The
past few weeks have been a very trying time in terms of American race
relations. I find myself, along with
others, holding a myriad of emotions (fear, anger, confusion, dismay, apathy),
as well as hope and love when seeing the efforts of protesters and minority
communities coming together in solidarity to speak out against injustice. Sadly, I find that as a Black feminist, it is
too easy to become disheartened with the current state of racial injustice; too
easy to relate current events to historical depictions of the treatment of
minorities in America; too easy to just want to ignore or become apathetic
about such real and present reminders of privilege, power and inequality. It’s too easy to pretend that if it doesn’t
directly affect you, then it’s not going to affect you at all.
After
reading numerous news articles and Facebook posts about Michael Brown and Eric
Garner, a friend of mine stated “Everyone expects me to be sad about this, I
don’t understand because it’s not directly affecting me. I didn’t personally know the Black men
involved”. In that moment, I became well
aware of just how easy it is to allow yourself to become so removed from the
situation that you believe it doesn’t affect you at all. No, I did not personally know Michael Brown,
Eric Gardner, Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice or Renisha McBride, but I speak their
names to affirm and validate their lives and experiences. I do, however, know my brothers, my father,
my uncles, my cousins, and myself. As
much as I imagine that their loved ones worried for their safety, I worry for
the safety of my loved ones as well. I
worry for my 3 brothers, because I know that it doesn't matter that they are
educated, humble, respectful & caring individuals, having black skin has
been/is seen as a crime in and of itself. I worry for myself, as a perpetual student
and resident of the Ivory Tower. How
will my passion and pride in my communities; my outrage with “the system”; and
my anger as a Black woman be viewed amongst friends, advisors, colleagues? I worry for my friends who may not understand
fully the historical implications of abuses of power and privilege directed
towards racial and ethnic minorities. I
worry about how this will impact views and interactions with and of them. Most of all I worry that my anger will be
invalidated and cast among the innumerable stereotypes attached to a body that
identifies as Black, feminist, activist, scholar, PhD student. I worry the same worries that have stressed those
who have paved the way for my existence in this space, place and time in my
life.
When
talking about race and cultural competence (as I somehow always find myself
doing amongst friends), I was once asked “So how is this a feminist
issue?” Shocked, confused, and
embarrassed, I found myself struggling to find an answer on the spot. Sometimes the words that you are looking for
have already been spoken and connecting to those words and the lips from which
they emerged brings the most meaning to your experience. So how is #BlackLivesMatter a feminist
issue? I believe that Audre Lorde spoke
it best in saying: “I am a Black Feminist. I mean I recognize that my power as
well as my primary oppressions comes as a result of my blackness as well as my
womaness, and therefore my struggles on both of these fronts are inseparable.”
– Audre Lorde
- Written by Tangela Roberts, M.S.
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