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Solange Knowles Pens Powerful Essay On Racial Discrimination And Being Uncomfortable In White Spaces

By Victoria Johnson
Published on: 14:09 PST, Sep 14, 2016

Solange Knowles penned a powerful essay on her site, Saint Heron, after she was reportedly harassed at a recent Kraftwerk concert in New Orleans, LA.

According to Solange Knowles, she entered the concert right when the German electronic dance group were performing their hit “Hall of Mirrors.” (The track was later used in her brother-in-law, Jay Z’s track, “Its Alright” alongside fellow Brooklyn rapper Memphis Bleek off of the Streets is Watching musical film.)

Solange Knowles attended the concert with her husband, son, and her son’s friend in tow but the happy family night allegedly turned grim when a concertgoer behind her ordered them to sit down and stop dancing.

Her essay paints the picture and shares her thought process through the ordeal.

“You get there about 10 minutes late, but lucky for you, as soon as you walk to your box seats, the song that you just played for your son in the car is on! It’s a song his uncle sampled, ‘The Hall of Mirrors.’ You haven’t even sat down yet because you just walked to your seat and you’re so excited to dance to this DANCE MUSIC SONG. About 20 seconds later, you hear women yell aggressively, ‘Sit down now, you need to sit down right now’ from the box behind you. You want to be considerate, however, they were not at all considerate with their tone, their choice of words, or the fact that you just walked in and seem to be enjoying yourself.”

Knowles admitted that the situation had her “confused” since Kraftwerk is indeed a “pioneer of electronic and dance music.” (She places emphasis on the dance part.) “Surely the audience is going to expect you to dance at some point,” she wrote.

But it seems that the concertgoers behind her did not have that same idea and reportedly proceeded to throw objects at her.

“You feel something heavy hit you on the back of your shoulder, but consider that you are imagining things because well….certainly a stranger would not have the audacity. Moments later, you feel something again, this time smaller, less heavy, and your son and his friend tell you those ladies just hit you with a lime,” it read. “You look down only to see the half eaten lime on the ground below you.”

“You were planning on sitting down after this song, as long as it wasn’t one of the four songs that you really connect with and plan on getting down to.”

Solange Knowles also live-tweeted the incident.

In the essay, Knowles also wrote about several other instances where of racial discrimination such as hearing her teacher throw a racial slur in her third-grade classroom and being harassed with her mom, Tina Lawson, on a train to Italy. All incidents she relays to how sometimes black people may not feel comfortable, welcomed or safe in predominately white spaces.

“Many times the tone just simply says, ‘I do not feel you belong here‘,” she continued later on in the essay.

Several other tweeters — including actress Gabrielle Union, have shared the article in agreement.

“I can relate to everything @solangeknowles experienced. This is real & it happens everyday. We are not making it up,” read Union’s tweet.

But when Knowles isn’t speaking up about harassment, she’s working on her music career. And it seems that she has some new music on the way. She reportedly has 24 songs recorded for the completed album. It’ll be her fourth studio album, and the first LP since her latest effort, 2012’s True. Knowles also curates entertainment and culture content for the aforementioned site, Saint Heron.

[Featured Image by Scott Barbour/Getty Images]

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