The Crisis of the Black Female

Originally posted on Friday, October 26, 2007

The Crisis of the Black Female
Current mood: crushed

Black men are in trouble. If we look at Chicago, a microcosm of the Black male population of America, we can easily see the problems that Black males are encountering are real and destructive. Between 1995 and 2005, 38% of black males in Chicago graduated from high school. 1 in 50 black males who were high school freshmen in 2006 will graduate from high school. Chicago's high school dropout rate for African American males is 70%. In 1999, 52% of African American males who dropped out of high school had prison records by their early 30s. For every white college-aged male in prison, there are 28 in college; for African American men, that ratio drops to less than 1 in 3. 45% of African American men between the ages of 20 and 24 are unemployed. Only 18% of African American men in Chicago have a college degree.

Yes, there is a problem and it is serious.

But I'm pissed. And not at the problem or the "victims" of the problem, per se. I'm pissed about the fact that nobody is talking about the other crisis in the Black community; the crisis of the Black female.

I was in church a couple of months back, and my pastor (a well-educated, Afrocentric, leftist, justice-centered man) was speaking about giving a commencement address at a historically Black university. With pain in his voice, he talked about how the school had once been predominantly filled with Black men, and now Black women outnumbered them 5 to 1. The point of his statement was to shed light on how Black men are obviously not enjoying the fruits of the Civil Rights Movement, when it comes to education. And I felt him on that point.

But I was pissed.

Instead of celebrating the fact that Black women, once shut out from these institutions by racism AND sexism, were now entering these schools at wonderfully high rates, he bemoaned the fact that Black men were not.

Why can't we be celebrated?

Because we're too busy being degraded.

I need not go into the whole hullabaloo of Black women's abuse in the media or in our communities. Surely, we all know the sad truths of these situations. Jezebels and video hoes dominate the stations on radio and television. Even my favorite contemporary female performer, Beyonce, is an oversexed representation of Black women (hell, she's an oversexed representation of herself; have you ever seen how painfully shy she is in interviews?). And Black women suffering at the hands of Black men in our communities continues to be a problem that needs constant addressing. Add to that the fact that we're Black and experience racism just like a Black man would, and you have a recipe for disaster.
And nobody seems to care.

Megan Williams was photographed coming from a courtroom only weeks after her brutal imprisonment at the hands of a group of racist white males and females (not men and women; these people were barely human). She was not photographed exiting the courtroom after testifying against her brutalizers. She was photographed leaving a courtroom after appearing in her own defense against minor crimes (mainly breeching terms of probation) that she was guilty of.

Instead of seeing this woman as the victim of a horrid deed, she was portrayed as a woman who, herself, was a criminal. And hell, who cares about what happens to criminals, right? Especially when the criminals are Black and those who criminalize them are white.

Where is Jesse? Where is Al? Where is Michael Baisden? NAACP? NUL? In Jena, of course. Defending a group of young Black men (who did need defending, but who were, yes they were, guilty of a crime). Megan is left to fend for her own against the white media who are much more interested in portraying her as a deserving victim, when portraying her at all. (Yes, I know Al has a pretty good reason to be scared to butt in on this one after Tawana, but still.) I mean, the NAACP is more interested in burying the word "nigger" than helping a woman who's had the world hurled at her while being sexually abused and physically assaulted.

Dunbar Village. I can't recount the details because they make me too sick to my stomach, so I will simply reiterate the questions that I've asked. Where is the Black leadership on this issue? A woman is raped in front of her son, made to perform sex acts on her son, and then threatened with death, and we get…nothing? Well, that's a double, "hell to da naw" for me. Not only was the victim a Black woman, her victimizers were Black men. And when it comes down to it, what's more important? Protecting Black women against sickos, or making sure that we don't put 5 or 6 more poor, poor, poor Black boys in jail?

I don't care about the white media covering Elizabeth more than Megan. They're white. That's exactly what I expect them to do. But do I have to come to the point where I can't care about Black male leadership not defending Black women because, they're men and that's what I expect them to do? Am I supposed to feel sorry for these assholes that did these things to this woman because of the color of their skin and the fact that "it's hard out there for Black men?"

Ring-a-fucking-ding-ding. It's hard for Black women too! Hell, I'd go as far to say that it may be harder. Because, guess what? Not only do we have racism alive and well, working against us in a very real and effective way, we have sexism working against us from every male and many females in AND out of our communities. I simply don't believe that it's any harder for a Black male to get his ass out of bed and go to school than it is for a female. A Black female can get hit with a stray bullet just like one of them. A Black female can get lured into a gang just like one of them. A Black female can get shot up by the police just like one of them. A Black female can get lured into a life of drugs, violence, and criminal behavior just like one of them. But nobody celebrates the fact that we are actually striving to succeed in the face of these obstacles. They simply weep over the fact that Black men aren't.

In addition to those hardships that Black females share with our men, we are subject to a number of totally different ones that rarely effect Black men. Like, being left alone to raise children and then being degraded because we're "baby mommas." Or earning less in the workforce because we're both Black AND female. Or what about the fact that teachers are less likely to expose female students to the sciences and math than they are male students which possibly sets them on a path to automatically make less money in their careers? Or what about the venomous myth that's embedded in Black women that we are to be "loyal" to the Black community no matter what, even when it is at the expense of our happiness (I'm sorry, but I have not seen the some indoctrination performed on Black men.) What about the fact that so many Black women remain perpetually single because of the crisis of Black males?

And it hurts that nobody seems to give a damn.

The freaking crisis of the Black female is that we face the same crisis as the Black male and everyone would like to act as if we don't. In fact, they'd like to act like we don't matter at all.

I am a member of the church Nailah Franklin attended, and her death saddened me. It also gave me hope. I, for the first time in my life, thought, "maybe, just maybe, if I go missing one day, someone will look for me. Someone, other than my family and friends will give a damn." But cases like Ms. Franklin's are few and far between.

I know there are some who are already pissed with me for writing this blog. Although their reasons might be voiced differently, it all boils down to, "how dare you speak against the Black male in public? How dare you not show the utmost and complete sorrow for the hardships he goes through? See, that's the f*cking problem with Black women. They always complain and they don't stand by their men." (Yeah, tell that shit to all those Black mothers raising Black boys ALONE.) I couldn't care less. Yeah, we might graduate from college more, but think about the affect that not seeing our men graduate with us has on us. Yeah, we might go to jail less, but think about the burden that not having our men free to help us improve our community places on us. And totally aside from anything to do with Black men (yes, Black women are able to operate and have issues that don't necessarily have to involve any man), think of the hardships we go through as human beings.

I'm not trying to beat up on Black men, as a whole. It's not their faults any more than it is ours, in many cases. I'm not trying to say that Black men don't have it hard all around the world. All I'm saying is that the same goes for Black women.

But I guess we truly don't matter.