Madison Keys won her first Grand Slam title after beating world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka at the Australian Open this past weekend in three exciting sets, 6-3, 2-6, 7-5.
The victory ended a frustrating time for Keys where she advanced but failed to win a Grand Slam.
In 2016, she lost to Serena Williams in the Australian Open semifinals and in 2017, she lost to Sloane Stephens in the US Open Final. So finally securing the elusive Grand Slam victory was a major moment for the soon-to-be 30-year-old player.
Her victory came on the first weekend of Tr**p’s return to the White House, a weekend where he unleashed retribution, hate and chaos across the country and the world.
While immigration took center stage at the start of his punishing administration, his other target was diversity.
In only a few short days, he has attacked and/or eliminated DEI initiatives at almost every level in the country. While many companies, like Target and Meta, collapsed under the weight of his executive order, others like Costco, JPMorgan Chase, Apple and Ulta have stood firm in their support of DEI programs.
DEI, as everyone with common sense and humanity knows, is not about harming one group for another. It’s about opening the door to different trains of thought and to those commonly overlooked because of their skin color, gender, age, sexual preference or other characteristics traditionally discriminated against.
But it’s been twisted to refer to Blackness and used as a term to scare white people into thinking it’s a revolutionary movement aiming to eliminate them from positions of power.
That ignorance, the same employed by anti-woke and anti-CRT whiners, has engulfed many and led to rollbacks in civil rights protections.
Now, emboldened by the former president’s return, Blackness is under direct and unabashed attack on a national level.
That’s why Madison’s victory and Blackness matter.
Her victory comes in the traditionally white sport of tennis. While a few Black players have won titles and risen to fame in the sport, they’re still in the great minority.
But Keys stands out; not for her skin color or because she became the second-oldest first-time women’s winner of the Australian Open, but rather for the Black identity debate she sparked in 2015 while discussing her identity.
“I’m very much right in the middle,” said Keys. “I don’t really think of it. I don’t really identify myself as white or African-American. I’m just me. I’m Madison.”
Keys’ father is Black and her mother is white. Historically, she would be considered Black, but modern-day identity politics has that up for debate.
Is she mixed, other or bi-racial?
Is she not Black enough or does she “pass”?
It’s the same discussion that raged around Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel almost three years ago, who claimed he identifies as human after fans learned that his father was Black.
Recently, Penn State’s James Franklin and Notre Dame’s Marcus Freeman were thrown into the racial identity debate.
Freeman became the first Black head coach in FBS history to coach in a national championship. While he accepted the history-making achievement, Freeman, whose father is Black and mother is Korean, also tried to deflect it so as not to “take attention away from the team.”
Those of us who are “Blasian” understand his position as you don’t want to favor one side at the risk of offending the other.
These debates will rage on and those at the center of it can identify how they choose.
But in today’s America, the one being destroyed by MAGA politics and its faux-outrage over non-issues, identity is important. Even though it shouldn’t be an everyday fight, this base has made it one due to their aggressively ignorant cultural politics.
That’s why the win by Madison Keys matters.
It’s another win by a Black woman in a sport with few Black superstars. Even if she doesn’t want to identify as Black, she is Black, especially in a traditionally non-Black space.
While players like Venus and Serena, Sloane Stephens, Taylor Townsend, Naomi Osaka and Coco Gauff have more Melanin than Keys, they all have Blackness.
So at a time when Black representation, experience and intellect are under attack, it’s important to acknowledge the success of those of a darker shade.
Even if some, like Madison Keys, choose not to.
