Black Women Tropes in Media: Black Best Friend

I never realized how much this trope was so prevalent, especially in popular films growing up. I always used to applaud the black best friend because at least these movies tried. At least they didn’t completely ignore that black people existed in their world. Nah. Just plopping a black sidekick into a film without any type of thought into the character, with no dynamics is almost as bad as them not being there at all.

Why we're still crushing hard on Dionne Davenport from "Clueless" | HelloGiggles — Dionne

What is the Black Best Friend Trope?

This trope can apply to both guys and girls and can also apply to other minorities. But for the sake of the post, I will talk mostly in regards to black women. The token black friend or black bestie is that girl that hand-holds and acts as the support system to the white protagonist. She is the person you call when you are sad, your sassy protector, and your rock to lean on. This trope propagates another stereotype I hate which is that black women are always strong, that we don’t have our own issues or moments of weakness, and that we would rather push them aside to help others.

While the white protagonists grow and evolve as people throughout the series or film. The black bestie is usually stagnant. Worst of all they could sometimes be forgettable because the spotlight isn’t on them at the end of the day.

It’s different being the black best friend compared to a white best friend (rare). People watch Clueless and see Dionne’s character and automatically assume that black women are not afraid to speak their minds, are sassy, and are always in your face. The token black friend in a sense now becomes a reflection of the entire black community. Now let’s take a look at a white best friend example. Rare to see that but there are some examples. Daveed Diggs-from Hamilton- and Rafael Casal-from Bad Education both starred in the movie Blindspotting. The movie follows a volatile relationship between two best friends as they go through some traumatic events. Automatically we can tell Miles (Rafael Casal) is a white man but not representative of all white people, he is just playing a role. Here is a clip to get a better understanding of what I am talking about. When people watch Miles’s character they won’t think “oh are all white people like this?”. No. That is the difference.

Examples in films

I have already mentioned a few but the most popular examples would be a lot of our coming to age teenage films such as Clueless, 10 things I hate about you, and almost every Disney show and film besides That’s So Raven. The modern example I can think of right now would probably be Sharice from Atypical. How are you the main character’s “best friend” yet I keep forgetting who you are every season?!

Clueless was one of my favorite films growing up. And quite honestly I loved Stacey Dash’s character (still do!). At the time I only considered her smart, beautiful, and stylish. Plus doing all that with braids?! Huge milestone, but it doesn’t hide the fact that as a character she really had no depth and no inner thoughts as the other characters. What was she like besides her outward personality?

Will this Trope go away?

I honestly don’t know. I feel things can get better the more media ages the more we emphasize the importance of diversity and inclusion. Not the fake kind where we plop a minority character into a scene without any type of thought process. When I watch black characters I want it to be relatable, I want to see conflict, mental health issues, family drama, but also the good stuff as well, like dating, promotions, starting a family, etc. Because that is what people go through so we as a black community should be able to see that even if it is as the white protagonist’s sidekick.

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