Dr. Allison Wiltz
1 min readAug 16, 2020

--

I don't think she tried glorify horrible relationships. She characterized a melancholy/stuck feeling but I never took it as idealistic, rather her ability to share intimidate, unflattering aspects about herself. She cannot speak about getting out of toxic relationships if she does not know how to herself. We cannot expect everyone to be psychologically healthy just because we look up to them. When I was younger, I wrote a story called Blue 17 about a young woman who was abused. The story did not end in an idealistic way in which the girl was saved. Instead, it highlighted the abuse endured and her lived experiences. I also read books about women who were in abusive relationships and they never always got out of them. While I undersand the critique, I want people to realize that every song or movie is not about setting idealistic standards for how we should live, but rather art is a form of self-expression. The more we police that expression the greater harm we do. What if we never heard songs about women getting abused because the very thought of it made people feel uncomfortable? Then a critique could be made that the songs would fail to portray the reality that so many women face. Not everyone can easily walk away from a bad relationshp, even when it is toxic. Thanks for writing this and making me think about these issues.

--

--

Dr. Allison Wiltz
Dr. Allison Wiltz

Written by Dr. Allison Wiltz

Black womanist scholar with a PhD from New Orleans, LA with bylines in Oprah Daily, Momentum, ZORA, Cultured. #WEOC Founder

No responses yet