So Michelle Yeoh Wins, But Jamie Lee Curtis Shines?

There’s something so f*****-up about that

Let me just start here by saying that I’m intentionally not putting up the viral photo of American actress Jamie Lee Curtis, cheering on Chinese-American actress Michelle Yeoh at this week’s Golden Globes, because I’ve seen enough of it.

And honestly, showing it here would defeat the point of my entire piece.

So for those that may not know, this week, Michelle Yeoh, won a Golden Globe for her spectacular performance in Everything, Everywhere. Indeed she is exceptional and the film deserves a watch.

Upon her name being announced at the glamorous event, Jamie Lee Curtis excitedly jumps in her seat, arms raised high above her head in a winning pose, to cheer on Yeoh for winning the prestigious award.

From my perspective as a Black woman, there is something fundamentally wrong with Curtis doing this in such an overt, attention-grabbing way. Why, because she has clearly upstaged Yeoh by doing so and everyone is talking about Curtis rather than about Yeoh — the actual winner.

The media and white feminists have co-opted the image to suit their agenda and recite in a mantra-like fashion that “it is good to see women support other women”. But is this really true? Do white women in particular support brown and Black women? The answer is a resounding no, at least not in my experience.

White feminism supports white women at the expense of brown and Black women. And their hyper-focus on Curtis rather than on Yeoh that actually won the award lays bare that very simple fact.

Lately, Black feminists have been pointing this out and fragile white feminists want to counter that argument by showing white women supporting brown and Black women. That is why they have jumped at this opportunity and that is why you will see this image of Curtis over and over and over and over. We’ll be force-fed it by media, social media, and what have you, so that white feminists could make their point — that they do support all women.

If you open any search engine right now and type in Michelle Yeoh, you’re sure to come across that viral image of Curtis with the message, this is what it looks like when women truly support other women. The Guardian published an opinion piece by Zoe Williams titled: The sheer joy of Jamie Lee Curtis cheering Michelle Yeoh sets a new bar for female best friendship. Curtis’ outburst is seen as the ultimate proof of women supporting women.

Isn’t it ironic? Because, if you are truly supporting other women, you need to give them the space to shine. This is not what is happening with Curtis — in reality, she’s not supporting another woman, she’s doing quite the opposite.

Now, Curtis may not have intentionally done this, I think that she was genuinely happy for Yeoh, but she needed to check herself, check her white privilege, and be a lot more discreet in her support without taking the limelight from Yeoh. This is exactly what Curtis and other white women need to do to show their support for us.

White women need to understand that they need to make space for brown and Black women to shine. They cannot always be front and center, attention-grabbing all the damn time.

Curtis should have known better than to screech and make a spectacle of herself. Intentional or unintentional, what she ends up doing is hugging the limelight and stealing the moment from Yeoh. That’s not fair. God knows that it’s taken forever for Asian-American actors to be accepted and recognized — how dare Curtis spoil this moment?

I know some will berate me for criticizing Curtis, and in most cases, I’ll expect them to be white feminists. They will willfully not understand the point that I am trying to make here and that’s okay. They’ll make this article about them like they do everything, and upstage me, the Black female writer. I’m used to that because that’s the way white feminism works. They’ve never ever really cared about all women, only white women.

Thank you for reading my perspective.