Serena Williams Crip Walking At the Olympics

Good grief, y’all, after nearly two weeks, the Olympics are finally winding now. And I don’t know about you, but I’m ‘zausted (aka exhausted and yes, I know there isn’t a “z” anywhere in that word. Just go with it) as hell. I mean, so much has happened:

1) Ryan Lochte proved he’s nothing but pecks and peen (I wish I was one of those people who wrote trashy biographies about famous people because that’s the perfect title. Pecks and Peen: An Unauthorized Biography of Kofi Annan because duh, that is the most ignorant title you can assign to someone like Kofi Annan) with one idiotic tweet:

2) German diver Stephen Feck trained his whole life to do this:

You know all his sponsors were like, “Sooooooooo, I could’ve have just thrown my money in the toilet, flushed it, and then caught up on old episodes of “The Good Wife” instead of paying for him to do this shit.”

3) These grown ass people went to dance school, so they could look like extras from Nick Jr.’s Yo Gabba Gabba during the opening ceremony:

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand a bunch of other things happened. Medals were won. Tears were shed. Blah, blah, blah. The fun stuff are all the lame ass mini-controversies: Gabby Douglas’ hair & that her “unpatriotic” leotard, China’s badminton teams being disqualified for cheating, Ryan Seacrest covering the Olympics at all. But there is one more controversy I forgot to address, which is that when US tennis star Serena Williams finally won the Women’s Singles gold medal that had been eluding her, she did this:

That’s right. People lost their damn minds because Serena crip walked (also known as C-Walk, a dance move that was created by Crip gang members from Compton during the 1970s) in celebration of her win. And certain members of media outlets took this moment as an opportunity to shout  from their mom’s basement the rooftops about how the dance was “inappropriate,” that “she’s glorifying gang culture,” and that she’s “misrepresenting America.” First, I always find the concept of “misrepresenting America” laughable because international sports competition seems to be the only time people care about America being represented properly to the rest of the world. I guess the US government’s bungling the relief and rescue following Hurricane Katrina, the way the average adult American acted like a nosy ass neighbor on 227 over every lascivious detail from the Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal, and how damn near four years into Obama’s presidency, there are still Americans who are certain that Obama is a Muslim and demand proof of his being a US citizen are all examples of representing America well? Or do these people who cry misrepresentation  just think the world was doing this while the aforementioned three things were happening:

Yes, that is the infamous Honey Boo Boo Child from “Toddlers and Tiaras,” a horrible show about toddlers and their stage mothers who submit them to children pageants. HBBC now has her own show for doing nothing. Guess where the show is? In America. Great representation, guys!!

Because it was Serena doing it. She has had a somewhat tempestuous relationship with the media, and therefore the public, throughout her entire career. Less concerned with with being tennis’ sweetheart, she remained herself: aggressive, different (in hair style, clothing, and personality), and opinionated. For example, this outburst from Williams at a US Open line judge during the 2009 finals caused a mini media firestorm in the sports world as people shaming Serena for her actions:

Okay, people would maybe have a point except that years prior, John McEnroe would do the exact same thing (and let’s be honest, he was way worse and did it on a far more regular basis) and while there were people who begrudged his behavior, the fact is that far more people were entertained by it. He was like the “heel” or villain character you’d fine in wrestling. Most tennis fans loved to hate him. Would go to matches in hopes that he would lose his shit and his fame rose as his outbursts grew bigger. Sure, he won matches and titles, so that “justified” his behavior, but so has Serena. In fact, she’s one of the greatest female tennis players of the open era. However with this outburst, there was a collective, “How are you behave this way? You should be ashamed.” Clearly, there is a double standard here. Serena is unlike everything John and people of his ilk are: White, privileged (playing tennis in fancy country clubs, raised in a middle class family) and female. I know, I know, it’s annoying to write that. How many times do we have to be reminded that people are treated differently? Until we stop treating them differently. Until we stop applying different definitions to the same behavior. Until we stop saying that a White guy having an outburst on the tennis court is simply called “fiery passion” while a Black woman has one and it’s called “intimidating and threatening.”

And the same goes for crip walking. Serena C-walking can’t be considered supportive of gang culture while a White hip hop dancer does it during a routine on So You Think You Can Dance and wins the competition and furthers his dance career. Enough with these double standards and manufactured controversy. Serena was just happy. So she danced for five seconds. But I guess in the future, to be on the safe side, Serena should get down like she was dancing to Dexys Midnight Runners’ Come On, Eileen:

**Y’all!! We’re just NINE DAYS AWAY from my headlining gig at Carolines on Sunday, August 19th at 10pm. Make those ressies by going to http://www.carolines.com/comedian/phoebe-robinson/ and use the code “COB10″ to get $10 tix. Thx!**

Tags: Crip Walking, Olympics, Serena Williams, Sports, Upset White People