The Acolyte’ Actress Performs Song on Oppression
Amandla Stenberg, a “Star Wars” actress, recently shared a video on Instagram where she sings about her experiences of oppression. The 25-year-old star of the upcoming spinoff series “The Acolyte” shared the song with her 2.3 million followers as a reaction to recent societal “discourse.” In her post, Stenberg, marking Juneteenth, also addressed those sending her racist messages, stating that she spent 72 hours creating the song and video, and humorously challenged her critics to respond with choreography within three days.
The video features Stenberg dancing as the word “discourse” appears, and the song references a past viral moment from an interview with Trevor Noah, discussing racial issues. The lyrics touch on her activism and the emotional reactions of audiences to films about police violence against black people, suggesting that evoking empathy was her goal, which she reasons might be why she faces backlash.
“Star Wars” actress Amandla Stenberg released a video of herself singing about being oppressed.
On Wednesday, the 25-year-old star of the new spinoff series “The Acolyte” posted the song to her 2.3 million followers on Instagram, calling it a response to the “discourse.”
Stenberg wrote in the caption, “Happy Juneteenth and to those who are flooding me with intolerable racism — since it took me 72 hours on my laptop to make this song and video, u got 72 hours to respond. and I expect choreo!!”
The song opens with the actress dancing as the word “discourse” is flashed on the screen.
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“I’m going viral on Twitter again. Open up the news to find some interesting things. 20 million views. Interview from 2018 with Trevor the King when I was thirteen,” the lyrics say. This seems to refer to a clip that went viral from an interview she did with Trevor Noah when she was 20 years old.
Stenberg sings, “I was running from city to city to speak on a story, you know the one, police murdering a black boy. My people cried in the theaters finding release. White people cried. They could see us as human beings. Trevor ask what I want the people to know. I say white people crying was the goal. If they could take one thing what would it be? I say empathy. Ooooo that’s why they mad at me?”
The song goes on, “They splice lines, make hate they recognize, make it look like the same propaganda they spew ’cause they conflate our pain with violence and try to weaponize everything that we do. The desperation of oppressors is rising and now they holding onto any ole thing they can use. If you rely upon misinformation then that tells me you afraid of the truth.”
Then the line “We so bored, don’t f*** with your discourse” is repeated over and over.
Stenberg’s song dishes up more anger in the next lines. “And now you listening imma tell you something fascinating. They spinning woke. Bastardize it and appropriate it. Last I recall woke was something we created. Speak truth to power. Keep an eye out for you silly racists. And now they use it to describe anything they threatened by. Remember when Gambino put it in the zeitgeist? It was all about the people recognizing bigotry. The power of community not fodder for your clickbait.”
She adds, “Speaking of which, journalists I’m looking at you. Did you forget it’s your job to provide the truth? Spreading divisiveness, mining the metrics and data, seems you gave up all your ethics for money and views. And I can tell that the people are tired and the kids don’t trust anything that they view. We can learn something from their discernment. The future’s coming and it’s always the youth,” the actress sings.
Stenberg concludes, “My sis said don’t let it get to my spirit, but I’m sick and f***ing tired of suppressing my rage. 400 years of taking their bulls**t to compartmentalize like my ancestors had to encaged? If you don’t confront the pain that you live with, it’ll manifest as addiction diseases and hate. I’ve seen the infection repression can give ya. I’m not gonna be the next one sent to an early grave.”
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Taniko Ekunwe