Tag: race

Lorde & Baldwin

Posted by helenboyd – June 2, 2013

Here is an amazing thing: a conversation between Audre Lorde and James Baldwin.

The incomparable Audre Lorde says:

There is a larger structure, a society with which we are in total and absolute war. We live in the mouth of a dragon, and we must be able to use each other’s forces to fight it together, because we need each other. I am saying that in our joint battle we have also developed some very real weapons, and when we turn them against each other they are even more bloody, because we know each other in a particular way. When we turn those weapons against each other, the bloodshed is terrible. Even worse, we are doing this in a structure where we are already embattled. I am not denying that. It is a family discussion I’m having now. I’m not laying blame. I do not blame Black men for what they are. I’m asking them to move beyond. I do not blame Black men; what I’m saying is, we have to take a new look at the ways in which we fight our joint oppression because if we don’t, we’re gonna be blowing each other up. We have to begin to redefine the terms of what woman is, what man is, how we relate to each other.

It’s worth reading, and re-reading, and re-reading again.

Stupid White People

Posted by helenboyd – May 30, 2013


This is one of the best things ever.

Integrate Prom?

Posted by helenboyd – April 4, 2013

I’m sorry — what did I just read?!? Is it 1953 all over again?

These students in rural Georgia have decided it is ABOUT TIME their prom become an integrated event. Yes, integrated, as in race integration.

I have to say I’m flabbergasted.

Support them by liking their FB page.

Ending the Day: Amiri Baraka

Posted by helenboyd – January 21, 2013

Every year we read a ton of quotes attributed to Dr. King, and miss out on all the other amazing, liberatory art that’s come out of Black america. This is only an excerpt:

This is my own transcription:

But I aint come from a foolish tribe
we wants the the mule / the land / you can make it 300 years of blue chip stock in the entire operation
we want to be paid in a central bank the average worker farmer wage for all those years we gave it free
plus we want damages for all the killings and the fraud, the lynchings the missing justice the lies and frame ups the unwarranted jailings the tar and featherings the character and race assassinations historical slander ugly caricatures for every sambo stepnfetchit flick
we want to be paid
for every hurtful thing you did or said
for all the land you took for all the rapes all the rosewoods and black wall streets you jobs
all the miseducation jobs lost
segregated shacks we live in
the disease that ate & killed us
for all the mad police that drilled us
all the music and dances you stole
the styles the language the hip clothes you copied
the careers you stopped

all these are suits, specific litigation

Race Matters

Posted by helenboyd – November 30, 2012

I’m going to be teaching Cornel West’s Race Matters next year, to first year students, and was compiling some links for my colleagues, but thought you all might appreciate them too:

Here are a couple of good link for alternative writers on race.These are my regular reads.

(The “Three Kinds of White Racists” is the best, to me, but might upset people who are not ready to admit to being racist.)

& Abagond talks about the Bechdel Test for race, which is a nice connection to Fun Home (the post explains The Bechdel Test in the first place, too).

 

IMHO, most white people are clueless and in denial about their own racism, and like gender discrimination, racism is a problem for all of us – not just black people. So let’s get our act together, shall we?

Race & Gender & Life Expectancy

Posted by helenboyd – September 23, 2012

So this is shocking news: whites who don’t graduate high school have a life expectancy that’s four years shorter than it used to be. And look at this:


In 2010, American women fell to 41st place, down from 14th place in 1985, in the United Nations rankings. Among developed countries, American women sank from the middle of the pack in 1970 to last place in 2010, according to the Human Mortality Database.

Uneducated white women are now living not even as long as black women with the same lack of education. That is honestly shocking. The life expectancy of uneducated black women has always been horrible, but now even more women are dying at the same rates.

But then there’s this guy:

“There’s this enormous issue of why,” said David Cutler, an economics professor at Harvard who was an author of a 2008 paper that found modest declines in life expectancy for less educated white women from 1981 to 2000. “It’s very puzzling and we don’t have a great explanation.”

Um, what? Bad health care, single parenting with little to no safety net (which can cause more stress), substance abuse (especially of prescription drugs and cigarettes), sexual violence… is this really hard to work out?

The one good part, I suppose, is that the percentage of everyone without high school diplomas is down from 22% to 12%.

So much for feminism being redundant in America, eh?

Isis King / Janet Mock

Posted by helenboyd – July 21, 2012

Here’s a cool interview by the folks at In the Life: Isis King of America’s Top Model is interviewed by/conversing with Janet Mock, the out black trans woman of People magazine.

Treated Like a Woman (Or a Young Black Man)

Posted by helenboyd – May 27, 2012

My friend Lena pointed out this short article on Think Progress by Alyssa Rosenberg about the return of D’Angelo to me, which talks about how D’Angelo was undone by the pressure to strip – and maintain an exacting and desired physique for his fans – and Rosenberg talks about how he was, effectively, treated like a woman.

Which, well of course: women have to be beautiful to be considered talented, but if beautiful have to work against type to be considered smart, or artistic.

Yet there is this long, long history of treating young black men as a stereotype too, of the young black buck: known for their bodies, and brawn; assumed to be hung, sexually provocative and yet also sexually and physically objectified. In a culture where well hung or athletic or both is often also assumed to mean small brained, or non/anti-intellectual, young black men are up against a lot of stereotypes women are up against as well. Both too are demonized for their apparent sexuality: women for having any, and black men for having their assumed and expected expertise “threaten” white men’s power and self-image.

So in a sense he wasn’t treated like a woman at all; he was treated as many young black men are treated, and have been: expected to be nothing more than their physical, sexualized, and objectified bodies.

Horrible, Horrible Racism

Posted by helenboyd – April 24, 2012

Here’s the story.


On Sunday, April 15th, at the Moderna Museet the Swedish Artists Organisation celebrated World Art Day, as well as celebrating its own 75th birthday. Lena Adelsohn-Liljeroth, the culture Minister, was Invited to speak and a number of artists were invited to create birthday cakes for the celebration. The Minister was informed that the cake would be about the limits of provocative art, and about female genital mutilation. The event was launched with Lena Adelsohn-Liljeroth cutting the first piece of cake from a dark, ruby red velvet filling with black icing, which we understand was created by the Afro-Swedish artist Makode Aj Linde, whose head forms that of the black woman, and is seen with a blackened face screaming with pain each time a guest cuts a slice from the cake. Rather disturbingly for many African women, the minister is pictured laughing as she cuts off the genital area (clitoris)from the metaphorical cake, as the artist Makode screams distastefully. The gaze of the predominantly white Swedish crowd is on Lijeroth who is positioned at the crotch end, as they look on at their visibly ebullient culture minister with seemingly nervous laughter as she becomes a part of the performance – a re-enactment of FGM on a cake made in the image of a disembodied African woman.

Here’s the petition. Sign it.

7 0f 10

Posted by helenboyd – February 4, 2012

In honor of Black History Month, here’s a neat article from Queerty about seven African-American LGBTQ people who have made some kind of significant impact, either politically or culturally.

White People

Posted by helenboyd – January 5, 2012

“White people are so lame.” – Homer Simpson

It’s so excellent, and the vocals are spot-on.

Slutwalk Critique

Posted by helenboyd – September 28, 2011

An Open Letter from Black Women to the SlutWalk, it’s titled, but it should be called how to dismantle white privilege in feminist movements, or something similar.

Black women in the U.S. have worked tirelessly since the 19th century colored women’s clubs to rid society of the sexist/racist vernacular of slut, jezebel, hottentot, mammy, mule, sapphire; to build our sense of selves and redefine what women who look like us represent. Although we vehemently support a woman’s right to wear whatever she wants anytime, anywhere, within the context of a “SlutWalk” we don’t have the privilege to walk through the streets of New York City, Detroit, D.C., Atlanta, Chicago, Miami, L.A. etc., either half-naked or fully clothed self-identifying as “sluts” and think that this will make women safer in our communities an hour later, a month later, or a year later. Moreover, we are careful not to set a precedent for our young girls by giving them the message that we can self-identify as “sluts” when we’re still working to annihilate the word “ho”, which deriving from the word “hooker” or “whore”, as in “Jezebel whore” was meant to dehumanize. Lastly, we do not want to encourage our young men, our Black fathers, sons and brothers to reinforce Black women’s identities as “sluts” by normalizing the term on t-shirts, buttons, flyers and pamphlets.

The personal is political. For us, the problem of trivialized rape and the absence of justice are intertwined with race, gender, sexuality, poverty, immigration and community. As Black women in America, we are careful not to forget this or we may compromise more than we are able to recover. Even if only in name, we cannot afford to label ourselves, to claim identity, to chant dehumanizing rhetoric against ourselves in any movement. We can learn from successful movements like the Civil Rights movement, from Women’s Suffrage, the Black Nationalist and Black Feminist movements that we can make change without resorting to the taking-back of words that were never ours to begin with, but in fact heaved upon us in a process of dehumanization and devaluation.

Great stuff. Go ahead & read the whole thing, especially if you’re a white feminist who is excited about SlutWalk. It won’t ruin it for you – it’ll just give you some context and maybe a little humility.

Don Lemon

Posted by helenboyd – May 19, 2011

Good for Don Lemon for coming out. I’m glad he’s talking about how being a gay black male is different than it is to be any other kind of male. It’s great to see more LGBTQ people of color stepping up.

Pam Spaulding of Pam’s House Blend has more on the story as it emerged, Lemon’s official statement, and The Grio has a nice piece on why Lemon’s coming out matters:

One thing I know for sure is that there are thousands of young people, black men specifically, who will see Don Lemon, an anchor for “the most trusted name in news” and be inspired. Hopefully, they will hate themselves a little less, love themselves a little more and the blows from the black church will not hit as hard.

Spaulding’s piece on skin color is essential reading, and provides good context for why Lemon’s coming out is vital.

January 22nd…

Posted by helenboyd – January 24, 2011

… was the 38th anniversary of Roe V. Wade. This article, about how anti-choice groups targeted black women with both race and gender baiting, is harrowing but essential reading.

Keep it safe and keep it legal.

Dr. King’s Inheritance

Posted by helenboyd – January 17, 2011

I love Angela Davis, & I love what she’s doing even now: speaking out against the racial bias of the industrial prison complex: