On her latest podcast episode, Meghan Markle unpacked the “angry Black woman” stereotype with Issa Rae and Ziwe, People reports.
Markle welcomed Rae and Ziwe to her Archetypes podcast released on Tuesday (October 25) to discuss the trope that continues to affect so many Black women.
During the podcast, Issa shared advice she’s taken from other Black women in Hollywood to not be afraid of being called a “b****.” The Insecure star said she was once called “particular” by a friend, which she now sees as a compliment.
“To me, that means I have a sense of what I want,” Rae said.
Markle agreed that being “clear” with what you want doesn’t make you “difficult” or “demanding,” though sometimes it is perceived as the latter coming from a Black woman.
“I’m particular,” Markle said on her podcast. “I think a high tide raises all ships — we’re all going to succeed, so let’s make sure it’s really great because it’s a shared success for everybody. But I also know that I will find myself cowering and tiptoeing into a room — I don’t know if you ever do that, the thing that I find the most embarrassing — when you’re saying a sentence and the intonation goes up like it’s a question. And you’re like, ‘Oh my God, stop!’ Stop whispering and tiptoeing around and say what it is you need. You’re allowed to set a boundary, you’re allowed to be clear. It does not make you demanding, it does not make you difficult. It makes you clear.”
When the Duchess of Sussex asked Issa: “Was there a point in your life, and maybe it still happens to you now, because of the archetypes, especially as a black woman, do you feel that you’re allowed to be angry in certain moments,” the actress responded: “Absolutely not.”
“Because I can’t lose my cool, I can’t do that, especially as a Black woman, but also just even as a public figure now,” Issa said. “Because people are looking for ways to justify their perception of you. That doesn’t mean I don’t get angry. That might mean that I will vent my frustrations to someone that I trust, get it out of my system and then go in fix mode. And I think even personality-wise, I’m always like, I don’t want to sit in my anger too long anyway because what does that do? I want to work on fixing something, but I want to be allowed to have that emotion because it’s a natural…like, it’s an emotion.”
Markle recalled her own acting career and applauded Issa for creating “nuanced, layered, multifaceted women” in her shows.
“I mean, I remember when I was auditioning, the idea of even Black roles, I remember those casting sheets where the description of the character, she always had to have an edge or an attitude,” Markle said.
During her conversation with Ziwe, Markle also revealed that a genealogy test she had done a couple of years of ago found she was 43 percent Nigerian.
“I’m going to start to dig deeper into all this because anybody that I’ve told, especially Nigerian women, are like ‘What!’” Markle told Ziwe.
“This is huge for our community,” Ziwe said in response. “No, honestly, you do look like a Nigerian, you look like my Aunt Uzo. So this is great.”
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