Singer Summer Walker is getting immense support from African Traditional Religions (ATR) practitioners after Twitter users trolled her for wearing a traditional white religious attire and shared the photo online.
Summer Walker posting her shopping at the grocery store with no mask buying all of this “healthy food” is a perfect example of how we look at health. pic.twitter.com/mFv9rtSd5G
— TheKingofReads (@TheKingofReads) March 10, 2022
Last week, a Twitter user shared the photo of Summer wearing a simple white dress and white headscarf, which quickly circulated on Twitter. While Walker appeared to be having a good time as she shopped for healthy food, people unfamiliar with the ATR traditions started to troll her, even comparing her to a character from Tyler Perry’s movie, “For Colored Girls.”
rare picture of summer walker at the market in 1812 pic.twitter.com/APguZ3SQvR
— madame cream j walker (@msjuicybootyy) March 10, 2022
Why it look like Summer Walker just filmed Color purple 2 and went grocery shopping after pic.twitter.com/1PUd7H4aZ3
— LANDO (@LandoSoReal) March 11, 2022
It took no time for practitioners of ATR to come to her defense, specifically comedian, actor, and musician, Jay Versace, who is a priest of Obatalá, according to his Twitter bio. After tweeting to his followers to post up photos of themselves wearing all white, one Twitter user tweeted the photo of Walker, which resulted in Versace telling the user space for Black women navigating through their spiritual practices is needed.
I know y’all are posting this hoping to make everyone laugh but we gotta create space for Black women to navigate their spiritual practice. this is an African traditional attire for a specific spiritual practice. let’s decide who we wanna tear down and who we wanna uplift
— ︎JAYVERSACE (@JAYVERSACE) March 11, 2022
“I know y’all are posting this hoping to make everyone laugh, but we gotta create space for Black women to navigate their spiritual practice,” Versace tweeted. “This is an African traditional attire for a specific spiritual practice. Let’s decide who we wanna tear down and who we wanna uplift.”
However, non-initiates and priests shared images of themselves in all white to show solidarity with Walker and bring awareness to traditional African religions.
Me, my godsister, and some omiero! 🌊🌿 pic.twitter.com/FpUfyKHyfN
— iya ehime ora (@ehimeora) March 12, 2022
— lavender mami. (@Dirtylilbruja) March 12, 2022
— N I Y A W E L L S/ A Y É (@NiyaWells_) March 12, 2022
— Bruja Brat (@BrujaBanton) March 12, 2022
On Sunday, Walker eventually responded to the trolls on her Instagram page, explaining that she is a practicing Iyawo, and had permission from her Godparents to share the photo online.
View this post on Instagram
“Who’s the clown? The ones trying to reconnect to STOLEN practices? Or the ones who can’t see the importance of their own culture,” Walker wrote. “Also, I know yawos aren’t supposed to post themselves, but I got blessings from my godparents to post myself for work. I wanna show how you can do your job and still be a yawo while still rejecting vanity. I’m doing this publicly to show how important it is to be in African religions / to de-stigmatize them.”
And she said what she said. Period.
