Art of of Being Basic

1) Writing a passive aggressive blog, keeping in mind all the people that overwhelm you–with their ability to frustrate you, fuck everything up, and be real damn basic.

2) Quitting your thesis to basically watch a season of Gilmore Girls every two weeks.

3) Not living by your community’s living standards and then shunning/hating/abusing  those that called you out about it.

4) Standing up and feeling patriotic for a nation that allows for the active genocide of people in and out of its “borders.”

5) (un/in)tentionally Cutting off Black women during a speak out because you really want to share your (yes, valid) emotions.

6) Walking down the wrong side of the road and pushing someone without boots into 6 inches of water.

7) Saying “Arabic” when you really mean “Arab” all while basically making a joke of another culture because of a situation you found yourself in.

8) Saying “people of color” instead of “Black folks,” which is really what you mean.

9) Ordering off of your parent’s Amazon account just so you can get free 2 day shipping (and effectively avoiding the spending of your own money).

10) Quoting Frank B. Wilderson III and then talking over Black folks in a conversation; Quoting Frank B. Wilderson III and then calling yourself an ally to Black folks when you are in fact not Black; Quoting Jared Sexton and then non-ironically saying “multiracial”; Quoting Audre Lorde and just fucking it up bad because you can’t read the whole quote, or you forget the context, or forget that she is talking about something that can’t always be generalized or abstracted; Saying that you don’t like Beloved.

11) Assuming that because you call yourself an ally to “LGBT” people you are an ally to queer folks; assuming that because you “identify as the ‘a’ in LGBTA” that you are really an ally or really living the struggle of being “LGBT.”

12) Being a (white) scholar of South African tribal literatures and then calling “anti-Blackness” too strong of a term; ignoring the fact that global anti-Blackness is a thing.

13) Working in the office next to me, seeing me everyday in the hallway, but refuse to acknowledge my existence as you run into me because you’re too busy on your phone, refuse to say excuse me, refuse to say anything.

14) Any time the word “different” is used as an adjective.

15) (On the second night of a newly established gay night at a local bar) Hosting a “frat party” that depicts racism, sexism, sizeism, ableism, etc., in its cover photo.

16) Refusing to acknowledge the privilege you have in passing.

17) Wearing shorts in 35 degree weather, even if it is sunny.

18) Disliking Azealia Banks.

19) Flirting with someone majoring in English and Philosophy and telling them that you hate reading and thinking too hard.

20) Pronouncing my last name “Portabella” to be funny.

21) Being sex negative.

22) Calling yourself a feminist, as a man, and still using “bitch” in your everyday vocabulary.

22) Identifying as cisgender and gay/bisexual/lesbian and stigmatizing Trans* folks. Stigmatizing Trans* folks EVER.

23) Letting people stay in limbo, who are waiting for a reply from you, just because you don’t want to face reality and instead watch Netflix and go on Tumblr for a week.

24) Assuming people will help you even when you don’t ask for it, and then being mad and blaming others for not helping.

25) Not telling someone that you love them when you do; Not telling someone that you like them or want to be friends with them or want to fuck them or want to ask them out or want to be in their vicinity because you’re scared.

26) Leaving your clothes in the apartment building dryer for 2 hours while leaving other clothes in the washing machine for 3 hours.

27) Disliking James Joyce or Virginia Woolf because they are “too pretentious.”

28) When you identify as white and: always identify as a successful anti-racist activist, call yourself culturally Black, equate issues of class with issues of race, pride yourself in your “ability” to twerk.

29) Publishing a blog about your frustrations because you just can’t right now and don’t foresee any amount of can for the next week.

30) Calling out “basic” things/people/activities and not defining “basic.”

31) Thinking that Madonna invented voguing.

32) Referring to HIV as AIDS; shaming those that have sex without a condom; not being aware that HIV and AIDS still exists.