Equity Post Maloning is one of the reasons (not the only reason of course) that the racial equity movement is regressing.
Post Maloning Equity (racial equity vulturing) is the act of non Black actors building and riding a platform of racial equity and justice into thought leadership and stardom during the Black Lives Matter era (let's say starting in 2013) only to jettison the work (or they might say “brand”) upon societal disinterest and pushback.
Often Equity Post Malones understand the systems work to make change and will champion it to anyone who will listen publicly to gain favor and credibility but behind the scenes are cynically against real change due to fear of loss of power and access (ironically).
Equity Post Malones are more interested in growing their own platform versus changing the system. Thus, once equity work is deemed disadvantageous to ones growth and essentially passe, watch as these folks subtly change their equity language to language ( or already have) that is more palatable to broad audiences but no longer captures the original intent of racial justice and equity work.
For proof of this all you have to do is look at these folks social media posts and blogs back in 2016, 2020... and then compare them to now. Are they raising hell about the rollback of DEI initiatives? The striking down of the Voting Rights Act or Affirmative Action by the Supreme Court? Black maternal mortality or Niani Findlayson or literally anything?
Go ahead and take a look. I’ll wait…
…... Okay did you look? Did you see those things? Exactly.
It very well could be folks that you even thought were "cool" and "down" but under all of our noses they switched it up like Post Malone started making pop and country songs.
We might say...no no...not "this person". They’re so committed. They said “all the right things.”
I get it. These are incredibly charismatic folks. We want to believe they’re legit. And, maybe some of them started with really good intentions. But ultimately, the very power they have purported to want to dismantle is too central to their position now and they can’t bring themselves to give it up.
One of the reasons this is problematic is that they are propelled to greater amounts of notoriety than the Black folks (especially Black Women) who were/are actually credibly doing the work for less acclaim, more scrutiny, and more weathering and burnout. Another reason this is problematic is that the transition of these Equity Post Malones to non racial equity work is that it signals to their followers that the work is no longer in fashion and they can wipe their hands clean of it for the next thing in style. That leaves those who are actually trying to push for change , all while never getting the credibility and access to actually make large scale change as the Equity Post Malones, with their hands up in frustration as they now receive the brunt of the anti-racist criticism and retaliation, the physical and mental health impacts associated with it, and more importantly..the racial inequities still un-dealt with and in some ways, perhaps worse than before.
In summary,
Post Malone is now post hip hop.
Equity Post Malones are now post equity.
But for all of us Black folks, the real threat and danger of systemic anti-Blackness is ever present.
