I’m still tired of people defending R. Kelly.
Singer, songwriter, and R&B producer Robert Sylvester Kelly has once again come under fire for accusations of his ongoing sexual abuse of girls and women. In Surviving R. Kelly, a six-part docuseries on the Lifetime channel, Kelly’s accusers have come forth to share the harrowing details of their alleged encounters with him. The women, some of whom became connected to him as young as age 14, were interviewed by the series’ producer, journalist and author dream hampton. (Kelly’s lawyer has said the series is packed with lies and has threatened a lawsuit.)
The last time Kelly’s name made waves in the news, we learned that he was allegedly holding young women captive in what some of their parents called a sex “cult.” In Surviving R. Kelly, we hear from some of the women who said they lived in houses owned by Kelly where every aspect of their lives were controlled — down to what they ate and when they had sex with him. We learn that as of November 2018, there were at least two women, Azriel Clary and Joycelyn Savage, still living with him. Their parents had not heard from them for several years and spoke with hampton about their efforts to rescue their daughters from Kelly’s grasp.
In 2002, Kelly was seen on video urinating into a teenage girl’s mouth and engaging in other sexual acts with her. Her close friend identified her and said the girl began visiting Kelly and receiving money from him at age 12, though she was presumed to be about 14 at the time of the video recording.
That year, Kelly was arrested on 21 counts of child pornography but was acquitted six years later, after the victim, then 20 years old, and her parents testified that it was not her in the video. The series reveals that the girl is still involved with Kelly, and has been since the video’s release, and her family remains close to him as well (her dad, a musician, remains employed by Kelly).
The documentary is extremely difficult to watch. Not only do we hear graphic, often triggering details from survivors, we also hear from a former tour manager who helped carry out and cover up some of Kelly’s alleged crimes, a producer who worked with him but never reported the behavior he witnessed, and various industry leaders, journalists, investigators, and psychologists.
Several high-profile celebrities have come out to condemn him via social media. Many others have remained glaringly silent. Earlier this year, his lawyer, publicist, and assistant all resigned from their positions.
So why have artists continued to collaborate with Kelly, despite years of shocking allegations against him? R&B singer Tank came out vehemently against Kelly after the series premiered, but he went on the “Memory Lane Tour” with Kelly throughout 2018, after the “sex cult” allegations emerged in 2017. Gospel singer Marvin Sapp defended his 2017 collaboration with Kelly, citing “forgiveness” as his reason. Why have his streaming numbers on Spotify surged since the documentary aired?
After all that was revealed during the series, I have to ask: What more will it take for this man to be held accountable for his alleged actions and for people to stop supporting him?
The victim and parent blaming has been rampant
In an investigative report published in 2017, BuzzFeed interviewed parents and friends of women believed to be so deeply involved with Kelly that they may be under some type of psychological and/or physically abusive control by him. Their fears are made worse by witnesses claiming they have seen Kelly physically abuse these women when they don’t comply with his orders. The report said Kelly has also limited or banned their phone access, so it was difficult to contact anyone but him; he required them to ask him permission to use the bathroom and other simple actions. Without communication, concerned parents have been desperate for assurance that their daughters aren’t being harmed.
I want to extend my continued support to the parents. As a parent, I know that if my child were missing or involved in what I perceived to be an unhealthy situation, I would seek as much help as I could to get him back home safely. And as a black parent, I know that we don’t get the attention and support we need to bring our children, who make up 42 percent of those missing in America, and other loved ones back home safely.
The media won’t tell our stories, though, at least not in the ways reporters focus on white women in peril. This is why Surviving R. Kelly is so important. We rarely hear about missing black girls. The explanation for the lack of coverage? Media outlets claim they choose to cover stories they believe their watchers will relate to most — the “Missing White Girl Syndrome.”
It’s a poor excuse and further dehumanizes black people and our lives by erasing our experiences from public knowledge. Missing white children are still afforded their innocence and deemed damsels in distress, while black girls are seen as “less innocent” and pegged as runaway prostitutes, drug abusers, or some other description meant to demean them and strip them of humanity and innocence. Search “missing girl” on Google Images and you’ll see pictures of mostly white women.
When men are suspected of preying on women of color, the victims and their parents are often blamed first. In the past few days, I’ve witnessed a lot of this sentiment on Twitter and Facebook regarding R. Kelly’s accusers, even as they have shared their stories so candidly and tearfully. Some say that with all the allegations against Kelly in the past, parents shouldn’t let their children go around him. Even I found myself frustrated with Azriel Clary’s parents, who willingly took their daughter to a meeting with Kelly when she was 17, to discuss her music career. Still, no parent deserves this feeling, and I hope they’re reconnected soon.
Many people are far more willing to chastise others for not protecting themselves and their children from harmful people than they are willing to chastise the harmful person, especially if that person is a wealthy, successful black man like Bill Cosby. From the moment R. Kelly married Aaliyah, an R&B singer who was 15 at the time, he has managed to escape punishment for his violations of young black women — perhaps in part because it happened in a time before social media scrutiny.
As an advocate for women and girls, I’ve heard all of the “but his music!” excuses before. There is no song recorded by R. Kelly that makes me think defending him is more important than protecting vulnerable black girls from harm.
“He wasn’t convicted!” they cry. I respond: “Neither was George Zimmerman.” When it comes to race-based violence, everyone rallies against the oppression of racism, but when it comes to gender-based violence, people are slow to rally and quick to ask, “Why was she there, though?”
Black women have been calling out R. Kelly for years. Nobody listened.
I’m often under fire for calling on people to face the truth that black women and girls are underrepresented and often ignored in mainstream feminist discussions about violence against all women and girls. And within our own black communities, calling out violence perpetrated by black boys and men is seen as an act of treason — I and other prominent black feminists have been vilified for calling attention to violence that feels epidemic.
We’re not supposed to talk about it, especially not to nonblack “outsiders.” We’re supposed to keep these secrets “in house” and do less calling out and more coddling. We unapologetically reject that demand and, as a consequence, catch hell from all sides for condemning white feminists and anti-feminist black men alike for the lack of support given to black women.
Do white people even acknowledge R. Kelly as a prominent artist the way black people do, outside of “I Believe I Can Fly” and “Ignition (Remix)”? Unlike Bill Cosby, who took center stage in millions of households of all races every week and who created a wholesome narrative of black family life, R. Kelly rose to fame within the black community because of his licentious lyrics and gyrating, envelope-pushing grooves.
Still, Cosby’s victims were primarily white women, so whatever support he had from white America has gone sour — so much so that some believe he’s being targeted and set up because he is black. Cosby has been convicted for his assault of one woman, at least, but there are so many more who received no justice. If R. Kelly’s victims had been primarily young white women, how much more outraged would white America feel? How much more insidious would these allegations seem to all of us? As a result of the Lifetime series, more white people are familiar with his violent history and many are asking, “How is he not in jail?”
It’s time to focus on the victims
Many campaigns that address violence against women and girls often feature white faces. That needs to change. We must stop ignoring the stories of black women whom Kelly allegedly targets and who regularly share traumatic stories of being sexually harassed and preyed upon from ages 10 and 11 on social media via hashtags like #YouOKSis and #FastTailedGirls.
In 2014, I created a bystander intervention campaign, “You OK, Sis?” to help women who experience street harassment get the help and support they need to navigate life more safely. My focus was and continues to be women of color, particularly black women and girls, who experience street harassment earlier in life and in more violent ways.
When black girls and women go ignored by everyone from family members to teachers to news outlets and the media, perpetrators of violence against us feel emboldened to continue treating us abusively. They are comfortable knowing they won’t face the same scrutiny and backlash as they might if they abuse white women because our lives aren’t valued as much.
R. Kelly continues to be a prominent example of this. As hampton attempted to reach out to artists he’s worked with in the past for the documentary, she couldn’t get most of them on record. Singer John Legend was the only one who would go on the record to speak about Kelly. (Chance the Rapper later said he working with him was a “mistake.”)
How many of those artists are black women, and how can they justify defending someone who, for decades now, has exhibited a pattern of predatory behavior involving other black girls and women? It’s painfully clear that for some, money matters most, and working with R. Kelly has been a surefire way to secure a hit record.
Black women matter. If we don’t tell our stories, who will? It took a great deal of courage on behalf of the survivors, and I commend Lifetime/A&E for taking a chance on this series, especially now that Kelly is threatening to sue the network. (At the initial screening in New York City in December, which I attended, a gun threat was phoned in from a Chicago area code; the screening was halted and everyone evacuated.)
How many times do we have to see our own people rush to defend men like Floyd Mayweather, Chris Brown, Ray Rice, Bill Cosby, and R. Kelly just because they feel compelled to support the brothers who “made it”? I understand that we, as a people, have been treated so horribly for centuries that our impulse is to protect those of us who come under attack by “outsiders.” But what happens when the predators are our own men and they target our girls and women? What happens when we give abusers a pass because they keep us entertained?
We know that men who abuse and sexually violate women are from all races and ethnicities. We know this isn’t specific to black men. However, we know that when the victims are black girls and women, empathy is minimal — from all people. As such, our girls and young women are vulnerable to the predatory allure of fast money, flowery words, empty promises, and whatever other tactics are employed to wrestle them away from their homes and into harmful environments.
Will R. Kelly finally stop being a thing?
Do black girls finally matter enough to enough people to make him disappear? That won’t stop us from fighting and rallying everyone to #SayHerName. It won’t stop us from crying loud to end invisible street harassment by comforting victims with #YouOKSis. We need to fight to be seen.
Feminista Jones is a social worker, award-winning writer, and community activist currently residing in Philadelphia. Her book Reclaiming Our Space: How Black Feminists Are Changing the World from the Tweets to the Streets comes out in January 2019 on Beacon Press.
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