Oh, Uh-Uh: Bhad Bhabie needs to hire someone to do her social media

Bhad Bhabie probably needs someone else to manage her social media.

The 17-year-old rapper, born Danielle Marie Peskowitz, is best known for her appearance on Dr. Phil (yes, Cash-Me-Outsside girl). Danielle has now created a name for herself in the music space with rappers like Kodak Black and Megan The Stallion recently got into major hot water over her new look.

Because of her recently plumped lips, skin darkening, with the addition of braids and cornrows as well as donning a “Blaccent” (adopting the stereotypical mannerisms of Black People) critics and fans alike have accused Danielle of blackfishing (putting on stereotypical aesthetics of Blackness in order to make one's appearance look Black or racially ambiguous).

Unfortunately, Danielle took to her Instagram, ranting disjointedly and ultimately making her own situation worse. Initially, the 17-year-old waved off the criticism and hit back that people “need to chill and focus on what’s important right now” in reference to the coronavirus crisis. Now, the “Gucci Flip Flops” rapper took to Instagram Live to defend her decision to darken her skin and shot down accusations that she was trying to be Black.

“Maybe the reason for that is because I grew up in the hood. Tarzan…he grew up around the bears in the jungle. He didn’t know no better…Tarzan was with the monkeys. He grew up with that. That’s all he knows! When someone grows up in a certain area or a certain place, they’re a part of their environment. They only know what’s been around them.”

She continues, “I can’t help it if I act a little hood or act [like] what y’all would say is more Black. I’m sorry. That’s the type of people I grew up around. I may do some little things that may make you think I’m trying to be Black. But, I’m not. I’m not trying to be Black.”

Yes. She compared her own upbringing in Boynton Beach Florida, a town whose racial breakdown is 62% White and 31% Black, to Tarzan in the jungle. Danielle compared her growing up exposed to Black people or as she says “in the hood” with Tarzan living with Apes.

Yes, that is racist.

Referring or comparing Black people to Apes or Monkeys is one of the oldest racist tropes around. Hundreds of years slavery required reducing people to objects. This required systematic dehumanization. After all, if I view you and your family as I would a chair set I find at a thrift store, but I only need one chair, it is easy for me to break up the set by only taking one of you and not feel guilty that I am destroying a family.

Science of the time really didn’t help matters. Josiah C. Nott and George R. Gliddon, both leading scientists of the day, in their 1854 Types of Mankind, documented what they saw as “objective racial hierarchies”. These observations featured illustrations and diagrams comparing Black people to chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. This document was not a strange fringe work but a well known and well respects piece of scientific literature for the day.

And then comes Darwinism. Charles Darwin’s 1859 work, “On the Origin of Species”, while revolutionary, did not discredit previous scientific racism. Instead, Darwinism would become the new racial orthodoxy, thus furthering and justifying White colonialism and domination as proof of the evolutionary superiority of the White ethnicity.

The rationale goes like this: if we all came from apes and there are more apes on the continent of Africa than anywhere else, and the people living there sort of resembling apes, than surely they are the first forms of evolution from apes and White people, who looked so different and lived in places where there were no apes but only other humans, must be evolutionarily superior than those on the continent of Africa. And because they are so evolutionarily close to apes, they must be less human than those of European descent and thus more animal-like.

In other words, it's racist.

While none of us expect Danielle to know any of this, the fact still remains, her comparison is saturated in supremacy. When Danielle rages “Who wants to be Black? Like, I don’t understand it. I can’t even comprehend it.” while trying to combat the Blackfishing label, the disgust saturating her comments cant be denied. Meanwhile, Danielle continues to shamelessly put on the aesthetics of Black women, becoming a literal example of the grossness of Blackfishing: loving the culture of Black people while feeling superior to Black people.

Blackness is not a costume to wear for clout or cool points. At a time when Blackness is still weaponized and oddly, simultaneously Black culture is commodified in the form of braids, bamboo hoop, and durags clad suburban teens riding around blasting rap music yet locking their doors when a Black person passes by their car, people like Bhad Bhabie stand out as oxymorons. So enraptured by Black culture and all of the trappings therein, while mocking or even detesting Black people themselves. 

Danielle is obviously young, but also poorly if at all, advised. I would encourage her and her handlers to engage in some serious soul searching and brand assessment before she continues on this hypocritical "I'm not Blackfishing" while Blackfishing tour and up and ruins her own career.

Oh, and someone else should probably manage her social...