Marketing to key demographics is a form of social engineering (in the phone commercial’s case, Black women because—at least before COVID—they tended to be employed more regularly).
They even play up the “Black queen” motif for good measure. In the Twilight flick, it’s the notion of female superiority over males overall (and yes, it’s quite ubiquitous in media), and the last two commercials highlight interracial marriages to white men and the new Black racial amibuity narrative respectively. The show with a Black woman judge with no apparent Black male who can offer parity. The Amazon commercial who referentially refers to Black boys in STEM via one boy, but clearly has a gynocentric focus as do the Schmidt’s and Target commercials. Or the Etsy commercial that highlights the only publicly acceptable form of Black masculinity, gay (the other is martyred). This was after watching 30 minutes of TV.
No one thinks about how material and policy investment in conceptualizing Black women and girls as a distinct demographic affects the Black community. It shapes behavior, coupling, and family development—especially over generations. Thus, when one demographic is forced (structurally) to eat all the failure (Black males) due to lack of access and hyperaggressive policy treatment and the other has symbolic access to middle-class stability, the result is a product of anti-Black gentrification. And the more people applaud this as women’s empowerment, the more we “welcome the wolf into our homes” as it were…
“ No one thinks about how material and policy investment in conceptualizing Black women and girls as a distinct demographic affects the Black community”. I have to disagree with you on this one point, there are some people who do think about this, the very people engineering it. Other than that, good points. 👍🏾
Another thing, I’m a trucker, currently at a truck stop in Memphis Tn. Memphis is a predominantly black city. I’ve been here over the weekend, and have been to the Wendy’s restaurant here a few times. Yesterday evening, this morning and afternoon. Most of the staff are black women. I’ve only seen two black males, that was this afternoon. So even at the local, or urban level, we see whose being chosen. And I’ve noticed that the males took their orders from the women. Neither one was in any leadership capacity.