Siddity in the City

I’m tired as hell these days and I definitely have a lot on my mind lately (paying bills, earning money for bills, wondering how the hell I’m going to pay my bills and rent, etc.) but media hasn’t really been one of them. I haven’t been reading mags, even though I’m currently temping for one. I’ve fallen way off the blogosphere, and haven’t been checking the Internets mag haunts for a minute now.

The last 24 hours or so, though, I’ve slipped back in for a look-see, prolly because it’s been dreary here in Chicago all weekend. A few thoughts:

1. After this month, Vixen is gone for good–or at least until they justify a special issue somewhere down the line–so get your copy while you can. Then put it with your other final issues of Honey and Suede in the R.I.P. pile. Then cry, because Jet and Ebony are still afloat, though written at the 4th grade level. What is wrong with our media-consuming public? Gotdamn.

2. Jimi Izrael. I can’t say I have ever really liked the guy, even way back in his Africana days, but he’s generally not someone I give a whole lot of thought. He seems to be pretty dogged in his journalistic determination, but he spells like a dyslexic and is way too chest-thumping-angry-misogynist for my liking. Sometimes, though, you need to be reminded of why you don’t like someone in order to carry on not liking them. It is incredibly depressing to read his thoughts on black women, homosexuality, and masculinity. It is especially depressing to read the opinions of the troglodytes who come out in his comments box to support him. Ick. Apparently, lil’ Jimi feels like all the problems black men face in the world are everybody else’s fault, including (especially) black women, who, having “decided” of our own feminist accord to break apart the black family in the ’70s (clearly all single black mothers are single because they just wanted to act a fool alone. I’m sure the fathers in these families did everything in their herculean power to make the relationships work), are now also responsible for homosexuality in black men. *eyes rolled toward heaven* Exactly who is “responsible” for homosexuality in the rest of the population, following this logic?

3. Glamour is a “don’t” for women of color. So, yeah. In case you’d forgotten, Glamour is really for focus-group-ready white women. The editors over there got no love for black women who don’t try their hardest to be white. Case in point: the Glamour ed who, having gone to chat up a group of young lawyers, told them all that natural black hairstyles–’fros and locks–were a corporate “don’t” because the styles were “political.”

Bitch, please. Go ahead and crawl back to 4 Times Square, settle your dessicated, Glamour-approved carcass into your cubicle chair, and write another bullshit “Look great at any age!” article that seemed a brilliant idea after your eleventh-straight skipped meal. Oh, I’m sorry, was that a tired stereotype of your intentions and appearance based on superficial evidence and extremely narrow, prejudiced thinking? My bad.

h/t Ding, Jezebel (of which, incidentally, I am fonder than nearly all the other bazillion heads of the hydra that is Gawker Media.)

4. Obama graces Vibe with a few minutes of his time. I’m glad–so, so, so very glad–that DS went with the political cover. Vibe has had lots of detractors lately, most of them insisting Vibe just ain’t saying much. I think putting Barack front and center makes for a nice FU to the critics. But. I was saddened by the Editor’s letter. It seemed she felt the need to justify her choice, to explain to our fellow negroes why a cover story on the first black presidential candidate with a shot at the title belonged in a mag like Vibe, like she needed to put him in a ‘hood-friendly context. It doesn’t upset me that she said it; it saddens me she may be right. We may have fallen far enough off our civic engagement game that we need to be spoon-fed justifications for why a cover subject is wearing his own well-tailored gear instead of the ironic, shiny suits and Air Force Ones the mag stylist might have chosen. But such is the fate of minority candidates. The media will harp on your aesthetics as much as your politics.

The interview is pretty good. Obama is a smart, slick character, and he doesn’t ever veer from his talking points. Better education for all, troops out of Iraq, etc. He wouldn’t even answer a perfunctory question about his music preferences in a direct manner. He said what his iPod would probably contain–music from his youth, black music old enough to not be controversial–rather than just saying what it did contain. Yeah, it’s a single word, but it makes all the difference between a clear answer and prevarication. I don’t give two shits what he’s listening to, but I do like to pick out candidates’ little telltale phrasings. It makes me feel like I’m paying attention.