Girl I loved this piece. They truly hate to see us live in softness and it’s rooted in our place of service in their lives. And the way you weaved in Meg The Stallion *chefs kiss*. As someone with a minor in journalism, I truly can’t understand why these roles keep going to influencers and celebrities. There’s a reason people go though rigorous academic and professional training to be in journalism. This is the type of content I love to see!
This was beautifully said. I’ve already commented other things on Threads, but I wanted to take a minute to mention how your piece really sparked some more thoughts and loving memories of Black motherhood and joy for me.
Growing up; my very obviously Black mom was a SAHM to my Mexican-American father (who voted Harris 😉). He had a Union job w/the city where he could study and be promoted w/o a degree as a firefighter. My mom was able to attend school events volunteering; baking cakes; making us baskets for our achievements at school and home. There were white and white Mexican women who were SOOO jealous of my mom for not *having* to work!
(Those 304s were the reason I was determined to learn Spanish and defend my Mama!)
Maybe I didn’t have name brands until I was about 16, but I had her presence, love and her joy.
Mom clipped coupons, showed me how to hustle up a coin, and was even the “candy lady”, too.
Seeing Meghan take time to delight in doing things for her family, friends and community reminds me of the ways my mom used to do that.
Losing her to complications from Scleroderma (an autoimmune disease similar to Lupus) has made me relish those moments all the more. She was decorating her second home before she ascended on Good Friday 2023.
No one can tell me Black women don’t DESERVE the soft life!
Thank you for sharing. Those 304's were spot on. I couldn't figure out why so much hatred is directed towards beautiful, intelligent, hardworking Black Women until I experienced how Dr. Michelle Robinson Obama was treated for eight years. I love both Dr/Mrs. Obama and Mrs. Sussex. They show we don't have to accept that tired narrative. We can find love and have beautiful children and have homes where we are safe. And we can create that bag! I love the Duke of Sussex too. He stands by his wife because of what his Mother experienced. He experienced mental health issues too. He found the strong support he needed in Megan. Megan got him away from those nasty Brexit people because she had connections. BTW f*** all those plastic blow up dolls called Khardasians.
I threw my tambourine when I got to this graf (ha, editor speak): "Black women don’t exist in softness. We only exist in service. White people don’t want to watch a Black woman live a life of ease. They just want her to arrange theirs."
Listen, Danielle. Cadet. Sister. I am so grateful that the world gets to experience more of your intellect (with the right amount of humor) and realness through this platform. Thank you!
Great article!! I often wondered why so many women hate Megan Markle. You hit the nail on the head….. Black women are supposed to serve not be ladies of leisure. Haters gonna hate. Before you know it they’re going to say she’s a DEI higher. This is a crazy world we live in. Subscribing now 😃
This is such a great piece — thank you for sharing! I’ve been trying to put my finger on why the criticism for this show had me feeling unsettled, and this is 100% it.
This is so thoughtful and relatable. Thank you for writing it! I’m also not a Megan stan but it’s wild to watch folks so irked by her happiness and how she’s normalizing Black women in the domestic sphere. As I read your piece, I also thought about how many Black women throughout time have done exactly what Megan is doing, but are invisible in our culture. My great grandmother and great aunt never worked outside the home or drove, they made fresh bread and meals daily (from scratch) and put a huge amount of love and tenderness into their homes and families. Our history is not just about work and struggle. We’ve always been entitled to and in many ways have been working towards softness.
I stumbled upon this too on threads and really loved it. I wrote a substack on this too but a totally diff lens. This is so so much more of an in depth read and so well articulated. I love what you’re saying here. There’s no shortage of these shows on tv with anyone else but when she did it, the media outrage was unreal. Good on her. I love that she just keeps doing her. And I am about to subscribe to this substack ! Great piece!
This was such a great piece! I stumbled upon it on threads! Thanks for voicing what so many black women struggle with… putting down having to be hard and independent.
For all those that are penning hit pieces or willfully writing snarky comments on social media about Meghan Markle, Ms. Sussex if ya nasty, it's not the flex you think it is. I want you to step into her sensible designer heels & imagine THE ENTIRE WORLD🌎 picking apart your writing, your style…hell, your every move & ask yourself how'd you feel? This level of hate is unfathomable to say the least!
But most of all, I'm left perplexed.
If ya don't like her--don't watch & don't comment. Some of y'all are just assholes. And you wonder why all the men you date are assholes….hmmn, what's that about like attracting like?
Oh yes! This encapsulated some of my running thoughts I've had since the Grammys re: babyface interview on the red carpet, and this level of nonchalant "disrespect" and disconnect that we've started to see from interviewers on red carpets – y'all need to study up, get some media training, and respect the greats, that's all I have to say!
The MM hate, especially for this show, makes me laugh at this point; because even beyond the traditional home-living shows of Ina and Martha or the early 2000s, I simply cannot believe people worship the home/cooking/day-in-the-life social media content, from random 20-year-olds, but want to FIGHT when a Black woman, who mind you, had a successful lifestyle blog, is simply living her best life. Be mad, because she just got renewed for season 2! LOL
As even her haters would point out, she isn't white passing. Maybe white looking or perceived as white by some. In fact, the way white people want their perceptions of her to define and control her might make her the Blackest woman on the planet. Point is, these words matter. Please don't feed the trolls. Passing is a specific and intentional act. If she were white passing, there'd be headlines about her lying about her race. She's a light biracial, not the first or the last. The loaded phrase of white passing is really unfair to add to her plate.
I love what you wrote here, and certainly nodded around the Kim eating a salad moment, BUT… it is the “Meghan wearing her Blackness like a sweater on her shoulders she can take on and off” that is what gets at me. I know I would feel differently if the passing wasn’t so overt. It’s a fine line, and I’m more than aware of identity politics in my own journey and off. It has always been something I notice.
The white media will always hate her because she is different and gave Kate a run for her money, but I can’t help but feel disappointed that many of us root for her, and the response feels lukewarm at best.
I’m curious….would we all or some of us feel differently if for example, some episodes her hair was straight and others it was her natural curls…. And ironically, for some people that might do it for them.
Does her mom make an appearance? She is a Black woman with locs… as a producer, there are little hints that would have nodded to the Black community, even. That would 💯 make her different than a Martha Stewart.
I watched a couple episodes and often compared to Martha Stewart bc as much as she wore a crisp shirt, it felt like it could get dirty, and when she was in the dirt, she felt as close to relatable as a white woman in Connecticut can be. Economically, Meghan is pushing a perfectionism that not everyone can afford, certainly not everyone with two kids.
I’ve loved her work since Suits, and have always rooted for her, but even reading this piece and these comments, it’s like that person you have to love from afar because you’re actually not sure if they’ll love you back.
And that’s about as much energy as I have for the 1% problems today.
Excellent! Your perspective is spot on. The hatred always felt like something beyond the usual. It’s that the gen (White) public doesn’t want to see Black people living the life of ease they envisioned for themselves. It shatters their upper-class fantasy.
When did she ever say she was trying to relate to you or anybody? Who even wants to be relatable?She's only ever tried to explain who she is. Because people are fascinated by her. They create lies about her. She's attempting to define and share herself on her own terms -- as too many entitled people have demanded -- and you still say it's not good enough. You can't see yourself in her? You shouldn't. She is her own person. As are you.
Not sure who your comment/reply was to, but there's an entire industry built around selling relatability AKA influencers. Her blog certainly started as her sharing her own interests in food, travel, wellness...but most people don't start any kind of content initiative like that just for fun. The eventual goal is usually to monetize, so...to influence people to buy stuff based on your taste.
I'm a general MM fan and wish her well (her show was already renewed for a 2nd season, so there's enough people plugged in love it or hate it, that netflix saw value in it). But if she weren't trying to be relatable, I don't think we'd see her making an "easy" one-pot pasta dish and bath salts for guests.
I think relatability is a word for unethical marketers and corporations. They use another person's - an influencer or celebrity or kind-looking unknown actor - perceived honesty to simulate their own. I don't think most people choose friends whose experiences match their own. (What would you talk about? lolol). Isn't it about the vibe and the way a person moves through and views the world (kindness, honesty, humor, etc)? To me, naming someone as relatable kind of announces that you're using them as an avatar and judging their actions against your own beliefs and imagination. That's not a safe or loving position for the avatar to be in. And maybe the celebrity-public relationship has become that now because life is more expensive than ever and most people struggle to leave the class they were born into. Meghan made it out, rejected that "better" class, and is doing even better. Her only crime is ruining the fantasies of people who read People magazine (or whatever gossip source) to distract from their own lives. Her story says that you can't behave or look your way into acceptance from the people in control. That's what we're all sold. And, for some, they'd rather be angry at Meg for "failing" to fit in than sit with the depressing fact that the game is a joke. Like, do people not see that Europe's rich and titled don't let their daughters marry into that family? Kate Middleton was just as middle class as Meg, but people ignore it - and the way she struggles in the role - because she's white.
The online hate and racism is real for sure but Megan’s also has bad advisors and it’s one of the reasons a lot of the stuff she’s tried to launch in the last few years have failed. They’re just not terribly interesting.
I agree with this. The last I checked, the companion website isn't even ready to start selling the products mentioned on the show, i think it says "coming soon" or something. Big mistake, and what's the hold up? Wasn't the show already delayed? I want her to succeed, but she needs smarter people running things.
Very this, i feel like if she had been able to continue with being "online" during her time as a royal, she would have been able to keep up with the changing trends. But honestly, with the amount of vitriol she's had to deal with, I wouldn't want to be online either. I hope she finds her footing and gets a strong team in place to guide her along, I really do.
Decent analysis from Tina Brown, but it unfortunately fails to mention the unmitigated abuse Meghan faced while there that we now know largely came from rags speaking on behalf of family members. Sure, it would have been easy for Harry and Meghan to just lay low stick it out for a bit if they had just left her the f#&k alone. Also no mention of Harry largely being the reason that they left in the first place. All that I think plays into the situation they're in now.
Yes yes yes - that line about Kim eating a salad but not Meghan making one PHEWWWW!!!! All of this!
Yes, that sentence is work of art!
I love your text!!! Great article!!
^^^^^^^^^^
Girl I loved this piece. They truly hate to see us live in softness and it’s rooted in our place of service in their lives. And the way you weaved in Meg The Stallion *chefs kiss*. As someone with a minor in journalism, I truly can’t understand why these roles keep going to influencers and celebrities. There’s a reason people go though rigorous academic and professional training to be in journalism. This is the type of content I love to see!
This was beautifully said. I’ve already commented other things on Threads, but I wanted to take a minute to mention how your piece really sparked some more thoughts and loving memories of Black motherhood and joy for me.
Growing up; my very obviously Black mom was a SAHM to my Mexican-American father (who voted Harris 😉). He had a Union job w/the city where he could study and be promoted w/o a degree as a firefighter. My mom was able to attend school events volunteering; baking cakes; making us baskets for our achievements at school and home. There were white and white Mexican women who were SOOO jealous of my mom for not *having* to work!
(Those 304s were the reason I was determined to learn Spanish and defend my Mama!)
Maybe I didn’t have name brands until I was about 16, but I had her presence, love and her joy.
Mom clipped coupons, showed me how to hustle up a coin, and was even the “candy lady”, too.
Seeing Meghan take time to delight in doing things for her family, friends and community reminds me of the ways my mom used to do that.
Losing her to complications from Scleroderma (an autoimmune disease similar to Lupus) has made me relish those moments all the more. She was decorating her second home before she ascended on Good Friday 2023.
No one can tell me Black women don’t DESERVE the soft life!
Thank you, Danielle.
-Ebony aka “Wanda’s Child”
Thank you for sharing. Those 304's were spot on. I couldn't figure out why so much hatred is directed towards beautiful, intelligent, hardworking Black Women until I experienced how Dr. Michelle Robinson Obama was treated for eight years. I love both Dr/Mrs. Obama and Mrs. Sussex. They show we don't have to accept that tired narrative. We can find love and have beautiful children and have homes where we are safe. And we can create that bag! I love the Duke of Sussex too. He stands by his wife because of what his Mother experienced. He experienced mental health issues too. He found the strong support he needed in Megan. Megan got him away from those nasty Brexit people because she had connections. BTW f*** all those plastic blow up dolls called Khardasians.
You've got me tearing up, Wanda raised a great one 💜
Thank you, so very much! It’s amazing how much simple values can connect people across space and time.
You outlined how their family values and humanity are what brought them together over pride and worry about maintaining appearances.
Thank you for sharing! Xx ♥️
I threw my tambourine when I got to this graf (ha, editor speak): "Black women don’t exist in softness. We only exist in service. White people don’t want to watch a Black woman live a life of ease. They just want her to arrange theirs."
Listen, Danielle. Cadet. Sister. I am so grateful that the world gets to experience more of your intellect (with the right amount of humor) and realness through this platform. Thank you!
Love you sister!!!
Great article!! I often wondered why so many women hate Megan Markle. You hit the nail on the head….. Black women are supposed to serve not be ladies of leisure. Haters gonna hate. Before you know it they’re going to say she’s a DEI higher. This is a crazy world we live in. Subscribing now 😃
Proud of you! Because of you I’ve downloaded this app xx
KP!! This made me tear up. THANK YOU!
This is such a great piece — thank you for sharing! I’ve been trying to put my finger on why the criticism for this show had me feeling unsettled, and this is 100% it.
This is so thoughtful and relatable. Thank you for writing it! I’m also not a Megan stan but it’s wild to watch folks so irked by her happiness and how she’s normalizing Black women in the domestic sphere. As I read your piece, I also thought about how many Black women throughout time have done exactly what Megan is doing, but are invisible in our culture. My great grandmother and great aunt never worked outside the home or drove, they made fresh bread and meals daily (from scratch) and put a huge amount of love and tenderness into their homes and families. Our history is not just about work and struggle. We’ve always been entitled to and in many ways have been working towards softness.
AMEN!
I stumbled upon this too on threads and really loved it. I wrote a substack on this too but a totally diff lens. This is so so much more of an in depth read and so well articulated. I love what you’re saying here. There’s no shortage of these shows on tv with anyone else but when she did it, the media outrage was unreal. Good on her. I love that she just keeps doing her. And I am about to subscribe to this substack ! Great piece!
This was such a great piece! I stumbled upon it on threads! Thanks for voicing what so many black women struggle with… putting down having to be hard and independent.
I second ALLL of this!🙋🏾♀️
Here's my take (I recently put in a note):
For all those that are penning hit pieces or willfully writing snarky comments on social media about Meghan Markle, Ms. Sussex if ya nasty, it's not the flex you think it is. I want you to step into her sensible designer heels & imagine THE ENTIRE WORLD🌎 picking apart your writing, your style…hell, your every move & ask yourself how'd you feel? This level of hate is unfathomable to say the least!
But most of all, I'm left perplexed.
If ya don't like her--don't watch & don't comment. Some of y'all are just assholes. And you wonder why all the men you date are assholes….hmmn, what's that about like attracting like?
Loving your reply.
Oh yes! This encapsulated some of my running thoughts I've had since the Grammys re: babyface interview on the red carpet, and this level of nonchalant "disrespect" and disconnect that we've started to see from interviewers on red carpets – y'all need to study up, get some media training, and respect the greats, that's all I have to say!
The MM hate, especially for this show, makes me laugh at this point; because even beyond the traditional home-living shows of Ina and Martha or the early 2000s, I simply cannot believe people worship the home/cooking/day-in-the-life social media content, from random 20-year-olds, but want to FIGHT when a Black woman, who mind you, had a successful lifestyle blog, is simply living her best life. Be mad, because she just got renewed for season 2! LOL
As even her haters would point out, she isn't white passing. Maybe white looking or perceived as white by some. In fact, the way white people want their perceptions of her to define and control her might make her the Blackest woman on the planet. Point is, these words matter. Please don't feed the trolls. Passing is a specific and intentional act. If she were white passing, there'd be headlines about her lying about her race. She's a light biracial, not the first or the last. The loaded phrase of white passing is really unfair to add to her plate.
Thank you for the comment. Like she chose how her skin would look.
I love what you wrote here, and certainly nodded around the Kim eating a salad moment, BUT… it is the “Meghan wearing her Blackness like a sweater on her shoulders she can take on and off” that is what gets at me. I know I would feel differently if the passing wasn’t so overt. It’s a fine line, and I’m more than aware of identity politics in my own journey and off. It has always been something I notice.
The white media will always hate her because she is different and gave Kate a run for her money, but I can’t help but feel disappointed that many of us root for her, and the response feels lukewarm at best.
I’m curious….would we all or some of us feel differently if for example, some episodes her hair was straight and others it was her natural curls…. And ironically, for some people that might do it for them.
Does her mom make an appearance? She is a Black woman with locs… as a producer, there are little hints that would have nodded to the Black community, even. That would 💯 make her different than a Martha Stewart.
I watched a couple episodes and often compared to Martha Stewart bc as much as she wore a crisp shirt, it felt like it could get dirty, and when she was in the dirt, she felt as close to relatable as a white woman in Connecticut can be. Economically, Meghan is pushing a perfectionism that not everyone can afford, certainly not everyone with two kids.
I’ve loved her work since Suits, and have always rooted for her, but even reading this piece and these comments, it’s like that person you have to love from afar because you’re actually not sure if they’ll love you back.
And that’s about as much energy as I have for the 1% problems today.
Great pieces spark dialogue. You did that! 😊
Her mother is in the final episode and she talks about her mother and grandma throughout the series.
Oh great. I’m through two episodes, and haven’t yet heard a lot of reference…. Couldn’t really make it a binge, but this is great to know.
I think you’re right and I’m going to address this in my write up today or tomorrow. I hope they don’t fight me. lol.
Excellent! Your perspective is spot on. The hatred always felt like something beyond the usual. It’s that the gen (White) public doesn’t want to see Black people living the life of ease they envisioned for themselves. It shatters their upper-class fantasy.
You are right about everything here and I still found the show incredibly boring while trying very hard to sell us some weird brand of relatability.
When did she ever say she was trying to relate to you or anybody? Who even wants to be relatable?She's only ever tried to explain who she is. Because people are fascinated by her. They create lies about her. She's attempting to define and share herself on her own terms -- as too many entitled people have demanded -- and you still say it's not good enough. You can't see yourself in her? You shouldn't. She is her own person. As are you.
Not sure who your comment/reply was to, but there's an entire industry built around selling relatability AKA influencers. Her blog certainly started as her sharing her own interests in food, travel, wellness...but most people don't start any kind of content initiative like that just for fun. The eventual goal is usually to monetize, so...to influence people to buy stuff based on your taste.
I'm a general MM fan and wish her well (her show was already renewed for a 2nd season, so there's enough people plugged in love it or hate it, that netflix saw value in it). But if she weren't trying to be relatable, I don't think we'd see her making an "easy" one-pot pasta dish and bath salts for guests.
I think relatability is a word for unethical marketers and corporations. They use another person's - an influencer or celebrity or kind-looking unknown actor - perceived honesty to simulate their own. I don't think most people choose friends whose experiences match their own. (What would you talk about? lolol). Isn't it about the vibe and the way a person moves through and views the world (kindness, honesty, humor, etc)? To me, naming someone as relatable kind of announces that you're using them as an avatar and judging their actions against your own beliefs and imagination. That's not a safe or loving position for the avatar to be in. And maybe the celebrity-public relationship has become that now because life is more expensive than ever and most people struggle to leave the class they were born into. Meghan made it out, rejected that "better" class, and is doing even better. Her only crime is ruining the fantasies of people who read People magazine (or whatever gossip source) to distract from their own lives. Her story says that you can't behave or look your way into acceptance from the people in control. That's what we're all sold. And, for some, they'd rather be angry at Meg for "failing" to fit in than sit with the depressing fact that the game is a joke. Like, do people not see that Europe's rich and titled don't let their daughters marry into that family? Kate Middleton was just as middle class as Meg, but people ignore it - and the way she struggles in the role - because she's white.
The online hate and racism is real for sure but Megan’s also has bad advisors and it’s one of the reasons a lot of the stuff she’s tried to launch in the last few years have failed. They’re just not terribly interesting.
I agree with this. The last I checked, the companion website isn't even ready to start selling the products mentioned on the show, i think it says "coming soon" or something. Big mistake, and what's the hold up? Wasn't the show already delayed? I want her to succeed, but she needs smarter people running things.
Also I think she’s trying to recreate 2010s blogging/online culture and that’s why a lot of this falls flat.
My sis said the same; she's like 12 years behind
Very this, i feel like if she had been able to continue with being "online" during her time as a royal, she would have been able to keep up with the changing trends. But honestly, with the amount of vitriol she's had to deal with, I wouldn't want to be online either. I hope she finds her footing and gets a strong team in place to guide her along, I really do.
I thought this analysis from Tina Brown was spot on https://open.substack.com/pub/tinabrown/p/meghans-buzzkill-and-a-murder-mystery?r=u7h9k&utm_medium=ios
Decent analysis from Tina Brown, but it unfortunately fails to mention the unmitigated abuse Meghan faced while there that we now know largely came from rags speaking on behalf of family members. Sure, it would have been easy for Harry and Meghan to just lay low stick it out for a bit if they had just left her the f#&k alone. Also no mention of Harry largely being the reason that they left in the first place. All that I think plays into the situation they're in now.