Some in the music commerce procure been unsurprised when the allegations about the DJ Tim Westwood came to light final week. There had long been tales recounted by Dark females of his alleged abuse of energy – rumours that circulated among chums in Dark nightlife and the music commerce. An investigation by the BBC and the Guardian particulars the accounts of multiple Dark females, some teens on the time – of alleged predatory behaviour and groping on the piece of the former DJ. Some claim to procure been groped at his reveals, while others screech that they procure been enticed to a flat on the promise of skilled steering, entirely to be abused.
In 2020, a Twitter story used to be created, named Surviving Tim Westwood and a hashtag of the same title started to pattern. Then the story disappeared, more than likely because of Westwood’s correct team, as he has denied the final allegations. But it used to be also presumably indicative of a deep-seated truth: that Dark females’s voices are generally silenced. Right here’s correct one instance of how misogynoir, the term frail to say misogyny particularly directed at Dark females, may perchance perchance presumably also procure aided and abetted Westwood in fending off accountability unless now.
Westwood used to be a deified pick within Dark music – cherished by party-goers as smartly as commerce gatekeepers. Many people, particularly Dark males, credit him with giving hip-hop and rap music that may perchance perchance presumably in every other case procure been relegated to the underground a mainstream platform. What’s telling about that argument is how Westwood’s negligible impact in a custom that is a lot bigger than him is treated as more necessary than the allegations made by Dark females. So, while the powerful, predominantly white, commerce executives who continued to employ him as these allegations swirled need to accumulated be held responsible, there may be clearly an intraracial gender pain right here, too – particularly that Dark females’s tales procure been diminished in characterize to clarify Westwood’s standing in Dark custom overall.
Colourism performs a part too. Elegance requirements exalt lily-white or racially ambiguous females – so it may perchance possibly probably well perchance presumably also smartly procure gave the affect very no longer going to many who a resounding man a lot like Westwood may perchance perchance presumably need these darkish-skinned females. Perhaps it used to be the presumed undesirability of darkish-skinned females that allowed him to allegedly pursue them in a covert manner, with out dismay bells ringing. Meanwhile, the fetishisation and hypersexualisation of Dark females flourished on his reveals – because it does in other areas in a custom by which the mere expression of our sexuality is considered as an invite. In 2016, Cardi B used to be a customer on his YouTube channel, TimWestoodTV. When she asked “develop that you just may possibly additionally procure sex with somewhat various Dark females?” he replied “no longer as powerful as I’d absorb to … but we may perchance perchance presumably rectify that”.
While #MeToo and #Time’sUp felt like moments of staunch accountability for lecherous males, the movements felt whitewashed. Meanwhile Tarana Burke’s an extended time-long work with survivors of sexual abuse, for the duration of which she originated the phrase Me Too, went uncredited.
It’s curious to checklist whether there has been huge alternate for the duration of the music commerce. No topic confidential conversations among ourselves, females are accumulated reluctant to talk out about the sexual inappropriateness they’ve faced, no longer entirely for pain of no longer being believed, but for his or her jobs. On the uncommon events that they develop document their accounts, non-disclosure agreements can additional silence them. Right here’s what makes the recorded testimonies of these Dark females so profound; the hope is that they will damage thru the wall of silence that protects alleged abusers for the duration of the music commerce.
The obstacles that #MeToo exposed potentially resulted in a better belief of the complexity of concerns which procure an brand on Dark females – and it certainly feels as if there are more light-skinned and white folks who are attempting to be better allies. But it is imperative that females of all races and shades band collectively for the reason that hypervisibility of darkish-skinned Dark females, of whom there are so few in public lifestyles, leaves them particularly exposed to racism and misogyny.
Dark musicians are initiating to search out their negate in tackling this. These days the singer Ari Lennox used to be asked “is any individual fucking you factual staunch now?” by a South African radio broadcaster. She visibly recoiled and asked: “Why query it in that come?” Within the previous, a Dark lady may perchance perchance presumably also need felt the procure to parry this roughly query the come Cardi B did with Westwood, but, by reacting in the come that she did, Lennox used to be in a discipline to plight an e