You're the Zoe to my Penny
What do you get when you put a pandemic and an idle mind together? You get the most important question of the century – am I the only person that’s ever noticed that the “token white girl” in all of our favorite childhood black sitcoms and television shows was usually a red head? Some of you suggested that I stretch before making this reach, and I can’t lie that was a good one, but I genuinely believe that there is a pattern. The question is, is this a trend or are we manic? Lets get into it!
Alright so boom - our red headed friend has BEEN around: Zoe from the Proud Family
Chelsea from That’s So Raven
Monique from Kim Possible
and CeCe from Shake It Up!
She’s even making appearances as the best friend to Latinx women as well - Harper from Wizards of Waverly Place!
Girllllll, she has even been in Gen Z Sitcoms - Elizabeth Harmon from the Queen’s Gambit!!
Bloom from the new series FATE: The Winx Saga on Netflix.
The jury is still out on whether we are including Daphne from Bridgerton - but I'm inclined to say potentially.
When I posted this trend on my story requesting viewer feedback to ensure that I wasn’t a psychopath, one of my viewers asked if I ever noticed that black actresses, when recast in a role that was originally made for a white woman, are usually always a character that was originally a red head? We see this with characters like Iris West, Mary Jane, Annie, and now the Little Mermaid!! We even see it comic strips as well.
I feel like red heads, generally in Hollywood, were typecast as “Irish” – regardless of whether they were or not. And historically, white Irish immigrants were treated just a few steps higher from Black people in America. Most of the refugees boarded minimally converted cargo ships—some had been used in the past to transport slaves from Africa. They were herded like livestock in dark, cramped quarters, the Irish passengers lacked sufficient food and clean water. They were showered by excrement and vomit. Each adult was apportioned just 18 inches of bed space—children half that. Nearly a quarter of the 85,000 passengers who sailed to North America aboard the aptly nicknamed “coffin ships” in 1847 never reached their destinations. This was probably the basis for the creation of the heinous ginger jokes i.e., gingers don’t have souls, gingers are devil children, etc.
So, here’s my theory – who relates more to being shipped on boats/herded like cattle/having their ancestors shipped on cargo fleets in their own feces and vomit – black people. Red heads and Irish white people were the only people that would even interact with black people on a human level because of the similarities in the way we faced discrimination in societies. So, in cinema, black girls and red heads (which to me might be a stereotypical portrayal of Irish girls) got along because they can relate to each other! It could also explain why roles that were originally played by a red head are recast with black women. If Hollywood was historically averse to casting red-heads and Irish women in leading roles, then it makes sense that they would only be comfortable with recasting these roles as black women – because were viewed the same. Honestly, I think that the word “was” should be replaced with “are,” but I have a fear of big media coming after me early in my career so let’s just go with past tense LOL.
Also – I couldn’t figure out where this fit in but on behalf of the black women and black people’s confederation of America, we stan Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. The end.
