KEY$ NADIA IS THE NEW KOOL G R@PPER

I am a black nerd. I don't think it's so important, but I don't think I'm a nerd and I happen to be black, or I'm black and I happen to be a nerd either. I don't happen to be anything, I am what I am. It's not important because it shouldn't be. I shouldn't have to prove my labels, as if such a thing weren't of any existence or was exotic. People are nerds, naturally, black people are people too. Lately, however, the Black Nerds of America have been owning their black nerdship, and creating a culture in their blackness (which they will assure is not decremented by their nerdiness, instead exhaulted to a more existential level), and the nerdiness they have come to embrace. And then they realize, from that, that nerds are really very stylish, and very in, and therefore the most attractive pieces of candy in the salt water taffy store on the boardwalk. It started with Issa Rae.
Or Donald Glover. Donald Glover, fellow Black Nerd (demoted to a lower standard for participating on Girls as their only Person of Color (that show really needs diversity it's kind of sad!) by People who Care and such) identifies Nerdship as that which involves obsession. Sure, he was joking as he said Kanye West is a Black Nerd, and not Urkel, for his infatuation with bears far succeeds Urkel simple dorkiness, but it's true. Nerds are those with obsessions. And mine is the Black Nerd Culture, and Mindless Behavior. And lots of music. And Issa Rae.

Issa Rae is my idol of all time. In high school, she wrote an entire essay in "Ebonics" as she withered through the loneliness of being on of the only black kids in her private school. She got an A for stylistic devices. She went to Stanford for African American Studies. She raps to get her emotions in tact. In college, she made a series about black students in prestigious colleges; and one day she decided to post a facebook status. "I'm Awkward, and I'm Black," it read. A friend commented, "Those are the two worst things to be;" thus Issa Rae, like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, became into a more perfect person than she had already proved to have been.
A friend told me the other day as she lamented her life, "I am a caterpillar wanting to fly. And that is just retarded Aidan." I do not promote the use of the word "retarded" in such a context, but I digress, such is the reason I LOVE Issa Rae. She's awkward, and black, and although in the eyes of BET and the rest of daytime media for ratchet people and midwest housewives, that's a death combination, she's a flying caterpillar. Issa Rae is the pioneer of the Black Nerd Movement, and she is the creator of Awkward Black Girl.
Its title may seem off putting, I know, but what it comes down to is humor and some jokes that will make you pee on yourself, and then pause to find the philosophical and ratchet undertones. It stars a girl with an awkward life named J, her best friend Ceci, White Jay, and the most hilarious disgusting workplace.


As J goes through the painful and raw moments of her life, she realizes the beauty of love and best friendship,  angry rapping, and daydreams. This is Issa Rae's genius. J's not awkward, she's a person, and she's unsure and insecure, and what she is is the awkwardness we have within ourselves as we learn to deal with our own nature. We are all inherently awkward, and we've all got something to share. But Issa Rae found a way to do that.
Even as J frowns in interviews and bites her lips as she prologues distressed silences, Issa Rae is loud and personable, and smart but unafraid to embrace any ignorance she has in order to learn. Issa Rae isn't even embarrassed to embrace ignorance; however, everyone is not a Stanford Graduate, and therefore, unable to do so as classy and prophetic as she does.
    
As such, Issa Rae is able to create such beauty as "Ratchetpiece Theatre" which explores the hilarious, delirious, and often disturbing culture of the ratchet of our country.
Ratchet, according to Issa Rae, is, "If ghetto and a hot [expletive] mess had a baby, and that baby had no father, and became a stripper, then made a sex tape with an athlete, and became a reality star."
Such an intelligent mind committed to understanding the self made-incompetent gives me hope about my world. Most of all, she inspires me that being black and nerdy and awkward doesn't make you a square in the sense that you are lame, because there's nothing cooler than a nerdy gangster, and that's what Issa Rae is.
So I've vowed to myself to become a rapper. I'm going to try to be a rapper for thirty days, and if it doesn't work, I'll try not to be Issa Rae, and just be myself; however, I'll try to make videos like Awkward Black Girl too, because that's something I'd love to do. My rapper name, everyone, is KEY$ NADIA. My title is the New Kool G Rapper, after the Das Racist lyric making a homage to the rapper Kool G.
My first mixtape will be 'Boys and the Universe: The Flying Caterpillar'. Here is a snippet from my single "Walking Cannibal Dagger"
DOLLAR SIGN/DOLLAR SIGN/DOLLAR SIGN/DOLLAR SIGN/ KEY DOLLAR SIGN NADIA/ COMIN' ACHA WITH A SONG (pause) YA/ BETTA KEEP YO HEAD COV(pause)AD/COS I'M A WALKING CANNIBAL DAGGA/COMIN' FO ALL THE SMARTS IN YA BRAIN YEAH MEDUSA/ THAT'S THAT GREEK [EXPLETIVE] FINNA DRIVE YOU INSANE/COS I'M A GOD/ OF RAP DUH/ I'M A [EXPLETIVE] PROD/IGY COS WE GETTIN JIGGY WIT IT/ MY WORDS DANCE LIKE I WAS ON POINT IN A MINUETTE/ WE GON CONTINUE THIS LATER/ MY WORDS SO FAST (pause) YOU NEED A CALCULATOR.
Thank you.
Other than my fabulous projected money-pouring-into-my-house-like-a-broken-waterpark-was-next-door-to-my-house-you know, cos the water would just splurge in-if money were water-career, Issa Rae has taught me what writing is, and what being yourself really can be.
Perhaps the greatest thing on Issa Rae's channel besides Ratchetpiece and the first season of ABG is Issa Rae presents the Fly Guys Present "The 'F' Word." Such is a show documenting three fools as they journey three years to record, "THE ONE!" or the single that will win them all the money, fans, and women they desire. Each episode is appropriately named after the song they create, and as they do so, the song takes a story of its own. Each adventure is quite silly, as they meet a knock-off Bruno Mars, hit on each others moms, dance compete, Sumo compete, and discuss important matters with their online manager who lives in Nebraska. Appropriately, each star is quite silly as well. There's DJB, who's adorable and sensitive, Tone, a player who's a bit of a jerk, and Enimal, the leader.

I wish they did not refer to women as the B-word so often, perhaps that is why they have no game. Even so, I have not laughed this hard due to a show in a long time. Such leads me to my absolute favorite, the most adorable show of the Black Nerds, Brothers With No Game.
There is nothing cuter than Brothers With No Game, as it follows four men in London as their magic tricks of love fail on the women of their dreams. There's Theo, the guy you're supposed to root for, the guy who's really sensitive and sweet, and just wants to treat a woman right, but for the same reason cannot get one. There's Marcus, the impossibly clueless ladies man, who's also very physically attractive. There's Dorian, who analyses everything and is absolutely dumbstruck as he debates methods to address his love to his crush of ten years. And there's Junior, who's in love and heart broken as the love of his life Vanessa leaves him to work in New York City. Each has no game for obvious reasons, but their almost ironic chivalrous character, and loyal friendship always gets the viewer to believe they'd have game with her or him. It's not a hillarious show, it just keeps it real.
Keeping it real as in, it feels like people's lives, and the funny things are those which happen everyday as you have good times with your friends. Brothers with no game, although about sad people, is a good day with your friends, and that's always refreshing. Nonetheless, it's very funny, especially Marcus's episode as he asks out Niya, and later goes speed dating with freaks and his friends. Brothers With No Game is a lot of what the media isn't, and I'm not sure is Britain isn't much the same as that which we have here, but if this show were in the United States, I think it would come as a bit of a shocker that these young Black men weren't being portrayed as players and idiots, rather sort of lame guys who just want to watch a good ball game.

"I'm on a higher level of sexy right now, and I want you to join me."

That's the Black Nerd Mantra. We're too sexy for one to understand, but our quirks exist in our awkward sentence structure, our politeness, our desire for you to understand, but for us to still be cool. That's all I want to be, but sometimes I think that's a lot harder than just being me.

Much Love to Issa Rae and congradulations on the show with First Black Nerd Shonda Rhimes!