Black Women, Property Twice

Can I comment as a man who USED to enjoy porno?  I see situations supporting this blatant lack of respect for women daily, sometimes too subtle for many to see or accept.  Sadly, people, men AND women, don't want to see something that should abhorred by all for whatever reason.  Having a daughter, for me, means changing things and forcing (too strong?) yourself and people around you to pay respect.  I do my best for my daughter to grow up proud of being strong and to never let someone be less than honorable with her.  How do I teach the rest of the world the same thing? 

Three times in my life I've been hit by men. Once, a boy I had been dating for a while got angry with me because I wasn't in the mood for sex. We had had sex before but that day I just didn't feel like it and he hit me and threatened to drive me to another city and leave me there. I was frightened but I fought back and he drove me home.

Another time, I was in college and were at a party, again someone I had known for a while, but had never dated. He wasn't drunk but his friends claimed he was to campus police when he asked me to dance and I pulled my arm away and he slugged me so hard I saw stars for a while. All because I wouldn't dance with him.

And the last time - same scenario - guy tries to push up on me, I say no and before I know it we're fighting. I actually wrote about this on my blog ( http://deblite.blogspot.com/2006/02/why-i-dont-tru... ) and how because of  this incident and another, I do not trust our local police.

And I consider my life to be fairly normal. But I see now that these incidents of violence have changed me.  And I can't help but think and pray for the sistahs who have to endure this sort of violence every day.

@ BrownImani

I thank you. Sara Bartman thanks you and one day Lil Kim will too.

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Im blinking back the tears love.

Thank you for reading and for sharing.

@ snobographer ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... )

All women's bodies are public property, but WOC, AA women particularly,
are more sexualized. White women are put on pedestals, to be taken down
for lulz. Black women don't get the pedestal in the first place.
/thinking aloud

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Thank you for commenting and sharing.

You are thinking aloud, and you are accurate.

My stance is that the power dynamics around gender realtionships

can be traced back to binaries produced and rooted in slavery,

Madonna/whore, wife/slut etc.... Paula Giddings "When and Where I Enter"

clarifies this and also offers some insight into Prop 8.

This is very interesting.  We have to keep being reminded. 

Alphanista™-It's A Blog Dedicated to the Alpha Female Perspective

http://wwww.alphanista.com ( http://wwww.alphanista.com/ )

Wow m.dot. Please please continue your research. I stopped watching BET years ago and refuse to let my child and my sisters children watch many of the Black videos that are out here now. They are so toxic. Some of them are subtle too. The music is funky and you sing along or dance and then when you think about it later you are like OMG ! I mean I like Snoop and Tupac too and the lists goes on but OMG, their images of us is mind boggling. I see young sisters emulating these images too. Trying to be what they think Black men want us to be and then they call them names and use them for sport.

Other cultures see these images too and think that this is what it means to be an African-American woman. Black women, property still. This is how it feels to me.

PTSD is real. I see it everyday when I leave the safety of my home. Sometimes it creeps into my home and my life. Many people will never agree with you but once you know the truth you are obligated to speak on it. I thank you. Sara Bartman thanks you and one day Lil Kim will too.

I've only gotten through about six minutes of the first of the three videos you linked, but it's got me seething over here. First these guys blame women for all their own weaknesses and shortcomings. Then, when a woman calls them out on their hypocrisy, they silence her by shouting her down with misogynist insults. Way to be "manly," if "manly" means being a bigot and stridently refusing to take responsibility for your own failures.

That professor of yours is an idiot too, m. dot. Like an institution that existed for about half a millenium and only ended about 150 years ago would have no reverberations in society. I hope he wasn't a history professor, but it wouldn't surprise me if he was.

As far as sexual harassment, the experiences you write about don't sound too different than some harassment and assault experiences I've had as a white woman. But I think WOC are subjected to a more virulent, insistent form of harassment. I'm still learning how to sort that out. All women's bodies are public property, but WOC, AA women particularly, are more sexualized. White women are put on pedestals, to be taken down for lulz. Black women don't get the pedestal in the first place. /thinking aloud

Roger,

Thank you for sharing and for the reccomendation.

 I am familiar with Joy's work. ( http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-ur... )

"Post-Traumatic Slave Syndrome" by  Joy Degruy Leary ( http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-ur... ) and research 'post-traumatic slavery disorder'.  There may not be a large body of literature tying slavery to modern-day maladaptive patterns in a demographic BUT the literature can bolster an argument stating that untreated abuse can normalize maladaptive patterns over generations and lead subsequent generations to embrace those patterns as 'commonplace'.  take the thesis from there. 

Roger S. Gil, M.A.
www.rogergil.com/blog ( http://www.rogergil.com/blog )
www.luvbuzd.com ( http://www.luvbuzd.com/ )