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In December 2021 I wrote a think piece regarding Brene Brown and the dangers of courage culture as it pertains to Black and Brown people. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine the article would go viral, but less than a month after posting it over 30K people had visited my website and read it.
When one has a “viral moment” we all believe their lives change for the better. Well, my life didn’t necessarily change, but the lives of others were significantly impacted from my viral moment.
Since December, I’ve been invited to participate in one panel discussion where I was told five seconds before going live not to say anything negative about Brene Brown and I was barely allowed to speak. I realized the organizers had used my name and image to draw attendees to the virtual discussion and bring awareness to their work, which had absolutely nothing to do with me or my article. Next, I was invited to be a guest on two podcasts. One was a live audience and it was a great experience, but afterwards I found myself being served legal papers by my now former employer. The second podcast has yet to air. I also sold fifty copies of Everyday Struggle: How Toxic Workspaces Impact Black Women from my website.
That’s it.
So how did everyone else benefit? Well for starters, I learned from several individuals who shared my article with their audiences on social media that they were invited to be guests on several podcasts, offered paid speaking engagements and served on panel discussions. I found this interesting because these individuals were either Black men or white women who had NOTHING – not a damn thing to do with the article I wrote except sharing it on social media. Those who invited them to participate in these events had gone to MY website to read My article, which clearly has a way to connect with Me for media appearances and speaking engagements. Interesting. I know, right?
One individual redirected the organization requesting his presence back to me and they told him “No, we want you,” of which he declined because he wasn’t versed in the subject matter. Another individual used my article as the basis of a training program for mental health clinicians at a university, yet no one asked my permission or for my input. Instead, I was tagged on LinkedIn as they announced the program to the public.
So all of these individuals gained significant exposure and some had monetary gains too, simply by sharing my article, tagging me in their social media posts and then crossing their fingers, hoping and praying I would engage, comment and like their sharing of my work. Yet I basically walked away with nothing compared to what they gained in return.
I also began to realize that when I commented on the LinkedIn posts of Black men and White women they were going viral. The posts would have nothing to do with Brene Brown, but instead diverse topics that focused on sexism, ageism or discrimination in the workplace. One Black male saw how my presence on his post impacted his audience engagement on LinkedIn with over 20K views and over 5K people liking and commenting. He took it upon himself to reach out to me via DM and ask if I would use MY platform and have him as a guest on MY LinkedIn Live and how much of a great team WE would make. That’s when I had to pump the brakes; “hold the hell up!”
Although I wrote this great think piece, no one really wanted to hear from a Black woman who actually has an opinion and (gasp) thinks. I realized that society is more comfortable having individuals who are not familiar with my work in the area of diversity, research, academics and mental health, and who also don’t look like me to speak for me, instead of allowing me to publicly speak for myself. And in the end, society has made a conscious decision to reward these individuals instead of me.
Let’s keep it real, no one wants to hear how difficult it is for Black and Brown women to lean in and be vulnerable in the workforce when a white woman says all is well with the world when you know yourself (or whatever Brene Brown is telling people these days). Yes, it’s easier to get people who are uneducated on the topic of courage and vulnerability to speak up and serve as the ‘experts’ instead of the actual experts, because this misinformation and poor representation continues to feed into the Mis-Education of the Negro narrative Carter G. Woodson spoke about. No one wants to hear from someone who actually has the credentials and the experience to call out the discrepancies in Brown’s research in certain areas because that would mean engaging in behaviors that would actually help Black and Brown people.
Now I said all of that to say this, I don’t hate Brene Brown nor do I dislike her as a professional, but this is the narrative many have tried to paint as they attempt to make me the problematic Black woman. I simply pointed out what I believe to be a flaw in her subject matter as it pertains to Black and Brown people, which it seems many agree with me because they are profiting from my critique.
So how have I pivoted to help make this viral moment benefit me? I am in the process of having the Brene Brown article copyrighted by the Library of Congress. It’s my intellectual property and at the end of the day, I need to protect it by any means necessary, in addition to maintaining control of how it is used and where it is used as much as I possibly can.
In closing, this viral moment has reminded me that people will read the work of a woman of color, talk about it and her behind closed doors, and then borrow it like a bowl of sugar with no intentions of giving her anything back in return. Like others who have gone before me, I’ve now been labeled a problematic Black woman, while white women use my work and are uplifted and glorified. And just like bell hooks was passed over to shine the spotlight on someone like Brene Brown, the intellect of Black and Brown women will continue to be used by whites, while we as the experts are talked about negatively, downplayed and pushed aside. Black and Brown women will never receive the support we deserve nor reap significant monetary gains for our labor or intellectual property, because no matter how educated we are, how many books we’ve written or how well spoken we maybe, folks are still under the racists spell that white is right and if we have to hear from someone Black, my God- let it publicly be the voice of a Black man instead of that of an educated Black woman.
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Dr. Carey Yazeed is a behavioral scientist who specializes in psychological safety in the workplace. She is the author of Shut’em Down: Black Women, Racism, and Corporate America, Everyday Struggle: How Toxic Workplaces Impact Black Women (both were bestsellers on Amazon in the category of business conflict), and Unbreak My Soul: How Black Women Can Begin To Heal From Workplace Trauma. Interested in having Dr. Yazeed speak at your next event, Click here to learn more.
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