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Written by Aaronique Powell

For Precious Girls

The buzz surrounding Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire, the controversial film directed by Lee Daniels, is remarkable. Weeks after its release, it is still a hot topic for debate.  It has opened up a forum for a discourse that many are not used to having. One must consider the irony-a girl named Precious, living such a vile existence.

I didn't want to see this movie. Having been brought to tears by the novel, I was certain that a filmic portrayal would be too much to handle. After weeks of debating, reading reviews, and rants about the evils of the film's portrayal of Black people, I decided that I needed to see for myself.

Precious is from Harlem, NYC. She walked the same streets that many of us have walked. She talks with the same NYC pop and snap that we are so familiar with. But Precious is sixteen years old, illiterate, pregnant with her second child by her father, and infected with HIV.  Her story is one of rape, incest, abuse, self-loathing, and sadness; a story that seems too horrific to conceive.  I suppose people were outraged by the audacity of Lee Daniels’ to air such dirty secrets on a national stage, by the boldness of this man to unearth the skeletons that had until now remained hidden in the backs of our closets and the between the pages of our books. But to watch Precious and to only see Blackness would be cheapening the films message. 

Precious is not a Black, White, Latino, or Asian story. Precious is a story for precious girls—a “universal story” about girls who have somehow been hardened and tarnished by the ills of the world; girls whose pink bows have browned and frayed prematurely. Precious is for the precious girls who slip through the cracks of an educational system that doesn't see, or doesn't want to see them. Precious is for girls who lived invisible lives against unthinkable odds. Despite Precious’ girth, she roams the streets unseen.  She cries silent tears, drowning in a world that tells her that she does not belong. 

This film sparked rage in me for reasons outside of the portrayal of Black people.  I was outraged that girls like Precious could exist, that it was possible for me to have walked past Precious on the sidewalk, or sat next to her on the train without seeing the sadness in her eyes.  The story of Precious ought not be considered a singular failure of the education, and welfare systems, but a failure of communities to act upon witnessing such atrocities.

To dismiss this story as another “cliché” Black tale would be to perpetuate the cycle that produces these precious girls--a cycle of denial and neglect.  I commend Lee Daniels for his efforts in breaking this cycle, for telling the story, and for reminding us that these precious girls live among us-crying out for our help.

Source: Interview with Lee Daniels- http://www.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUSTRE5AP1EV20091126?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=11617