Bullied Black Girls and the Echo of “School Memories” We Carry

It took me a long time to call what happened to me in middle school bullying. Maybe it’s because like many millennials I grew up with cheesy portrayals of the ripped-denim-lunch-money-stealing stereotype, or because my teachers dismissed the behavior due to my obvious crush on one of the assailants and the “boys will be boys” mentality. What began as innocent enough sarcastic barbs hurled across the classroom and the occasional prank grew to objects being thrown, stealing of my personal property (a notebook filled with fanfiction and poetry) by an entire group, and even a graphic sexual reference to my mother. Even though a boundary had clearly been crossed, I felt helpless in stopping the slippery slope because I had so clearly consented to the previous interactions and that was how a boy showed you he liked you anyways. After all as Colton, a character featured in Sharean Morishita’s newest project School Memories quips, it was “just a harmless joke.” We actually talk a great deal about bullying as a culture. From after school specials starring your favorite cartoon characters, to the success of riveting dramatic series like 13 Reasons Why  or even comedic movies such as Mean Girls, we’ve got media portrayals by the locker-load desperately trying to keep up with technology’s ever shifting potential to emotionally (and even physically) scar other human beings. And yet, despite living at the crushing intersection of misogyny and anti-Blackness where our entire society maintai…