Average Acceptance Now

In 2016 I went to the Shorty Awards, a show that honors greatness in internet culture, at which you can be nominated for top comedy performance of the year along with a dog that went viral for having a tongue that hangs out all the time. It’s humbling.

Anyhoo, I took a picture on the green carpet of an awards show I didn’t necessarily want to be at. In all honesty, I was embarrassed. I dreamt of the Emmys, the Golden Globes—even the ESPYs, where I would present an award and offer comic relief next to LeBron James. An internet awards show felt beneath me.

I posted the green-carpet selfie on Instagram. For the most part the comments were kind and complimentary, filled with “yes girl!” and “slay gorgeous.” But there was one that has stuck with me for four years.

“Eh, she’s so average looking.”

Average. I don’t know if the person who wrote that comment meant to insult me but.… I take it back; I’m pretty sure that was 100 percent their intention. My first thought was no thought. The comment just kind of had me staring at it and trying to understand how I felt, whether to care and if I should say something back. I didn’t, but I did care. At that point in my career I wanted to be outstandingly good at my job and to be considered pretty at least. I thought what probably everyone has thought, including the person who left the comment: In order to be worth something in this world, you have to be above average.

One definition of average is “the usual or ordinary standard, level or quantity.” If anything, average sounds, dare I say, comfortable? Constantly fighting to be more than average or even less than average seems exhausting, like entering yourself in a race you can’t win while committing to being sweaty and out of breath for the rest of your life. When I had this epiphany, years later, I knew I needed to reevaluate my place in the endless race—and to ask myself why I wanted to run it in the first place.

I needed to take a stand: Average Acceptance Now.

Like most of us, I was taught to aim for the stars. In school we were told, “Look at George Washington Carver. He fucking invented peanut butter. You should strive to be just as amazing.” And look, I get it. I really do. But I wish I’d also learned something like “Look at Ms. Johnson, your computer teacher. She loves her job and has a nice house and a cool family.”

For me, a little girl who grew up on the west side of Philly, right at the intersection of the rich kids from UPenn and my friends who robbed the rich kids from UPenn, more realistic portrayals of a good life might have helped. While I think George Washington Carver was absolutely a fucking G, I wish I could have been impressed by my own father, a man who went to work and took care of his family every day. (Also, I wish I had noticed the boys at school instead of worshiping Omarion from B2K and actually thinking I had a shot with him.)

Dear capitalism: Your insistence on obscene wealth is partly to blame. Bernie and Warren talk about the vanishing middle class, which is great, but what about America’s average class? After all, their electorate includes countless Americans who are not extraordinary or basic. The We’re the Millers of the world. Pleasantly average.

Mainstream media, you’re guilty too: You’ve promoted unhealthy and unattainable standards of beauty that have disturbed the psyches of all genders in America. You tell us that anything less than physical perfection is shameful—unless we have some weird quirk that can be marketed as “strong” or “brave” instead. But I’m not going to give you another lashing for your part in the war on the average. You get it every day, and you don’t care. No, instead I’m going to focus on an issue closer to my heart.

The regular black girl can barely exist and be praised for it the way “everyday beautiful” starlets like Saoirse Ronan, Emma Stone and Brie Larson are. Don’t get me wrong, I think these women are beautiful, but I don’t see the same attention lavished on your everyday beautiful black girl actress or singer. If you happen to look like the average black girl, you’re subject to scrutiny over whether or not you’re attractive, the ways in which you look like an animal or a man and why women like you should be liked based on your talent, not your looks. Social media and the inflated currency of likes and shares are also to blame. We’re all caught in the dirty cycle.

So I’m going to help break that cycle. I started here: Over the New Year’s weekend, I went to Big Bear, California with some friends. I was so excited about heading to a cabin with people who have known me for years and always loved me for who I am. But on the way there, zigzagging through majestic mountains, I received a text. I was invited to a New Year’s party thrown by a celebrity back in Los Angeles. Part of me wanted to somehow race back to the city and show face at this party—to take bomb pictures and really flex on the ’gram. To be among the above average and prove I was one of them.

Not this time. Why would I want to go to a party where I would be forced to evaluate my status every other second, hovering over the snacks table and agonizing, Am I famous too? Just a little bit? Like goofy-friend-in-1980s-sitcom famous at least?

So I responded, “Thank you so much for the invite. I got my own things going on. All the best in the new year.”

I chose my life.

I shut my phone off, looked around the car and almost shed one single G tear from the overabundance of peace I felt. I had left the race and decided to sit at the finish line. Because it turns out the finish line isn’t at the end of the race at all; it’s wherever people love your average-ass self.

Oh, and the anonymous user who left that mean comment on my Shorty Awards pic? Reader, I went to that person’s page. They looked exactly like me. I hope I’ve embodied their every word.