Months ago, Ayesha Curry, wife of basketball star Stephen Curry, penned a series of tweets that, to this day, remain controversial and a reoccurring topic on Twitter.

Now like I’ve mentioned before in a previous article, Ayesha’s disdain for women who do not choose to dress like her is apparent. It’s dishonest to ignore the tone behind these series of tweets. It was a condescending dig towards women who aren’t interested in “keeping it covered for the one who matters” or for women who don’t care to choose “classy over trendy.”

When I saw that thread of tweets, I automatically knew Ayesha was about to become the poster girl for ashy knuckle twitter’s fantasy of what an ideal woman should be: reserved, “modest”, demure, and submissive.

Sure enough, not even two seconds after she pressed send on those tweets, men were going to town with their “We need more Ayesha’s and less Cardi’s or Amber’s” tweets. Men began antagonizing other women, claiming we needed to aspire to be just like Ayesha. (These same men also tell women we need to have a mind of our own when we gush over women like Beyonce but I digress…)

Now, I’ve already talked about the harm in compartmentalizing women (Read here) but what I haven’t delved into is how men claim they have this deep seated respect for Ayesha Curry when in fact that is not true at all.

They don’t actually respect Ayesha as a person–a whole ass person. When it comes to respecting women, people have a very shallow view of what kind of women are deserving of respect and what that respect actually looks like. I’ve broken down, what I call, conditional respect people have for women:

Conditional respect for women is often confused as general respect for women. If you can only respect 1 kind of woman, u don’t respect women

— urfavelilredcorvette (@delafro_) December 9, 2015

 

+ you don’t actually respect women as people because once a woman doesn’t fit that “type”, you no longer see her as deserving of respect.

— urfavelilredcorvette (@delafro_) December 9, 2015

 

And the idea that a woman who isn’t “modest” is a woman w/ no self-respect, morals, and is not deserving of respect is widely accepted too

— urfavelilredcorvette (@delafro_) December 9, 2015

 

So to most people, if you “respect” the “respectable, modest” women and disregard the “immodest” women, you aren’t seen as sexist.

— urfavelilredcorvette (@delafro_) December 9, 2015

With that being said, why do I say men don’t respect Ayesha as a person? Well for one, Ayesha has said multiple times that she’s not interested in being their meme that they use against other women. I question the sincerity behind that statement from her but I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. She may have seen how harmful her words were and have grown from that. Again, I digress.

She’s literally said that when people use her to antagonize women, it’s harmful to other black women. She’s not looking to create division with other black women. The fact that she’s said this and men ignore this, shows that they don’t actually care about what Ayesha has to say nor do they respect her boundaries.

What they should ask themselves is, do they actually respect Ayesha or do they fetishize her? Do they see her as a fellow human or as a mule–excuse me, fantasy  of what they think a mule–goshdarnit, excuse my french again–a woman should be?

Ayesha literally embodies everything they want in a wife: conventionally attractive,  “modest”, loves to be a mom and wife, cooks, and cleans. But what do they actually know about Ayesha past these surface level things? Nothing really and that’s not important to them either which is why I say, they idealize Ayesha but they don’t actually respect her as a person.

They idealize her for what she does for her man. Note how when they speak about their “respect” for her, it’s revolving around what she does for her husband (who is worth $27 million and provides for her but I’m sleep) but not around her as an individual.

In the end, “modest” women receive a shallow end of what “respect” is. Respect, in this context, means being seen as fitting to be a man’s wife and the mother of his children. It doesn’t mean to be seen as a fellow human being who is inherently deserving of respect based off the principle of well.. human decency. The latter form of respect is vital to the safety and well-being of women but is rarely the respect women receive–even the “modest” ones.

If men aren’t claiming this shallow idea of respect for Ayesha, they’re weaponizing her against other women. They use her as a tool to police other women into what they want us to do. Quite frankly, I can’t blame Ayesha for feeling some type of way about that. How would you feel if the so called people who “respected” you reduced your entire existence into being a meme whose purpose is to chastise other women?

What kills me is when men claim women are jealous of Ayesha Curry when we point out how obsessive they are about her. No one is hating on Mrs. Curry but women are exhausted with constantly being compared to her or being told that we need to be the direct reflection of her. Women are individual beings. A good portion of us also do not care about gaining approval from men or being consumed by men in any kind of way. You’ll deal.

We do not have to fall into the same cookie cutter mold. Stop expecting women to be Ayesha. I’m not Ayesha Curry nor am I Amber Rose or Cardi B–women ya’ll are constantly comparing her to. I’m Candace and I only know how to be Candace. I celebrate women’s uniqueness and multifaceted qualities. It’s an insult to dilute our complexity.

Before you even claim you respect Ayesha, broaden your idea of what it means to respect women. Tokenizing and idealizing a woman is definitely not respect nor is constantly pitting her against other women. Let women exist in peace and let us thrive as individuals.

Remember, Ayesha ain’t ya tool fool.

** I would also like to add that women like Ayesha–the respectable ones–get cheated on everyday b. Respect deez nuts.