Serena Williams Guts it Out - We Love Her

Last Saturday Glamazon Deluxe, Serena Williams came roaring back into the top ranks of the tennis world by winning her 3^rd Australian Open. There were naysayers a-plenty, and we heard them talking loudly and freely about her size, her injuries, her being out of shape, her commitment and so on. Serena just kept on plugging away until she put a spanking on the number 1 player in the world, Maria Sharapova 6-1, 6-2.

Serena and her sister Venus seem to have always had a strange relationship with the press, especially here in their native country. In last Sunday’s New York Times, sports columnist Christopher Clarey described it this way:

“Serena Williams is a fascinating athlete, and a fascinating tennis player. She doesn’t fit the mold. She has never fit the mold, in her ethnicity, her build, her athleticism, and her style. She has power, skill, determination and a body many in her sport would die for.”

Even the green of her outfit was criticized as a distraction. Maybe because her opponents couldn’t even see her blinding serve, it made more sense to focus on her fashion choices. More could be said, but I am going to leave that alone other than to quip; can you say “haters.”

Now everyone is talking about Ms. Williams’ determination and steely will. This seems to come as a shock to many since they seem to have always felt her past domination was about being bigger and stronger. The fire in her eyes might have escaped their notice when they were gripping about her cat suit. In true Glamazon fashion, Serena rose up, smote her enemies, and raised the trophy. I’m ending with a quote, so congrats Ms. Serena Williams. Some of us have always loved you and will never stop.

Serena said: “I think I get the greatest satisfaction just of holding up the Grand Slam trophy and proving everyone wrong; I just love that.”

We love it too. For an interesting piece on Serena and Self-Confidence go here.

Bitches on HIgh Horses

I really wanted to get to this sooner, but a spiritualized socialite like me has a busy schedule. I can't get to all the stuff I want too.

Thursday night is Grey’s Anatomy night, and I am off to my best friend’s house to enjoy a show that’s one of my guilty pleasures. The doctors in Grey’s live in a total fantasy world where love and friendship trump everything. A happy pappy place where a group of mostly white interns love each other deeply and work under not 1, not 2, but 3,3,3 levels of African American supervision with all their pearly whites on display at all times. This is usually because they are too focused trying to get their groove on with the gorgeous senior staff to think much about the kinds of things that would come up in real world where people would get in trouble for using the genitals this openly, this regularly.

Back in October of last year, 2 cast members got into a disagreement, over the lateness of a 3^rd member of the cast for work on a scene. Supposedly words were exchanged, voices were raised, some reports included a choking incident (still unconfirmed), and the word faggot got tossed into the mix by an angry Washington, making for a good scandal. He seemed to be referring to the 3^rd castmate TR Knight, who has since come out of the closet. Apparently there was an Indian summer closet cleaning, releasing Neil Patrick Harris, the former Doogie Houser, as well. Initial reports were all about McDreamy getting choked. Little mention was made about the word part of the incident. BUT . . . The story refused to die. Fast forward to this year, and Grey’s wins a Golden Globe. Backstage during a press feeding frenzy, a clever chap asks about tensions on the set after the October incident. The inebriated Washington pops out, grabs the mike, apparently telling a big ole lie says he “never called TR a faggot” and all hell breaks loose in the gay community. Isaiah is a evil, venal homophobe as must be fired from the hit show immediately, the protectors of gay virtue cry. Some say that IW won’t be fired because he is black. Some go so far as to attack the shows’ creator because she protected him because she is black. Some insist that using the word faggot is as the same as using the word nigger. This all fascinates Ms. Gaydah since earlier this month watching an episode of Real World Denver on MTV, the Gaydah espied a white gay man referring to one of his black cast mates as a nigger on-screen. I wonder where is the outrage, about that? Of course, when these things come up, the info you get coming back is I didn’t know about that. How neat and pat. I wonder do the politically correct crew ever wonder why? Now Ms. Gaydah realizes the difference between a MTV show and a network show. Where Gaydah gets confused is how the high and mighty bitch brigade chooses its targets.

Just to come correct I have to say, that I want to smack the hell out of Isaiah for a cornucopia of reasons. For being so stupid as to be caught saying something like that. I try to lie about it. Then his clumsy attempts to express his lack of gay bias. That I wish I were gay crap. I’m sure he thought it was cute, but it just came across as silly, and maybe even patronizing. Although I think he was sincere. AND if he were to become gay, his dick would get sucked a lot. I know this. I’ve seen him up close. He’d have to invest in a stun gun to run the children off his stuff. You know, ever since he has been on this show, he has been in this weird trying to play race down thing like, you know, where all equal and it’s all love bullshit. I’m guessing there’ll be some revisions to that tune. He keeps telling this story about some Korean people coming up to him in a restaurant or something. Maybe he thinks he really cured something here, and the bitch in the store up the block from me just has a permanent case of indigestion. That’s why she keeps scrunching up her face when I give her pennies on purpose, or make her put the change in my hand instead of on the table.

On the other hand I am not mad him about homophobia. You see back in 1990 or so, IW was the lead in a play written by my boyfriends’ best friend. A crazy bitch if I’ve ever met one. N-T-way, my boyfriend and several other gay men were in the play. We met Isaiah, hung out with him, several times. There was no trace of the dreaded hatred of gays, that everyone is sure is the case now. He had the weird, intense, creative-type thing going on, but then so did my boyfriend’s best friend. They became pretty close. So nobody is going to convince me that he is a homophobe because the Gaydah shook his hand and looked him in the eye myself.

On the other hand, I have been dancing at the gay club since the end of disco, and I KNOW that high priestesses of gay culture don’t always wash their hands when they use the bathroom. Gaydah never shakes unless I know for sure. The gay glitterati are just as capable of using slurs and epithets as anybody else and have very little hesitancy about doing so. The children call me bitch so much I began to think it was a part of my name. Buddha bitch. They don’t mean anything by it. C-mon bitch, let’s go to brunch. That sort of thing. They use the word faggot just as interchangeably. I know have seen the word faggot on many of the big gay blogs online, used by the authors. Them hands ain’t so clean. We all know that it really comes down to when you use a word like that, what context you are using it in. Is it being used among friends, or community members or somebody who’s in on the joke, if it is a joke? Is it in an argument to hurt somebody’s feelings? Or is it being used to genuinely identify some characteristic of a person in a negative way?

I think ole IW has taken quite enough heat for this already. He’s apologized profusely. Decided to publicly address his anger issues. Met with the appropriate poobahs of public protection and received the important lectures equivalent to washing his mouth out with soap. Let the girls with the golden spun mouths go back to berating Brittany for her undergear choices.

Interesting what stories the media picks up on and which ones just go by the wayside. In that episode of Real World Denver, after being separated by the producers, the white gay man who called the back man a nigger, come back to his housemates and apologized for his behavior. After explaining to them that he had a drinking problem and should not have had so much the drink the night before, the 2 black men in the house decided to forgive him and squash the beef. Then they went beyond that in subsequent episodes where both sides made an effort to reach and get close to one another. What a novel idea. Where firing someone gives them an opportunity to stay angry and become bitter, befriending someone makes opportunities for understanding and growth. Hmmm, so which one do we really want? I wonder.

BGA