The Criticism of Beyonce's Sarah Baartman Biopic




If you have read my previous post "Having Dinner with Beyonce", you'll know that I am not the BIGGEST Beyonce fan/supporter. I do listen to her music and enjoy the fact that it causes young women to flip into their alternate ego and have a fierce display of confidence, etc. HOWEVER, I question and continue to question her relation to the Feminist Movement of Today and her personal efforts of empowering young women in our society.

News has come out recently stating that she plans on writing a screenplay about Sarah "Saartjie" Baartman, an African slave who was captured and enslaved into a circus with the label of a "freak" because of her large breasts and buttocks. Beyonce not only plans on writing Sarah's biopic but also plans on starring in it.

Some people are excited that this is an opportunity for Beyonce to show her true side of acting and take her acting career seriously. Others are very disappointed and not supportive of the idea and state "this is not her story to tell". Want to know my honest thoughts about it?

"If not you, then who? If not now, then when?" by John Lewis stands out in my mind.

Who are these people to tell Beyonce that "this is not her story to tell?" Who else will do it then? Who better to educate these people of ESPECIALLY my generation and younger about a woman who was exploited because of her body shape. Sarah Baartman was a beautiful, Black woman... not to far stretched from beautiful, voluptuous Black women in today's society. Does Beyonce look like her? No but does that exclude her from telling a story that needs to be told? A story that if not Beyonce, another Black woman, then no one would still learn or listen to?


So is Beyonce not worthy of writing and starring in the biopic of Sarah Baartman? I am fully encouraging and supporting Beyonce in writing this screenplay because Sarah's story needs to be told! They called her a freak and abnormal because of her body... issues talked about and discussed with Black Feminists and in the Black community. Society continues to mock us and objectify us by our bodies. If well written, it should hopefully open people's eyes to how the examination of women's bodies are no or little difference to how they examined women's bodies back then. I hope she does not let the critics stop her from telling Sarah's story. GO BEYONCE!

 If you want to know or read more on Sarah Baartman, please check out my blog post "The New Sarah Baartman: It's a Man's World".

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