Our version of “cool girl” makes white colleagues comfortable. I used to be the coolest black girl.

I tried the “cool black girl” persona growing up. When you’re always the only one — the only black person, women, or both in your career, for most of your life, it’s not just easy to fall into the “cool black girl” trap — It’s inevitable. Sarah Stockdale wrote about the cool girl trope in tech inspired by the cool girl outline from the book Gone Girl. She acknowledges the cool girl trope “is complicated further when you consider race.” I was compelled to speak on that since it hit so close to home. Maya Rupert outlines the cool girl trope for black women in her essay “This ‘Cool Black Girl’ is Gone”:

Black girls have our own version of the cool girl. The cool black girl is urban but not hood. She’s down enough to use slang her white friends will want to poach, but won’t embarrass them by sounding too black. She’s willing to date white men, but is unbothered when they don’t want to date her. She’s unflinchingly patient and endlessly supportive of the white women around her. And above all else, she never — ever — makes a white person feel uncomfortable about race. Accusing someone of racism — particularly when that person is saying things that make them sound racist — is the cardinal sin for a cool black girl. Cool black girls are, after all, still black girls, which means we’re stronger than everyone else. We can take it.

We can take it. Just like the “cool girl,” we’re never angry. That’s just a stereotype about black women after all.

Go ahead, shit on me. I’m a black girl. I can take it.

The cool black girl in my industry is one of the white guys. She tells herself not to sound too black before she speaks to her colleagues. She puts more effort into pronouncing Tchaikovsky then pronouncing the names of her colleagues of color.

The cool black girl in my industry lets her colleagues touch her hair, and says things like “I’ve never experienced discrimination at work, I just work hard”, “I don’t sound white, I sound educated,” “I don’t see race,” and “I have more white friends anyway.” She thanks her colleagues when they tell her she’s well spoken, defends her colleagues to other black men and women, doesn’t call out sexist and racist remarks, doesn’t speak up when feeling neglected by non-black feminists, and does everything else the cool girl does as a black woman.

She avoids offending her colleagues with suggestions that you have offended her, uses racial self-deprecation to indulge “ironic” senses of humor, and laughs when something’s not funny or nods when something doesn’t make sense. She makes them feel better for making her feel worse, because she knows she needs this job more than anyone.

But that’s okay. After all, they’re still black girls. I’m still a black girl. We can take it. I’m the cool black girl.

We’re never angry.

I’m grateful for Rupert for outlining our own version of the cool girl. Just like “the cool girl” the cool black girl doesn’t exist. She’s a coping mechanism for black women.

Just like the “cool girl” we have to stop letting people think “cool black girl” exists too.

The cool black girl persona was so damaging. Something needed to be done about her once I experienced some harassment — repeated wolf whistles at work, unsolicited bae calling at work, ass cheek brushing at a work party, sentence interjections, racially motivated negging, sexual messages — that kind of harassment. One of my “cool black girl” friends at the time said “I wouldn’t make a big deal out of it. It’ll go away. You could risk losing your job.”

What I was really hoping to hear was a justification for being assertive and proactive about this — “Get angry about it, hold people accountable for their actions.” That’s what I was hoping for…

I also had “cool black girl” experiences at a tech conference during senior year of university. The “cool black girl” thanked a white woman for telling me I was well spoken after a presentation, but she didn’t speak up when a white woman, after telling her where I went to school, walked away in the middle of our conversation to talk with a lighter skinned woman from a more selective university. My “cool black girl” ally at the conference said “Don’t let it bother you. There’s lots of great people here for you to meet. Focus on getting to know them.”

Don’t let it bother you. Don’t get angry.

I still couldn’t bring myself to be assertive. I would have spoken up had someone validated my emotions at the time.

In making others comfortable, I was making myself sick. Reading Rupert’s essay was a serious wake up call. This “cool black girl” is gone.

The “cool black girl” is another toxic myth. She enables gender and racial discrimination from both men and women. She’s made palatable for mainstream whiteness. She pockets a black woman’s emotions. She helps people silence her, myself, and black women. She’s hurting you, she’s hurting me. She needs to go the fuck away.