Terrible Thing of the Week: All My Babies’ Mamas

This week, I was going to write about Kim Kardashian and Kanye West’s fetus, Beelzebub, but that’s tired. We all know it’s a bad idea for those narcissists to have children, no less with each other. End of story.

Instead, I want to talk about something I stumbled upon while laying in a hungover heap on my couch. It’s a forthcoming reality show on the Oxygen network called “All My Babies’ Mamas,” featuring Shawty Lo, a rapper, and, you guessed it, the myriad women who have birthed his offspring. (Don’t look at me that way. I wasn’t watching Oxygen. I was channel surfing.)

Oxygen is not exactly known for its fair portrayal of women, especially women of color. I mean, this is the home of shows such as “Bad Girls’ Club” and “My Shopping Addiction.” Oxygen is the new Lifetime. Except, instead of showing women being beaten, they show women fighting with each other and obsessing over clothes.

Wimminz be crazy, rite?? LOL.

No, but really, this is a horrible idea. This man has ten “baby mamas” and eleven children, so we could discuss how horribly irresponsible it is to give him money and essentially reward him for having unprotected sex, for clearly viewing women as sexual objects, or for bringing children into the world without a thought to their individual needs.

Or, we could discuss how this is another example of white television executives taking advantage of the poor and uneducated. LOL @ the black guy doing what he does best, right?? Promiscuity, rapping, probably cheering on any weave-pulling that occurs.

Let’s, instead, discuss how race, gender, and sexual preference become the punch line of show after show. “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”: because we all need gay men to tell us to stop looking so sloppy. “America’s Next Top Model”: because women, oh vapid sex, just want to be told they’re pretty. “Bad Girls’ Club”: because women—especially women of color—just want to get drunk and pull each other’s hair.

I mean, even the promo photo is laughable. It shows Shawty Lo standing at the forefront, a wide, confident stance. One of the mothers of his children is standing to our left lookin’ mean. She is clearly the main mama. The other ladies are all standing to our right with their children sitting in front of them. They all look so sassy. You can just tell from this photo that there will be wacky hijinks and crazy blow-outs.

This show serves as a foil to “19 Kids and Counting”, where there is never any drama, any shouting on that show. And you know why? Because they’re good Christians who are, more importantly, white. Seriously, I know that the worst the Duggars do is forget to switch over the laundry. But don’t you think it’s a funny coincidence when the one large non-traditional white family you put on television happens to be debt-free and have robots for children, and the one large non-traditional black family you showcase seems embroiled in mayhem? I mean, even that eternal frat douche Kody Brown of “Sister Wives” gets more respect. And you know why? Because he’s married to all four of his baby mamas.

Shit like this perpetuates negative stereotypes. Shit like this is why our country is still run by stodgy old white men, despite being 51% female and 30% non-white. Shit like this is not okay. So, congratulations, Oxygen. You found a way to hit bedrock and burrow even deeper. I’ll be in my bunker, waiting for all of this to blow over.