• Celebrity
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
    • Black Women in Music
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
  • Fashion
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion House
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Color Files Podcast
    • Nails
    • How-To
    • Beauty Carnival-Archive
    • Dope Stuff On My Desk
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
  • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weaves
    • 4C
    • Spring Hair And Beauty
  • Love
    • Love & Sex
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle News
    • Build Your Legacy
    • Coronavirus: Everything You Need to Know
    • Health & Wellness
    • Holiday Gift Guide 2020
    • Unbossed Podcast
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
    • Currency Conversations
  • News
    • Latest News
    • BLACK VOTES MATTER
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Videos
  • Events
    • WELLNESS HOUSE: YEAR OF RENEWAL
    • LEVEL UP: Entrepreneur Summit (DEC 2020)
    • Power Tools
    • SHE GOT NOW
    • Girls United Summit
    • Making Moves Now: Virtual Bootcamp
    • #EF SESSIONS
    • Dear Black Men
    • Cares Act
    • News & Announcements
  • Festival
  • Subscribe
  • Essence Studios
  • Girls United
  • NaturallyCurly
  • Shop Essence

Follow Us

Skip to content
  • Essence Studios
  • Girls United
  • NaturallyCurly
  • Shop Essence
  • Celebrity
    • Celebrity
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
    • Black Women in Music
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
  • Fashion
    • Fashion
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion House
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Beauty
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Color Files Podcast
    • Nails
    • How-To
    • AVEENO® Skin Health Startup Accelerator
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
    • Beauty Carnival-Archive
    • Dope Stuff On My Desk
  • Hair
    • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weaves
    • 4C
    • Spring Hair And Beauty
  • Love
    • Love
    • Love & Sex News
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle News
    • Build Your Legacy
    • Coronavirus: Everything You Need to Know
    • Health & Wellness
    • Holiday Gift Guide 2020
    • Netflix’s Jingle Jangle Gift Guide
    • Unbossed Podcast
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
    • Currency Conversations
    • Your Legacy
  • News
    • News
    • Latest News
    • BLACK VOTES MATTER
    • Essence 50th Anniversary
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Videos
  • Events
    • Events
    • WELLNESS HOUSE: YEAR OF RENEWAL
    • LEVEL UP: Entrepreneur Summit (DEC 2020)
    • Power Tools
    • SHE GOT NOW
    • Girls United Summit
    • Making Moves Now: Virtual Bootcamp
    • #EF SESSIONS
    • Dear Black Men
    • Cares Act
    • News & Announcements
  • Festival
  • Subscribe
Michele Crowe/CBS via Getty Images
Home · Celebrity

We Don't Need To Destroy Gayle King To Preserve Kobe Bryant's Legacy

By Allison McGevna · February 8, 2020December 6, 2020
The treatment of Gayle King over the last 48 hours is a case study in the inability to critique Black women without tearing them down in the process.

In the emotional days following the death of Kobe Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna in a helicopter crash, Black people, in our shock and sorrow, seemed to be united. Through shares and retweets, in conversations both private and public, Bryant’s larger-than-life influence on our collective psyche was as palpable as the hush caused by his death. Black women, confronted with the raw vulnerability of Black men and boys facing the loss of their hero—and their own mortality—gave them a safe space to weep and mourn. This is radical, Black love, we thought. This is us at our best.

Then, Gayle King, a Black woman in the United States of America, dared to ask a question. And the jig was up.

On Thursday, CBS posted a clip of King’s interview with WNBA star Lisa Leslie, a longtime friend of Bryant. In the clip, taken from a longer interview about Bryant’s legacy, King pressed Leslie on whether the 2003 rape accusations, later dropped in criminal court and settled in a civil case, tainted the way that Bryant would be remembered. For Leslie, it was clearly a painful and difficult moment as she discussed her late friend just days after his passing. For King, it would soon become a disaster.

I’m uninterested in debating whether, as a journalist, King was wrong for her line of questioning. Not just because I do not believe in telling another Black woman, and a veteran of her industry at that, how to do her job, but also because it stands completely beside the point.

If you’re a Black woman reading this, you no doubt know the immeasurable weight of misogynoir. We’re always in danger of being crushed beneath the precarious burden of racism and sexism. We bob and weave our way through a patriarchy that makes no real space for us, especially if we dare to break free of the tropes of who we are expected to be. But if the backlash to King clarifies anything, it is that retribution never seems more swift than when Black women step outside of the confines of how a Black man expects us to speak, act, or think. It is how some people in Black communities can go from extolling the virtues of being a #GirlDad one moment, to being out for the blood of a woman who dared to go off of their approved script of behavior the next.

Indeed, it took mere minutes for the massive drag of King through the internet streets to begin. LeBron James framed his by calling for the protection of Lisa Leslie, no doubt at the expense of King. Snoop Dogg was more graphic with his, calling her a “funky dog head b****” who should watch herself before “we come get you.” Ari Lennox, a victim of misogynoir herself just weeks ago, shifted to being an aggressor without hesitation, labeling King a “coon” in a profanity-laced tirade. Bill Cosby, serving time in prison after being convicted of raping and drugging women, took to Twitter to drag King—or someone from his camp did it in his name.

Tragically, yet not at all unexpectedly, so many of those same men extolling the virtues of being a #GirlDad took no issue with degrading and debasing another Black woman, allegedly in honor of a man who spent years of his too-brief life striving to ensure that women were empowered and respected. And in the same breath used to ask the world to avoid bringing up Bryant’s darkest moments, most would dare not even consider affording any grace for King.

In an interview, Oprah Winfrey tearfully noted that her friend is “not doing well,” and had been forced to travel with security in the face of death threats. “Obviously all things pass; she will be ok. But she hasn’t slept in two days,” she added.

Yes, navigating this environment is something Black women and girls must learn quickly. In a sea of microaggressions, most of us rapidly reach a point where very little surprises us. And yet, what will never stop shocking me to my core is the neck-breaking pace with which the collective can turn against a Black woman and toss her to the wolves.

Though Kobe Bryant’s death may have elevated him to a god in the minds of some people, his legend already growing to mythic proportions, this is not about him. It is about violence—emotional, verbal, and physical—against Black women being the default of so many Black people in this country. The lie that abusers tell themselves is that it is to protect someone’s legacy, or someone’s job, or someone’s family, or someone’s freedom. But, in truth, it is because Black men have too few heroes and too many Black women are the receptacles for everyone’s pain and wrath because of it.

Money and proximity to power may provide some level of protection for King, but, today, she is still another Black woman left alone to pick up the pieces of herself.

Loading the player...
Share :
TOPICS:  Celebrity Culture basketball black mamba celebrity Entertainment Gayle King gianna bryant in my feed Kobe Bryant lakers NBA Sports
COMPANY INFORMATION
  • Our Company
  • Customer Service
  • Essence Ventures
  • Change Your Address
  • Contact Us
  • Job Opportunities
  • Internships
  • Media Kit
  • tag
SUBSCRIBE
  • Newsletters
  • Give a Gift of ESSENCE
  • Magazine Tablet Edition
FOLLOW US
MORE ON ESSENCE
  • Home
  • Love
  • Celebrity
  • Beauty
  • Hair
  • Fashion
  • ESSENCE festival

ESSENCE.com is part of ESSENCE Communications, Inc.

Essence may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.

©2021 ESSENCE Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Essence.com Advertising Terms

Get The ESSENCE Newsletter and
Special Offers delivered to your inbox

By clicking Sign Up, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

Get The ESSENCE Magazine
by subscribing below
subscribe now