“We are the daughters of feminist privilege.”
Morgan, 59
In this chapter of When Chickenheads Come Home To Roost, Joan Morgan expresses the need for Black feminism to truly be about Black women, the need for a Black Feminist Movement, and to step away from constantly bashing and saving Black men.
The discussion I want to key in on from this chapter is the need to create a formal Black Feminist Movement and centralize Black women.
Black feminism is about us, let’s focus on us.
Two Sides of the Same Coin
Morgan starts this chapter by addressing the societal intersection which conceived Black feminism: racism and sexism. We’ve talked about this a few times in this book already but I really want to revisit sexism in the Black community for this post.
The conversation on sexism begins with Morgan telling us about the Million Man March and how her feminist sensibilities couldn’t ignore the sexist undertones of this achievement. It’s crazy that I have never heard of the march, and I do suggest reading the article on it.
Morgan chooses to directly quote to explain her feelings:
“It wasn’t banishment from the march that was so offensive… It was being told to stay home and prepare food for our warrior kings. What infuriated progressive black women was that the rhetoric of protection and atonement was just a seductive mask for good old-fashioned sexism…” (p. 50-1)
Kristal Brent-Zooks, “A Manifesto of Sorts for a New Black Feminist Movement”
Joan Morgan continues on to gloss over the racist gates that keep Black women out of the mainstream feminist movement. She talks more about “feminism’s ivory tower elitism” in previous chapters. I only included this bit because I like that phrase. It’s perfect.
We Are More
Just once, I didn’t want to have to talk about ‘the brothers,’ ‘male domination,’ or ‘the patriarchy.’ I wanted a feminism that would allow me to explore who we are as women —not victims. One that claimed the powerful richness and delicious complexities inherent in being black girls now—sistas of the post—Civil Rights, post-feminist, post soul, hip-hop generation.”
Morgan, 56-7
My feminism directly aligns with Morgan’s in this way. Constantly talking about men and their issues and the issues we have with them is exhausting. Depleting, arduous, draining, and often fruitless. I steer clear of the conversations most times. It’s labor. Labor that goes unappreciated and most times falls on death ears. Receptiveness is key in these situations. There’s no point in explaining yourself, or your pain, or your anger to those whose goal is to gaslight you.
Consider the array of work that Black women do in the community. Social justice work, raising sexual violence awareness, child development, community counseling, etc. All of these often require educating or uplifting men. But instead of having constructive dialogue, we either end up begging or shut down.
How much time do we work for ourselves exclusively? What conversations do we have in which we never mention men? I want to reroute our energy to ourselves. I want us to do as much as we can to liberate ourselves, by ourselves. YES, we need unity in order to be free as a community, but there’s some work that men just have to do by themselves.
Back To Us
The stories we tell about ourselves are important. We are more than victims and we are not just our bodies. Black feminism is designed to give us the space we need to be every little piece of ourselves, authentically. The lives that we get to live out, the narratives that have us as the main character were unimaginable fifty years ago. Many of the limitations that we face today are behind four or five doors that our grandmothers never even got the chance to step through.
We really are the daughters of feminist privilege. And we owe it to our feminist foremothers to prioritize ourselves; to look beyond the horizon.
“Black women can no more be defined by the cumulative sum of our pain than blackness can be defined solely by the transgenerational atrocities delivered at the hands of American racism… defining our ourselves solely by our oppression denies us the very magic of who we are.”
Morgan, 60
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