Taraji P. Henson Is Taking Issue With The 'Strong Black Woman' Label: 'It Belittles Us'

Taraji P. Henson doesn’t want you to call her a “strong Black woman”.

In a discussion with Essence, the 49-year-old actress is explaining why she has an issue with the label.

“It dehumanizes our pain. It belittles our tears. It belittles our pain. We’re supposed to be able to watch our brothers and sons and fathers get murdered in the street but we can take it because we’re strong,” she said. “We can deal with it, we can handle it, and that’s just not true.”

Taraji added that the phrase tokenizes Black women.

“We’re not fairies. We don’t magically rebound from pain,” she shared. “We hurt and suffer just like others.”

People need to be “very careful with that term,” Taraji continued. “Strength is in being vulnerable, and that’s what I want my people to understand. The strength is in being vulnerable and being honest with yourself and saying, you know what, I’m scared right now. Or, I honestly don’t know what to do right now.”

“Maybe if we fix how we define strength and weakness in people, it can stop being a potentially damaging, diminishing or even life-threatening descriptor for Black women.”

Recently, Taraji opened up about how she tackled mental health during the pandemic.