Beyoncé isn't afraid to make bold statements and go to bat for her message (sometimes literally), and her younger sister is no different. Solange has just stepped up to deliver an important message.
The younger Knowles sister has penned an essay titled And Do You Belong? I Do and published it on her website, detailing the way she and her family were treated at a recent Kraftwerk concert.
Solange attended the show at New Orleans' Orpheum Theater on Friday (September 9) with her husband Alan Ferguson, their 11-year-old son Daniel and his friend Rasheed. In her essay, she outlines a series of events demonstrating how poorly they were treated, and explains the sadly familiar tone she is often addressed with "being a minority in predominantly white spaces."
After her son and his friend were reprimanded for smoking e-cigarettes (that were actually being smoked by two older white men in front of them), she was aggressively told to sit down by a group of women in the box behind her. Choosing to side with her excitement and continue dancing "to this DANCE MUSIC SONG," one of the women proceeded to throw a half-eaten lime from her drink at Solange.
She voiced her outrage, reasoning: "You know that you cannot speak to them with out it escalating because they have no respect for you or your son, and this will only end badly for you and feel it's not worth getting the police involved. So, you are hoping they will hear you this way."
She goes on to detail the media's troubled relationship with reporting on race, and her own internal conflict with using social media as a platform to speak out against injustice, knowing that it will draw unwelcome and racist responses.
Solange eventually concludes: "After you think it all over, you know that the biggest payback you could have ever had (after, go figure, they then decided they wanted to stand up and dance to songs they liked) was dancing right in front of them with my hair swinging from left to right, my beautiful black son and husband, and our dear friend Rasheed jamming the hell out with the rhythm our ancestors blessed upon us saying…. We belong. We belong. We belong. We built this."
Read the moving essay in its entirety here.
The younger Knowles sister has penned an essay titled And Do You Belong? I Do and published it on her website, detailing the way she and her family were treated at a recent Kraftwerk concert.
Solange attended the show at New Orleans' Orpheum Theater on Friday (September 9) with her husband Alan Ferguson, their 11-year-old son Daniel and his friend Rasheed. In her essay, she outlines a series of events demonstrating how poorly they were treated, and explains the sadly familiar tone she is often addressed with "being a minority in predominantly white spaces."
After her son and his friend were reprimanded for smoking e-cigarettes (that were actually being smoked by two older white men in front of them), she was aggressively told to sit down by a group of women in the box behind her. Choosing to side with her excitement and continue dancing "to this DANCE MUSIC SONG," one of the women proceeded to throw a half-eaten lime from her drink at Solange.
She voiced her outrage, reasoning: "You know that you cannot speak to them with out it escalating because they have no respect for you or your son, and this will only end badly for you and feel it's not worth getting the police involved. So, you are hoping they will hear you this way."
She goes on to detail the media's troubled relationship with reporting on race, and her own internal conflict with using social media as a platform to speak out against injustice, knowing that it will draw unwelcome and racist responses.
Solange eventually concludes: "After you think it all over, you know that the biggest payback you could have ever had (after, go figure, they then decided they wanted to stand up and dance to songs they liked) was dancing right in front of them with my hair swinging from left to right, my beautiful black son and husband, and our dear friend Rasheed jamming the hell out with the rhythm our ancestors blessed upon us saying…. We belong. We belong. We belong. We built this."
Read the moving essay in its entirety here.
