Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower

by Brittney Cooper

I’m not really into self-help books, so I don’t have one of those catchy three-step plans for changing the world. What I have is anger. Rage, actually. And that’s the place where more women should begin—with the things that make us angry.

I am fat, Black, and Southern. But this is not a sassy Black girl’s tale. Black women turn to sass when rage is too risky—because we have jobs to keep, families to feed, and bills to pay.

Owning anger is a dangerous thing if you’re a fat Black girl like me. Angry Black Women get dismissed all the time. We are told we are irrational, crazy, out of touch, entitled, disruptive, and not team players. The story goes that Angry Black Women scare babies, old people, and grown men. This is absurd. And it is a lie. If you have the nerve to be fat and angry, then you are treated as a bully even if you are doing nothing aggressive at all.

Don’t you just hate when folks yell at you to “Smile!”? I told the last man who said that shit to me, “You smile!”

for me, so I could look fresh at the start