May 5^th can’t come soon enough. No, I’m not super excited for Cinco de Mayo, because Lord knows I’m all set with appropriated holidays and am up for drinking margaritas any day of the year.

 

 

What I can’t wait for is the return of Love and Hip Hop Atlanta!!!!!! Season 3!!!!!!!!!!

That supertrailer was everything! Kirk Frost ole trifling behind swabbing that little baby’s cheek, when he knows good and hell well that he was the one stepping out on Rasheeda. Lil’ Scrappy is back to his two-timing ways and, quite frankly, I’m just wondering who are these women who continue to date him.  Wacka Flacka and his boo seem to have replaced that couple that favor BJ and Baby Bop.

 

 

Speaking of faces from the milk carton, Karlie Red has dusted off Yung Joc and brought him to the telly—although you couldn’t tell me nothing about “It’s Going Down” back in the day. Joseline and Stevie have rented a place down the street from Nene and Porsha—cause you know none of these negroes have the credit to buy these McMansions. And Stevie Jr. Nikko and Mimi have a fully produced porn video sex tape (Trust that this trailer is NSFW!)

Of course some of the funniest stuff to come out of this revelation are all the memes devoted to Mimi’s rather acrobatic sexual stylings, especially involving a certain shower rod. Case in point:

 

 

Long live the shower rod! But don’t let that move take away your security deposit or put your behind in the ER.

 

Nevertheless, I’m most interested in how we are talking about sex in the wake of this “scandal.” Despite Mimi’s slut shaming of Joseline in the past two seasons for the latter’s history of sex work, I wasn’t surprised at this sex tape business. For one, Funky Dineva reported on this last fall and, two, hypocrisy and patriarchy often go hand in hand. What I’m finding so interesting about this moment is the public reaction to the sex tape.  I appreciated the nuanced and at times hilarious commentary on from HuffPost Live (Treva and Jamilah in particular), Anti Intellect, Awesomely Luvvie, and The Grio.  But I’ve also seen a lot of shit talking, shaming, and respectability politics across Twitter, on Facebook threads, and on Instagram. And of course our favorite relationship expert Steve Harvey had to weigh in with his janky ass advice. Ain’t nobody got time for that! Meanwhile, all of the folks blasting Mimi have nary a word to say about Nikko.

I’m not sure that Mimi’s age or the fact that she has a daughter says as much about her as it does about us. Pornography and other types of sex work are often the places where even the most feminist of feminists draw the damn line, and I’m not sure that this hardline approach is helpful for feminism as an ideology or as a lived practice for us navigating and negotiating life in a whole range of circumstances.

Rather than a moment of us shaking our heads at “another Black woman making poor choices,” I think this is an opportunity for us to think more energetically about sex, shame, and desire. To me, this is really about Mimi trying to leverage her platform as a reality star and get some coins–which seems to have worked out thus far. Ultimately, it may not work out the way she likes (she might want to holla at Montana Fishburne) but I’m not sure that this decision makes her a horrible person or mother, quite frankly. This move is probably not going to land her on the cover of Vogue, but that does not seem to be her motivation. And, to be honest, she seemed to be having a hell of time in that bathroom. #showerrod

What are your thoughts on Mimi and her foray into the porn industry?