Great! Newsletter #3: DEI's With Attitude
...if you already saw that joke on my Twitter, no you didn't.
It’s me, hi! I’m Alexandria Love, it’s me! This is the third installment of my newsletter Great! It’s named Great! because it is written by me and I am great. Every other Monday, I’ll send something great to your inbox. Then, on Tuesday, you can return to work saying, “You’ll never guess the great thing I read yesterday!” And then your boss will be like, “Sit down. HR needs to have a talk with you. We know you’ve been committing time fraud.” And you’ll be all like, “Ah shit, not this again.” The bad news is you’re out of a job. But after you get fired, you’ll have even more time to read my Great writing! So overall, I’d call this a win-win.
Speaking of winning, let’s talk about history’s most consistent winners: white people. Something that has always fascinated me about white people is how they come up with so many coded terms for minorities. They’ll use words like “DEI” or “Woke” as a term for black people. I miss the good old days when they just called us “Urban.”
Personally, I think the inclusion of Black women can improve anything. Country music, superhero-ing, being mermaids, writing substacks while not wearing pants… the list goes on and on! That being said, as a Black woman, there are some stories that, no disrespect intended, I think we can let the white boys have. I’ve broken down some examples of each below:
Let The Whites Have It: Gone Girl
My friend Walker loves this movie, and he urged me to give it a second chance. I’m sorry, but I just don’t find it relatable. This movie only works with a pretty blonde white girl at the helm. If a Black woman had gone missing, the cops would have been like, “Okay, and?”
Better In Black: Whiplash
This was a near-perfect movie that can only be enhanced by the presence of seasoning. An all-black reboot of Whiplash would be incredible. Can you IMAGINE how much better the drumming would be? Plus, you wouldn’t even have to recast JK Simmons. We’ve accepted him as one of our own.
Works Best In White: The Wolf of Wall Street
I enjoy this movie. Unfortunately, it would just not work if Jordan Belfort is black. He would have gotten caught in the first act of the movie. By the time he bought his first yacht, the FBI would have been on that nigga like taxes on groceries. The black Wolf of Wall Street would be exactly 30 minutes long and end with a title card saying, “Jamal Belfort suddenly went missing and was never seen again.” Fade to black.
We Should Steal From The Whites: 127 Hours
The main reason an all-black reboot of 127 hours would work is that we would not have been in that situation in the first place. The main character, played by Samuel L. Jackson, would have gotten invited to a remote hiking trip in the desert and responded with, “Bitch, please.” He would then spend the rest of the movie doing other Sam Jackson things, like recruiting Avengers or lamenting the high number of snakes on planes. The movie would have been called “0 Hours”.
Keep It Palm Colored: Fight Club
Black people can’t be in Fight Club. That’s actually rule 3 of Fight Club. You haven’t heard people talk much about rule 3 of Fight Club because of rules 1 and 2. It’s not just because we would easily win every fight (we would). It’s mostly because they don’t want anyone pulling out a camera and shouting, “Worldstar!”
BONUS
Secretly Woke: Jurassic Park
Canonically, all of the dinosaurs are female, and they are seen interacting with Laura Dern. Technically, that means Jurassic Park passes the Bechdel test. Checkmate, incels.
Upcoming NYC Shows
4/7: “Sour Grapes” at Speakeasy at the Gin Mill (8PM)
4/11: “Flopsauce” at The Grassy Noll
4/20: “Hot Mic” at Somebody’s Darling (5PM)
Wanna book me for your show? Fill out my booking form on my website or respond to this email.