…So, once intersectionality shows us what is missing, we have ahead of us the task of reconceptualizing the logic of the “intersection” so as to avoid separability(Lugones, 2008).”

Black women’s protection against verbal and physical is rarely on minds of legislatures, attorneys, or public media. Black women exist in between the margin of the things that matter in America, which is evident in the shooting and public humiliation of Megan. Black bodies are invisible, along with the struggles they endure.

 

*Protection Granted to Women Only*

—
Tweets:

“Yup! She Either shot herself or it’s made up for publicity (@politicaljordan, 2021)”
“Unpopular opinion: Lanez Lanez never shot Megan Thee Stallion and is innocent (Devin, 2021).”
(In response to above tweet:) “honestly shouldn’t be unpopular, there is no evidence against him (luvzach, 2021).”

The case of Megan Thee Stallion’s shooting shows how Black women are not seen as women through the European eye. “Womanhood” and “femininity” are based on the European woman, a woman with fair skin, who is soft and supple. Lugones emphasizes that,

“Females excluded from that description were not just [white women’s] subordinates. They were also understood to be animals in a sense that went further than the identification of white women with nature, infants, and small animals. They were understood as animals in the deep sense of ‘without gender,’ sexually marked as female, but without the characteristics of femininity. (Lugones, 2008)”

One cannot be deemed an animal, or even less than, and be granted womanhood, let alone the protection and support that is granted to their white counterparts. Megan’s plea to not be masculinized, to be supported, is the production of the enslaved woman. Her questioning if she could be treated like a woman is similar to Sojourner Truth’s speech “Ain’t I a Woman,” where she states, “That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain’t I a woman?(Truth, 1851)” During enslavement, White women were deemed beings to nurture and protect, whether by white men or white women communally.

Nurture and protection was not extended to Black women as they were masculinized so that they could do their share of work and be used at the disposal of their capturers. Enslaved women were given a ‘woman-adjacent’ status when it pleased the European gaze, yet that status was never complete. Although the standard for protection of women is not as traditional today, it still stands that, based on the misogynoir theory, Black bodies are not ‘protected’ by the public, meaning they supported, defending, and pushed to seek justice.

—
Tweet:

“Black women are so unprotected & we hold so many things in to protect the feelings of others w/o considering our own. It might be funny to y’all on the internet and just another messy topic for you to talk about but this is my real life and I’m real life hurt and traumatized.(@TheeStallion, 2020)

Some of the ways that Black women are silenced are through pushing harmful stereotypes. In the Digital Misogynoir Report, on of the tropes are described:

“[The Sapphire] trope presents Black women as “rude, loud, malicious, stubborn, and overbearing”. It creates the extremely harmful and violent idea that Black women speaking up on matters that are important to them, no matter how mundane or how significant, are not an example of wanting to “improve things; rather, she criticizes because she is unendingly bitter and wishes that unhappiness on others (Glitch, 2023).”

This differential understanding of Black women often leads to tone policing their voices, as well as dismissals and/or criticisms of their contributions to ‘public’ discussion, including social media. The dehumanizing nature of online abuse erodes Black women’s right to freedom of speech and self-expression, especially in instances like Megan where they are harmed. In the Black Feminist Statement, the Combahee River Collective says, “The mere names of the pejorative stereotypes attributed to black women …, let alone cataloguing the cruel, often murderous, treatment we receive, indicates how little value has been placed upon our lives during four centuries of bondage in the Western hemisphere (Combahee River Collective, 1977).” The way that Megan was perceived throughout the trial, how her pain was not considered through media, is reflective of the tropes that have followed Black women for centuries. Her many pleas for help, through tweets and interviews used in this essay, were ignored for the sake of making someone’s followers laugh or to uphold that one’s favorite rapper couldn’t have shot her. The support and protection of the Black body is contingent on whether they are going to be given it that day, or if something else is more important.

 

What is Owned Cannot “Own” Themselves

“You think its okay to shoot me then harass me online and make it like this was some weird cat fight what the actual fuck is wrong with you. (Pete, 2020)”

“I feel disgusted, I feel dirty, my own partner is embarrassed.” She also said, “I wish [Lanez] had just killed me, if I knew I would have to go through this torture (Levy, 2022).”

In this case, it is solidified that Black women’s sexualities are not their own but rather something for onlookers to spectate, investigate, and take advantage of. The defense team claimed that Harris, Megan’s friend, shot her because they both were having sex with Lanez and were upset at each other for it. Much of the public watched intensely and, through their scrutiny of Megan, exhibited how little respect the European gaze has for a Black woman that is confident in her sexuality. American culture, generally, sees sexual promiscuity or erotic behavior bad. Rubin, in Thinking Sex, says, “Virtually all erotic behavior is considered bad unless a specific reason to exempt it has been established. The most acceptable excuses are marriage, reproduction, and love(Rubin,1984).” Megan Thee Stallion had always been very open about her sexuality and, in this trial, media and the court used against her as a way to blame her for being shot. This is only possible when social media users, lawyers, and jurors look at the Black body with the European gaze because Black bodies are never owned by the person inhabiting it, meaning they cannot control the narratives put on them or the investigations held against them.

On the sexualization deprivation of Black women, Spillers quotes Patricia Hills Collins by saying,

“The image of Jezebel originated under slavery when Black women were portrayed as being, to use Jewelle Gomez’ words, ‘sexually aggressive’ wet nurses. The Jezebel’s function was to relegate all Black women to the category of sexually aggressive women, thus providing a powerful rationale for the widespread sexual assaults by White men typically reported by Black slave women (Spillers, 1987).”

Black women’s sexualities did not exist for the sake of the Black woman but for the European, because their bodily autonomy was completely in the hands of the European. When sub-humans begin to deviate sexually, especially with sexual behavior, they are now even further from the European ideal, relating back to the limitation of their respect.

Overall, this tactic of labeling non-European bodies as aggressively promiscuous is to justify the lust Europeans had for foreign bodies. Lugones asserts the colonial view of non-European bodies by quoting Imperial Leather,

“For centuries, the uncertain continents–Africa, the Americas, Asia–were figured in European lore as libidinously eroticized. Travelers’ tales abounded with visions of the monstrous sexuality of far-off lands, where, as legend had it, men sported gigantic penises and women consorted with apes, feminized men’s breasts flowed with milk and militarized women lopped theirs off. (22) Within this porno tropic tradition, women figured as the epitome of sexual aberration and excess. Folklore saw them, even more than the men, as given to a lascivious venery so promiscuous as to border on the bestial(Lugones, 2008).”

The masculinization of Black women, of which was accomplished through slavery and labelled stereotypes, prevents them from having autonomy in sex. Where white women are pure and could tempt a man, Black bodies are subhuman, sexually aggressive and the European man is forced to overtake them sexually. They are labelled to have a condemnable, yet intense sexuality that causes a European to be sucked into their vortex. When the European eye is not looking onto the Black body, the Black sexuality is expected no longer exist. When reality contradicts this perspective, like when Megan Thee Stallion affirms that she had sex with the person who shot her, the defense team deem it a good reason for her injury or abuse. In the Digital Misogynoir Report, “Fetishistic stereotypes are discussed, such as ‘big booty’ and ‘bbc’ which is a demeaning abbreviation for ‘big Black c**k’. Men indicate that they explicitly want to have sex with a Black woman, often because Black women are hypersexualized and therefore said to be more promiscuous(Glitch, 2023).” Through the European gaze, Black women are used for a specific purpose and pushed back into the darkness once the user is done. Megan’s music was praised and popularized for the benefit of the listeners, yet, when it was revealed she had sex with Lanez, she was condemned and shamed.

Through the Black gaze, Black women are permitted to be sexual and still be given access to support and protection amongst a community. Some tweets defended Megan’s sexuality saying, “We don’t care if Megan lied about having sex with Lanez Lanez. He still going to jail(April, 2022). ” This direct confrontation to the European Gaze allowed the perspective of respectability in the European stand to not matter. It is the notion that Megan being Black, being sexual, and being woman should not deter her from getting justice. The acknowledgement that Black women are not allowed to have access to both sexual confidence and justice through the European gaze, is the intersection to which the Black gaze should shine on. The Combahee River Collective supports the need for communal support in the Black gaze: “We do not have racial, sexual, heterosexual, or class privilege to rely upon, nor do we have even the minimal access to resources and power that groups who possess any one of these types of privilege have(Combahee River Collective, 1977).” Existing at an intersection of identities, means invisibility from the privileges of one’s respect identities could otherwise have. With Megan’s sexuality being shamed by onlookers and the court, it is imperative look through a Black gaze and see that the shame being placed on her in this situation only works because of her specific set of identities.

Usually, this perspective was also supported through the, forced, medical analysis of Black bodies. Black women, whom were not women but ‘female’, inhabited bodies which did not belong to themselves but rather the enslaver, were used in medical cases when they were sick, also can be determined as when they were not strong enough/useful to the enslaver. Spillers argues: “Among the myriad uses to which the enslaved community was put, Goodell identifies its value for medical research: ‘Assortments of diseased, damaged, and disabled Negroes, deemed incurable and otherwise worthless are bought up, it seems . .. by medical institutions, to be experimented and operated upon, for purposes of ‘medical education’ and the interest of medical science.’(Spillers, 1987)” The medical use of Black bodies during slavery fuels notions that Black Bodies are valuable based on it’s usefulness to the European ideal, whether through scientific investigation, sexual fantasies or forced labor.

 

Conclusion

I used the shooting of Megan Thee Stallion to theorize on, and use, the Black gaze. The Black gaze analyzes the European lens of non-European bodies and confronts the popular conceptions of those bodies, done by analyzing stereotypes, abuse, and shame placed on Black women. Through this transformative gaze, a transformation inspired by the call to change in “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House,” analyzes the trauma and humiliation that Megan Thee Stallion endured, deeming it a direct result of colonial history of the perception of Black bodies.

To respect the sexuality and bodily autonomy of a Black woman while looking through the European eye is to consider Black women human and free, yet, because of the colonial histories that enslaved bodies endured, this is impossible. In the colonizer perspective, Black women exist to be used by the spectator and, therefore, cannot be free to “use” themselves in the same manner. This prevents Black women from seeking justice, being sexual, or merely existing outside of European standards. Digital Misogynoir breeds due to the continued invisibility forced onto Black women and their struggles, allowing the abuses that Megan endured to flourish.

The Black gaze is the only way to revolutionize the perception Black women have of their autonomy and human rights, on and offline. The more we can close the watchful and controlling European eye that we were conditioned to use through colonization, the more we can view ourselves through the only lens that matters: our own.

 

References

 

Combahee River Collective. (1977) A Black Feminist Statement. Women’s Studies Quarterly. https://sakai.claremont.edu/access/content/group/CX_mtg_164358/Readings%20Class%207%20-%20September%2019th%2C%202023%20-%20Black%20Feminist%20Theory/Combahee%20River%20Collective%20-%20Black%20Feminist%20Statement.pdf
Glitch, UK (2023) The Digital Misogynoir Report: Ending the dehumanising of Black women on social media. www.glitchcharity.co.uk/research

Lamantia, B., Mzezewa, T. Truffaut-Wong, O. (2023). What to Know About the Megan Thee Stallion Shooting Case. The Cut. https://www.thecut.com/article/megan-thee-stallion-and-Lanez-lanezs-assault-case-recap.html

Levy, G. (2022) Megan Thee Stallion’s Fight for Justice Was a Test. This Time We Passed. NBC. https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/megan-thee-stallion-Lanez-lanez-verdict-test-for-black-women-victims-rcna62869

Lorde, A. (1979). The Master’s Tools Never Dismantle the Master’s House. https://sakai.claremont.edu/access/content/group/CX_mtg_164358/Readings%20Class%207%20-%20September%2019th%2C%202023%20-%20Black%20Feminist%20Theory/Lorde%20-%20The%20Master_s%20Tools%20subrayado.pdf

Lugones, M. (2008). The Coloniality of Gender. Worlds & Knowledges Otherwise
https://sakai.claremont.edu/access/content/group/CX_mtg_164358/Readings%20Class%203%20-%20January%2024th%2C%202023%20-%20The%20Sociological%20Imagination%20and%20the%20Coloniality%20of%20Gender/Lugones%20-%20Coloniality%20of%20Gender.pdf

Pete, M. (2023). Victim Impact Statement. https://twitter.com/meghanncuniff/status/1692356869237706874/photo/1

Rubin, G. (1984). Thinking Sex: Notes for Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality.
https://sakai.claremont.edu/access/content/group/CX_mtg_164358/Class%2016%20-%20October%2024th%2C%202023%20-%20Compulsory%20Heterosexuality/Rubin%20-%20Thinking%20Sex.pdf

Sanchez, C. (2022). Megan Thee Stallion says she Doesn’t “Want to Live” While Testifying Against Lanez Lanez. Bazarr.
https://www.harpersbazaar.com/celebrity/latest/a42243440/megan-thee-stallion-testify-Lanez-lanez-shooting/

Spillers, H. J. (1987). Mama’s Baby Papa’s Maybe: An American Grammar Book. JSTOR. https://www.jstor.org/stable/464747

Truth, S. (1851). Ain’t I a Woman Speech. https://thehermitage.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Sojourner-Truth_Aint-I-a-Woman_1851.pdf

amaya. [@amayarearden] (2020, July 22). Somebody referred to Megan as having a “shot girl summer” and if you don’t get why we said protect Black women more a couple weeks ago do you get it now? She could’ve died[Tweet]. Twitter.
April [@TripleOGAyeP] (2022, December 12). We don’t care if Megan lied about having sex with Lanez Lanez. He still going to jail. [Tweet]. Twitter.

Devin. [@Bladein99] (2021, December 14). Unpopular Opinion: Lanez Lanez never shot Megan Thee Stallion and is innocent[Tweet]. Twitter.

Kyiah. [@official_kyiah_]. (2020, July 15). Me and my friends pulling up on #whoshotmeg [Tweet]. Twitter.

veto. [@vitovansano]. (2020, August 21). Megan the Stallion out here getting shot, call it a shot girl summer[Tweet]. Twitter.

hoodangel. [@suisevenfifty_]. (2020, July 17). Megan Thee Stallions ‘shot girl summer’ [Tweet]. Twitter.

luvzach. [@luvzach__] (2021, December 14). Honestly shouldn’t be unpopular there’s no evidence against him [Tweet]. Twitter.

[@politicaljordan] (2021, December 16). Yup! She either shot herself or it’s made up for publicity [Tweet]. Twitter.

Tina Snow [@theestallion] (2020, July 17). Black women are so unprotected & we hold so many things in to protect the feelings of others w/o considering our own. It might be funny to y’all on the internet and just another messy topic for you to talk about but this is my real life and I’m real life hurt and traumatized. [Tweet]. Twitter.