By Jordan Ashby
We’ve all been there. Scrolling through social media, one second looking at a cute fit pic, the next a GoFundMe, the next an interesting event you’re excited to attend, the next a war crime and a dying child, then next an ad for exactly what you and your bestie were just talking about because the algorithm just knows you that well.
Staring at the screen, your eyes remain glazed until you close the app on autopilot and quickly move on to the next to-do. The numbing is so complete you don’t even register it.
In June of 1981, Audre Lorde delivered a keynote presentation “The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism” at the National Women’s Studies Association Conference. “I want to speak about anger, my anger,” she told the audience, “and what I have learned from my travels through its dominions.” She talks primarily about white women’s racism, her anger in response, the particular threat her anger poses, and, crucially, the importance of Black women’s anger as a source of insight, clarity, and energy for revolutionary action.
She goes on to say that when we reject or suppress our anger, we turn away from insight and “accept only the designs already known, deadly and safely familiar.”
While catching the last bits of sun in the park next to my house, I listened to one of the best meditations on gratitude I’ve come across: “When the times was rough, I would look up and pray, thank God I ain’t have to smack a bitch today!” (Rico Nasty 2018). Sitting there, listening to the gospel, I thought: exactly. Thank God I ain’t have to smack a bitch today. But if I did have to, would I?
Or would I just, in my numbness, accept the deadly and safely familiar?
URRRGE!!!!!!!!!! (Doja Cat 2023)
When I was a kid, I wanted to fight the world. My strong sense of righteousness meant that the littlest thing could send me into a fit of rage, fits my mother spent endless hours taming. Eventually, she was met with success. Largely for my own self-protection, I channeled my rage into sadness, or anxiety, or shame, or despair—more appropriate and internal emotions. The external anger, which other people would be forced to reckon with, all but disappeared.
But recently, in the face of apocalyptic levels of death and unfathomable pain, I found myself wondering: where had all that rage gone? After a lifetime of being told not to be the “angry black woman,” finding that fire again felt impossible.
How can we feel our own anger? To begin, I’ve found it helpful to listen to the women, like Rico, who haven’t shied away from their own.
Sho Shot (The Lady of Rage 1997)
Black women rappers have made innumerable contributions to the culture, from their storytelling, lyricism, style, sexual expression, and, importantly, unapologetic anger. The Lady of Rage was one of the first and best to ever do it. Despite never receiving the recognition she deserved due largely to the misogynoir of the music industry, her lyricism reminds me of the focused precision that Lorde writes about:
“Every woman has a well-stocked arsenal of anger potentially useful against those oppressions, personal and institutional, which brought that anger into being. Focused with precision it can become a powerful source of energy serving progress and change.”
The Lady of Rage’s debut album begins with a skit of a reporter covering a crowd shouting “We want Rage! We want Rage!” The reporter interviews people “crossing all color lines, all age lines” but all asking for the same thing: rage.
This introduction spoke to me. It was the grounding I needed for a collection of songs that have helped me get in touch with my long suppressed anger.
Flood (Little Simz 2025)
Not every song on this mixtape is angry, per se, nor do I think that cultivating anger was all of the artists’ intent while creating. Rather, these are songs that have helped me tap into my own anger. If we collectively broke free from passivity, honed our anger with precision, I wonder what we could shut down? Who could we scare? What could we build?
Zoom (LeiKeli47 2020)
I’ve always loved LeiKeli’s distinctive sound, humor, and range. In this song, she blends the weighty feeling of the need for self-protection (a fist clenched in your pocket, holding keys in your hands walking across a parking lot, just in case, just in case) with her typical humorous lyrics (sock em! Zoom zoom zoom!).
D.I.Y. (Bbymutha 2018)
Bbymutha is one of my absolute favs. In D.I.Y. she raps about not selling out and staying true to her art. While not a rageful song, it reminds of the uncompromising values that my anger needs to be grounded in.
SixSaidIt (Six Type Beat 2025)
Some of the songs aren’t about the bars at all – the anger that they inspire comes from a heavy, rhythmic beat that makes me feel like I could march into war.
Crazy (Doechii 2024)
When I first started tapping into my rage, I didn’t know, in fact, that I would go fucking crazy. But in the face of a crazy world, the proper response (sometimes!) is to also lose it!
Our anger can fuel protests, organize our community meetings, contribute to mutual aid. With our rage, we can call out that racist coworker, stop to ask how our neighbor is doing, put up a fight for the most vulnerable in our communities.
So, this is an invitation to you to go fucking crazy as well. Take this as a starting point to create your own “Uses of Anger” playlist! What songs shake you from your numbness? What songs help you cultivate and hone your rage?
In doing so, we can begin our own processes of traveling, like Audre, through anger’s dominions.
Track List
- Riot (Intro) - The Lady of Rage
- Sho Shot - The Lady of Rage
- Six Type Beat - SixSaidIt
- Smack a Bitch - Rico Nasty
- Flood - Little Simz, Obongjayar, Moonchild Sanelly
- URRRGE!!!!!!!!!! - Doja Cat ft. A$AP Rocky
- GTFO - Doechii, Fetish
- 2ON - Bree Runway
- Pacer - Doechii
- Zoom - Leikeli47
- SHE DGAF - BELOVED SUN
- D.I.Y - BbyMutha
- Wilin’ - Quay Dash
- DILEMMA - Azealia Banks
- Breakdown - Ms. Boogie
- Countin’ Up - Rico Nasty
- Werkin’ Girls - Angel Haze
- Freedom Time - Ms. Lauryn Hill
- Crazy - Doechhi