Martha Pitts's Posts

Happy-To-Be-Nappy Barbie

This week, a group of black women in Columbus, Ga., started a campaign to donate 40 black Barbie dolls to young black girls. And here’s the twist: Before gifting the Barbies, the women used boiling water and pipe cleaners to transform them into curly-haired “beauties.” In my 32 years on this earth, I’ve owned a [...]

A Single Lady Watches “Single Ladies”

For the past few years, single women of all races, shapes and sizes have pumped their fists in the air, lip-synced, writhed their hips and/or done the ring-finger-hand-flip dance to Beyonce’s “Single Ladies,” an anthem for unattached women who know what they want and when they want it. But on Monday night as I, a [...]

White Christmas, White Santas, White Privilege

I am dreaming of a white Christmas, and I’m not too thrilled about it. Last week my kid came home with her latest art project: a peach-colored Santa with a cotton-ball beard. I was curious. “You colored him peach?” I asked, remembering our conversation earlier in the week when I brought home black plastic Santas [...]

Sexy Cancer

One friend likes it on the coffee table. Another friend posted that she likes it on the floor near the couch. Then there’s one who like it on the desk. And no, these statements aren’t related to Karen Owen’s sex “thesis”—these are actual status messages on Facebook by my female friends. First reaction: Um? Second [...]

bell hooks Is My Fairy Godmother

After our eleventh viewing of Disney’s The Princess and the Frog, my four-year-old daughter announced to her brother and me that Mama Odie, the blind and toothless Voodoo witch of the swamp, is her favorite character in the movie. Not Tiana, the hardworking heroine who gets her prince in the end. I asked why, and [...]

Betty White in Cleveland: Still Funny, Still Underused

Hot in Cleveland‘s premiere began with three fabulous 40-something best friends on an airplane from Los Angeles to Paris and ended with three fabulous 40-something best friends and one white-haired, track-suit-wearing 80-something (played by Betty White) nestled together on a porch swing in Cleveland. Sure, the new TV Land series has a vaguely familiar plot, [...]