Birth of a Black Feminist Podcast

Last Friday, a dynamic duo of petty Black feminists “popped their trunks” and shared with the world The Black Joy Mixtape. Hosted by the High Priestess of Black Joy, Amber J. Phillips, and the King of da South, Jazmine Walker,  The Black Joy Mixtape is a new podcast full of laughs, information, and Black feminist perspectives.

In their inaugural episode titled “Birth of a Black Feminist”, they discuss Jazmine Sullivan’s Facebook eulogy to gospel singer Thomas “TC” Clay, Issa Rae’s new HBO show Insecure, and the controversy of Nate Parker and Birth of a Nation. Last week Amber was a guest on Roland Martin’s News One Now. She recapped what happened leading up to her appearance on the show and what she believes is at the heart of the pushback against Nate Parker and his film.

Black feminists are not solely angry about Nate Parker being accused of sexual assault or the film about Nat Turner that he produced and directed being historically inaccurate. They are also angry and hurt at yet another example of the silencing and scapegoating of Black women by Black men. After Black women gave valid reasons for not wanting to see Birth of a Nation, their reasons were belittled to pettiness that somehow centered on Nate Parker’s wife being white with no regards to what Black women were actually critiquing.

When Black women highlight issues of violence against Black trans women, intimate partner violence impacting Black women, and police violence against Black women, they are told that they are being divisive and working against Black men. But as Amber and Jazmine point out in their first episode, we will get nowhere in the process of liberation if we exclude people and their experiences. Amber ends their discussion of the film with a challenge to Black men: stand up for Black women. She challenges Black men to struggle with the question of what it means to be an active ally to Black women, and to fully commit themselves to the liberation of all Black people and not just themselves.

As a fan of podcasts like The Read and Another Round, I’m super excited to add a new one to my weekly line-up that centers the voices and experiences of Black people. Amber says that one of the reasons she and Jazmine wanted to create their podcast was the need for more Black media. If you’d like to check out this Black media masterpiece, you can find the podcast on Soundcloud and can follow them on Twitter.

Photo courtesy of The Black Joy Mixtape.