A bit too Northern. A bit too feisty. A bit scary. Larger than life hair.
That’s the way Melanie Brown (aka ) described herself around the time she got the nickname almost 30 years ago.
She loves the nickname because ‘there’s a bit of scary in all of us’, but this week she’s said she doesn’t think the moniker would work in today’s society because – according to her – we’re ‘a bit too politically correct’.
, I believe her nickname has done untold damage – especially when it comes to perpetuating the .
Growing up, I always thought each ’s name was cute and suited their personalities. I thought Mel B was getting paid to be unapologetically loud by wearing leopard print and rocking beautiful afro curls.
However, it was only after I found out how they got their alter egos that I started to raise an eyebrow.
Mel B revealed a few years ago: ‘It was actually a lazy journalist that couldn’t be bothered to remember all our names, so he just gave us nicknames.’
I remember thinking, Hold on a minute, the only melanated member of the iconic group got stuck with a negative nickname.
What about her in that interview made her scary to the journalist? Did she answer the questions while throwing steak knives across the room? Was she breaking wine bottles and pretending to be at a jousting tournament?
What was so ‘scary’ about a young woman from a working-class background who found herself thrust into the limelight?
Apparently the reason at the time – according to the ‘lazy journalist’ in question – was because Mel B was ‘so loud and had tried to take over our whole photo shoot’.
And it’s done lasting damage to the Black community ever since.
The ‘angry Black woman’ trope has been around for a very long time.
From the 1800s, Black women were often portrayed on various entertainment platforms as the brazen mammy figures who ruled their homes with iron fists and a sharp tongue. They had ‘back-chats’ and ‘clap backs’ that provided humour to the white masses (as long as white audiences were not the butt of their jokes).
This trope is still used today – and it’s mired in anti-Black racism. This is why I find the way Mel B seemingly brushes off the criticism of her ‘Scary’ nickname without considering its impact on people like me so disconcerting.
Over the past 15 years, I have found myself in countless meetings in my career – more often than not being the only woman or Black person in the room.
I couldn’t tell you the number of times I didn’t dare show any emotion that reflected frustration, irritation or outrage because I didn’t want to amplify any stereotypes about Black women.
I’ve seen white peers walk into office kitchens and throw plates into the sink, but hearing someone pass it off as them ‘having a bad day’. Meanwhile, a Black coworker (who had just found out her mother had terminal cancer) came into the office kitchen and shouted an expletive at herself after dropping toast on the floor, and a white co-worker leaned towards me and said: ‘I find her a bit scary sometimes’.
So Mel B letting the nickname ‘Scary’ slide just amplifies why people don’t understand the macro impacts this microaggressive language has on Black women and how it chips away at our identity.
I have seen so many Black women become a shadow of their former selves because they’re too scared to speak up and want people to like them at the cost of their mental health.
To me, media personalities like Mel B not calling out these tropes just gaslights and erases the lived experiences thousands of Black women go through every day in the workplace.
The singer said she doesn’t ‘take offence’ to her ‘Scary’ nickname, but that just shows me how lost she is by not wanting to challenge the status quo.
On top of that, she seems to overlook her privilege as a mixed-race woman. Being a fairer Black woman allows her to bask in the stereotypes that us Black women with darker hues are seldom afforded.
Going forward, I’d like celebrities to think about how their nonchalant attitude towards harmful tropes negatively impacts the working lives of regular people like me. Especially when people use her ignorance as a poor example to wiggle out of being held accountable for the hurt they’ve caused.
When Mel B says things like this seemingly without thinking, it always reminds me why Mel C (aka ‘Sporty Spice’) was always my favourite.
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