Black Feminist

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BLACK FEMINIST is a lively and illuminating documentary that explores the double-edged sword of racial and gender oppression that Black Women face in America.

Frustrated by the lack of intersectionality in the women’s movement and the misogyny plaguing the Black liberation movement, filmmaker Zanah Thirus set out to shine a light on the complexities and power of Black feminism. Featuring interviews with a wide range of scholars, writers, business owners, veterans and comedians including former Ebony Editor-in-Chief Kyra Kyles, professor Carrie Morris, and author Tami Winfrey Harris, the film lays bare the everyday lived experiences of Black Women everywhere.

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Main credits

Thirus, Zanah (film director)
Thirus, Zanah (film producer)
Thirus, Zanah (editor of moving image work)
Sinclair, Maiya (film producer)
Sinclair, Maiya (editor of moving image work)
Lugg, Nadirah (narrator)

Other credits

Editors, Chan C. Smith, Zanah Thirus, Maiya Sinclair; director of photography, Chan C. Smith.

MARC Record See Worldcat record

Keywords

African American,; Feminism,; Gender,; Racism,; Mass Media & Popular Culture,; Women's Movement; "Black Feminist"; Women Make Movies

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(upbeat jazz music)

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- Chapter one, what is black feminism?

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Hey, sisters, misters,

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Hoteps and Beckies,

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and all of y'all relevant
and irrelevant alike.

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My name is Latoya Johnson

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and I'm here to help this
talented group of black women

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tell you the story of black feminism.

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In other words, I'm here to school y'all.

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Now, to help guide you
through all of this,

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I'm gonna be citing some of
my absolute favorite readings.

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Now take note,

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'cause you are definitely
gonna want a copy

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of these gold mines

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once you finish this crash
course in black girl magic.

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I'll first take you

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to one of my favorite
excerpts from Thistle.

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It's called "But Some of Us Are Brave:

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"A History of Black Feminism in the US."

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"The Black Feminist Movement grew out of,

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"and in response to,

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"the Black Liberation Movement
and the Women's Movement.

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"In an effort to meet the
needs of the black women

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"who felt they were
being racially oppressed

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"in the Women's Movement

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"and sexually oppressed in
the Black Liberation Movement,

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"the Black Feminist Movement was formed.

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"All too often,

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"black was equated with black men

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"and woman was equated with white women.

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"As a result, black women
were an invisible group

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"whose existence and needs were ignored.

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"The purpose of the movement
was to develop theory

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"which could adequately address

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"the way race, gender, and class

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"were interconnected in their lives

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"and to take action to
stop racist, sexist,

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"and classist discrimination."

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One thing I love about this article

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is that it also lists the outlandish myths

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to divert black women
from our own freedom.

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"Number one, the black
woman is already liberated.

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"Number two, racism is the
primary or only oppression

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"black women have to confront.

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"Number three, feminism
is nothing but man-hating.

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"Number four, women's issues are

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"narrow, apolitical concerns.

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"People of color need to deal
with the larger struggle.

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"Number five, those feminists
are nothing but lesbians."

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Whoo.

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My head hurts just from
reading those myths.

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Now let me check in with my girls

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to see what they have to say.

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- I should put some ChapStick on.

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- [Woman] Yeah, let's get some ChapStick.

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- Is it recording?
- It is recording.

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- Bloopers.
- Yeah.

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- I asked y'all if you
wanted to get some food.

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- [Woman] This is more important, though.

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- Okay.

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- Gang gang gang gang.

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Content, what?

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- I made this film 'cause I was tired.

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I was tired as hell.

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I'm tired of the misconceptions
surrounding black feminism.

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I'm tired of the misinformation
that is out there

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about black feminism.

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And I'm especially tired

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of black women feeling
like they have to choose

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between their blackness
and their womanhood.

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- Feminism for me is the
movement to liberate women,

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and everyone else,

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from patriarchy and sexist
exploitation and oppression.

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- I am absolutely a feminist.

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I don't know, I feel like
it's a no-brainer question,

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and it's stunning to
me that kids these days

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don't identify as feminists,

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because why wouldn't you
and how could you not?

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As a woman, as a
professional, as an adult.

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- Feminism in and of itself is
a really broad world, right?

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And for me, I'm not exactly
a scholar of feminism,

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but it definitely does
impact my life every day

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as a woman in the professional world.

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- I will admit I was
not always a feminist,

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simply because I grew up with black women.

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Now that might sound very counter,

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but there's a difference
between being told something

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and then watching how people are treated.

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So thusly because the fact

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that I grew up around
a lot of black women,

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I was told by them, just like,

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"Don't do this, don't do this."

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You know, don't treat women this way,

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don't treat women that way.

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But watching how society treated them,

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I fell more in line with
how they were treated

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and not necessarily following
what it is that they told me.

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- At this point I'm not sure if I identify

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strictly as a feminist,

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just because I know

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that there are a lot of
issues with intersectionality.

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And so I do think of myself

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as someone who believes that women, men,

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people of all backgrounds
should be equals,

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but I don't know if that term

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quite captures the way that I feel

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based on the way that it
plays out in the media.

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- Being a female bishop
is not and has not been

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widely accepted across the
board with denominations,

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and so encountering those

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that are not really in sync with that

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I think has really definitely pushed me

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more on the feminist side.

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- So I refer to this thing
as racist patriarchy,

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and the thing is, the patriarchy

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has been in place for so long

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and one of the things in oppressing women

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is that it's not just
that it oppressed women,

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it oppressed femininity.

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In order to bring balance
to what humanity really is,

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we gotta push femininity
back to where it belongs,

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and that's up there where humanity is.

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Because I don't think
we can be fully human

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until we embrace and include

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both the feminine and masculine

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and whatever the spectrum
between them are.

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- Feminism is, I mean,

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I guess it depends on how you define it,

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but I define it as demanding and expecting

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and insisting upon equal treatment to men.

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And even saying equal treatment
to men seems a little bit,

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even a lower bar than I
want to hold myself to

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and the world to,

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which is that we are
people fully realized,

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fully human and fully engaged,

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and to be treated as such.

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- Because we studied history

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and we understood that
the oppression of women

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is not specific of Egypt or Arab people,

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it is historical.

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It is everywhere, in every country.

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Women were rebelling in all religions.

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In India, in Egypt, under
Hindu, under Judaism,

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under Christianity or Islam.

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Women were fighting for their rights.

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So we call ourselves historical.

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Feminism is not a Western invention.

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Feminism was not invented
by American women,

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as many people think.

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No, feminism is embedded in the culture

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and in the struggle of all
women all over the world.

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- Feminism's ultimate goal
is to make itself redundant,

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so the hope is to get to a world

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where we no longer have
to be labeled feminists

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because the world will be gender equal.

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And for that to happen

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we need to have as many
people on board as possible.

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And often my question
is, what's the point?

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Is it about being part

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of this sort of special
party that's exclusive

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and we can all get to be
a little self-righteous

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about being better than other people?

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Or is it about changing the world?

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- This cannot be woke or aka
conscious and oppress women.

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You've got to decide.

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You wanna be Nat Turner or Ike Turner?

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You do not get to be both.

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- Yeah.
- Second of all,

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we have to extract
feminism from the movement,

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the 20th century movement in America,

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from the actual term
of what a feminist is.

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A feminist can be a man, a woman, a trans.

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A feminist simply means you believe

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that men and women are equal,

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even if different,

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but they are equal and they have the right

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to have equal opportunity.

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So if you can't get behind feminism,

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you need to either check your definition

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or you need to check yourself,

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because I don't see anything

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about my believing that me being a woman

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is a curse from God

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or makes me lesser than anybody else

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as being counterproductive
to the movement.

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- Chapter two.

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This ain't new.

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The history of black feminism.

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Okay, so let's talk about

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some of the iconic black
feminists of the past,

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because some of you Hoteps and Beckies

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think that black feminism is a new thing.

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It's not.

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Audre Lorde was an American writer,

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feminist, womanist, librarian,
and civil rights activist.

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As a poet, she is best known
for her technical mastery

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and emotional expression,

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as well as her poems that
express anger and outrage

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at civil and social
injustices that she observed.

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Ida B. Wells was an African-American

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investigative journalist, educator,

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and an early leader in
the Civil Rights Movement.

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She was one of the founders
of the National Association

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for the Advancement of
Colored People, NAACP.

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She arguably became the most
famous black woman in America

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during a life that was centered

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on combating prejudice and violence.

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Bell hooks is an American author,

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feminist and social activist.

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The focus of Hooks' writings have been

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the intersectionality of
race, capitalism, and gender,

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and what she describes as their ability

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to produce and perpetuate
systems of oppression

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and class domination.

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Mary Church Terrell was an activist

00:10:04.930 --> 00:10:06.520
for civil rights and suffrage.

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Terrell was one of the
first African-American women

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to earn a college degree

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when she graduated from
Oberlin College in 1884.

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Terrell was also a founding
member of the NAACP

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and helped organize the black
sorority, Delta Sigma Theta.

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Anna Julia Cooper.

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One of the most prominent black scholars

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in American history,

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Cooper was the fourth
African-American woman to earn a PhD

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when she graduated

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from the University of
Paris-Sorbonne in 1924.

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Having been born in slavery
in Raleigh, North Carolina,

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Cooper used both her lived
experience with racism

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and her scholastic ability

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to pen her first book in 1892,

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"A Voice from the South:
By a Woman from the South."

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Amy Jacques Garvey,

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the second wife of black
nationalist Marcus Garvey,

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was a daunting intellectual

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and social activist in her own right.

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A gifted journalist,

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she worked as a columnist
for Negro World in Harlem

00:11:05.450 --> 00:11:07.580
and often discussed the intersectionality

00:11:07.580 --> 00:11:09.490
of race, gender, and class

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as it pertained to black women.

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Harriet Ann Jacobs,

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who fled slavery in North Carolina,

00:11:15.950 --> 00:11:18.640
became an abolitionist
and social reformer,

00:11:18.640 --> 00:11:20.027
published a single work,

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"Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl."

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The 1861 book was one of the first

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and the few autobiographies

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that documented the physical abuse

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and sexual exploitation
enslaved women suffered.

00:11:32.730 --> 00:11:36.150
Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin
founded The Woman's Era,

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which was the first magazine column

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written by and for black women in 1888.

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Now, fun fact, in 1896,

00:11:44.820 --> 00:11:47.310
her, as well as, Ida B. Wells,

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Harriet Tubman, Frances E. W. Harper,

00:11:50.570 --> 00:11:55.210
they all founded the National
Association of Colored Women.

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Zora Neale Hurston's 1937 novel

00:11:58.607 --> 00:12:00.300
"Their Eyes Were Watching God"

00:12:00.300 --> 00:12:01.710
is widely considered

00:12:01.710 --> 00:12:04.147
one of the best novels
of the 20th century.

00:12:04.147 --> 00:12:07.640
"In Search of Zora Neale
Hurston" by Alice Walker,

00:12:07.640 --> 00:12:11.420
published in the March
1975 issue of Ms. Magazine,

00:12:11.420 --> 00:12:13.790
helped revive interest in Hurston's work,

00:12:13.790 --> 00:12:15.380
and the reemergence of her writing

00:12:15.380 --> 00:12:17.450
coincided with the rise in popularity

00:12:17.450 --> 00:12:18.860
of black women authors

00:12:18.860 --> 00:12:21.620
such as Toni Morrison and Maya Angelou.

00:12:21.620 --> 00:12:22.730
A literary giant,

00:12:22.730 --> 00:12:25.430
she was a cornerstone of
the Harlem renaissance

00:12:25.430 --> 00:12:28.930
and influenced generations of
writers who came after her.

00:12:28.930 --> 00:12:32.760
Marie W. Stewart began
as an indentured servant

00:12:32.760 --> 00:12:34.830
and then later began an abolitionist

00:12:34.830 --> 00:12:37.060
and women's rights activist.

00:12:37.060 --> 00:12:39.950
She was the first
African-American woman on record

00:12:39.950 --> 00:12:42.690
to lecture publicly on women's rights,

00:12:42.690 --> 00:12:44.420
and her speeches often preached

00:12:44.420 --> 00:12:46.680
African-American exceptionalism

00:12:46.680 --> 00:12:48.880
and the autonomy of black women.

00:12:48.880 --> 00:12:51.210
Jarena Lee was a pioneering preacher

00:12:51.210 --> 00:12:54.290
at the time when women were
never seen on the pulpit.

00:12:54.290 --> 00:12:57.790
Lee fought for gender
equality within Christianity.

00:12:57.790 --> 00:13:00.370
She became the first
woman authorized to preach

00:13:00.370 --> 00:13:02.930
for the African Methodist
Episcopal Church.

00:13:02.930 --> 00:13:05.180
And as she became a traveling minister,

00:13:05.180 --> 00:13:08.360
she faced much hostility
because she was a woman.

00:13:08.360 --> 00:13:10.623
Writing in her autobiography, she said,

00:13:11.517 --> 00:13:15.217
"If the man may preach because
the Savior died for him,

00:13:15.217 --> 00:13:16.667
"why not the woman?

00:13:16.667 --> 00:13:18.927
"Seeing he died for her also.

00:13:18.927 --> 00:13:22.530
"Is he not a whole Savior,
instead of a half one?"

00:13:22.530 --> 00:13:24.730
Mary Ellen Pleasant.

00:13:24.730 --> 00:13:27.240
After she became a mighty entrepreneur,

00:13:27.240 --> 00:13:28.530
Pleasant used her fortune

00:13:28.530 --> 00:13:30.710
to support the abolitionist movement.

00:13:30.710 --> 00:13:32.100
She jumped from state to state

00:13:32.100 --> 00:13:33.610
working on the Underground Railroad

00:13:33.610 --> 00:13:36.660
and helped spread it to
California during the Gold Rush.

00:13:36.660 --> 00:13:37.980
Out of jealousy and anger

00:13:37.980 --> 00:13:40.200
at the wealth and
influence of a black woman,

00:13:40.200 --> 00:13:41.870
locals often smeared her,

00:13:41.870 --> 00:13:44.790
calling her a voodoo priest and a mammy.

00:13:44.790 --> 00:13:47.710
After she was kicked out of
a street car in San Francisco

00:13:47.710 --> 00:13:51.230
along with several other
black women in 1866,

00:13:51.230 --> 00:13:54.180
she filed and won a lawsuit
that required desegregation

00:13:54.180 --> 00:13:56.113
of the city's public transportation.

00:13:58.010 --> 00:13:58.843
Florynce Kennedy.

00:13:58.843 --> 00:14:00.940
A feminist and civil rights advocate,

00:14:00.940 --> 00:14:02.860
Kennedy was known for her flamboyant

00:14:02.860 --> 00:14:07.120
and attention-grabbing
activism in the 60s and 70s.

00:14:07.120 --> 00:14:08.330
Among other protests,

00:14:08.330 --> 00:14:11.000
she led a mass public urination at Harvard

00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:13.460
in response to their
lack of female restrooms

00:14:13.460 --> 00:14:16.570
and filed tax evasion charges
against the Catholic Church

00:14:16.570 --> 00:14:19.590
because she felt their campaign
against reproductive rights

00:14:19.590 --> 00:14:22.970
violated the separation
of Church and state.

00:14:22.970 --> 00:14:24.970
Kennedy also helped build alliances

00:14:24.970 --> 00:14:27.910
between white feminists
and black power activists

00:14:27.910 --> 00:14:30.460
by working with organizations like NOW

00:14:30.460 --> 00:14:32.440
and the Black Panthers.

00:14:32.440 --> 00:14:34.857
She's often credited
with coining the phrase,

00:14:34.857 --> 00:14:38.407
"If men could get pregnant,
abortions would be a sacrament."

00:14:39.500 --> 00:14:42.690
Elaine Brown is an
American prison activist,

00:14:42.690 --> 00:14:45.900
writer, singer, and former
Black Panther Party chairwoman

00:14:45.900 --> 00:14:48.360
who is based in Oakland, California.

00:14:48.360 --> 00:14:50.360
Elaine Brown chaired
the Black Panther Party

00:14:50.360 --> 00:14:53.800
from 1974 until 1977.

00:14:53.800 --> 00:14:56.770
In her 1992 memoir "A Taste of Power,"

00:14:56.770 --> 00:14:58.870
she wrote about her experience.

00:14:58.870 --> 00:15:00.810
A woman in the Black Panther movement

00:15:00.810 --> 00:15:02.980
was considered, at best, irrelevant.

00:15:02.980 --> 00:15:05.280
A woman asserting herself was a pariah.

00:15:05.280 --> 00:15:07.730
If a black woman assumed
a role of leadership,

00:15:07.730 --> 00:15:10.310
she was said to be eroding black manhood;

00:15:10.310 --> 00:15:13.000
to be hindering the
process of the black race.

00:15:13.000 --> 00:15:15.347
She was an enemy of the black people.

00:15:15.347 --> 00:15:17.357
"I knew I had to muster something mighty

00:15:17.357 --> 00:15:19.620
"to manage the Black Panther Party."

00:15:19.620 --> 00:15:21.940
Okay, let's be clear.

00:15:21.940 --> 00:15:24.160
These are just a few of the greats.

00:15:24.160 --> 00:15:26.242
Too many to name.

00:15:26.242 --> 00:15:27.610
But let's keep it moving

00:15:27.610 --> 00:15:29.690
because we have a whole lot to dive into.

00:15:30.570 --> 00:15:33.880
Chapter three, Becky's bullshit.

00:15:33.880 --> 00:15:36.210
Intersectionality and womanism.

00:15:36.210 --> 00:15:38.360
- [Interviewer] All right,
so there's an unspoken beef

00:15:38.360 --> 00:15:40.680
between black feminists and womanists.

00:15:40.680 --> 00:15:42.114
How do you feel about that?

00:15:42.114 --> 00:15:45.440
- I think that it's so unnecessary.

00:15:45.440 --> 00:15:48.137
I'm somebody who looks at the definition

00:15:48.137 --> 00:15:49.050
of what something is

00:15:49.050 --> 00:15:51.160
or the origin of something.

00:15:51.160 --> 00:15:54.290
I rarely judge a movement by it's people,

00:15:54.290 --> 00:15:56.090
'cause people are hypocritical.

00:15:56.090 --> 00:15:59.630
When you look at black
feminism, feminism being...

00:16:01.030 --> 00:16:03.080
Or feminist being a person who believes

00:16:03.080 --> 00:16:05.770
in the social, political,
and economic equality

00:16:05.770 --> 00:16:06.603
of the sexes.

00:16:06.603 --> 00:16:08.147
And then you would get black feminism

00:16:08.147 --> 00:16:11.830
and how that looks at how
race and gender and class

00:16:11.830 --> 00:16:15.260
and sexuality are all intertwined

00:16:15.260 --> 00:16:17.313
when it comes to someone's oppression.

00:16:18.240 --> 00:16:21.956
Then you look at the
definition of womanism,

00:16:21.956 --> 00:16:26.340
and the creator of the definition
of womanism, Alice Walker.

00:16:26.340 --> 00:16:29.207
The first sentence in her definition is

00:16:29.207 --> 00:16:31.810
"a black feminist or a feminist of color."

00:16:31.810 --> 00:16:36.810
So she positions herself in
alignment with black feminism,

00:16:37.030 --> 00:16:40.610
and I think that that is something
that we need to consider.

00:16:40.610 --> 00:16:42.760
- I don't even know if
it's unspoken, you know?

00:16:42.760 --> 00:16:45.050
For some people, I feel for a lot of us,

00:16:45.050 --> 00:16:47.840
it's very clearly that white feminism

00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:50.920
does not include black women.

00:16:50.920 --> 00:16:54.950
It does not include
marginalized communities.

00:16:54.950 --> 00:16:58.140
- Black feminism and white
feminism are not the same thing.

00:16:58.140 --> 00:17:00.493
Let's just establish that flat out.

00:17:01.540 --> 00:17:04.416
I think in mainstream feminism,

00:17:04.416 --> 00:17:08.630
we see a lack of intersectionality.

00:17:08.630 --> 00:17:10.610
So I'm going to start off by quoting

00:17:10.610 --> 00:17:13.560
my favorite black feminist, Audre Lorde.

00:17:13.560 --> 00:17:16.367
She said, "Black feminism
is not white feminism

00:17:16.367 --> 00:17:18.250
"in black face."

00:17:18.250 --> 00:17:20.280
It is not the same thing.

00:17:20.280 --> 00:17:22.190
- [Latoya] Intersectionality
is a social theory

00:17:22.190 --> 00:17:24.580
based off of the notions
that humans experience

00:17:24.580 --> 00:17:27.283
various degrees of
oppression simultaneously.

00:17:28.150 --> 00:17:30.760
Being black and being
a woman, for example.

00:17:30.760 --> 00:17:32.810
A lot of the times white
women don't realize

00:17:32.810 --> 00:17:35.260
that even while being oppressed as women,

00:17:35.260 --> 00:17:38.083
they still benefit and
perpetuate white supremacy.

00:17:39.920 --> 00:17:41.420
- [Announcer] Are you a woman?

00:17:42.390 --> 00:17:45.590
Are you a white woman and a feminist?

00:17:45.590 --> 00:17:46.990
Do you have trouble focusing

00:17:48.550 --> 00:17:50.350
on the issues that affect

00:17:50.350 --> 00:17:52.313
only heterosexual cisgender women?

00:17:53.380 --> 00:17:57.910
Then white feminism is the
brand of feminism for you.

00:17:57.910 --> 00:17:59.750
- If you are just feminist

00:17:59.750 --> 00:18:01.880
and not being an intersectional feminist,

00:18:01.880 --> 00:18:06.540
what you essentially are seeking
is privilege, not equity.

00:18:06.540 --> 00:18:08.080
You're simply trying to figure out a way

00:18:08.080 --> 00:18:09.820
in which you can benefit from the system

00:18:09.820 --> 00:18:12.140
without including all the other people

00:18:12.140 --> 00:18:13.360
that may not look like you

00:18:13.360 --> 00:18:15.720
within that system of privilege.

00:18:15.720 --> 00:18:18.190
- I think that part of the challenge

00:18:18.190 --> 00:18:19.240
with the feminist movement

00:18:19.240 --> 00:18:22.683
is that it came so close to
the Civil Rights Movement.

00:18:23.542 --> 00:18:25.700
It came almost hand in hand
with the Civil Rights Movement.

00:18:25.700 --> 00:18:29.300
And so what a lot of people,

00:18:29.300 --> 00:18:30.550
and it's understandably so,

00:18:30.550 --> 00:18:32.780
felt that it should have gone,

00:18:32.780 --> 00:18:34.620
a lot of privilege or power

00:18:34.620 --> 00:18:36.890
or money or whatever, opportunities,

00:18:36.890 --> 00:18:39.310
that should have gone to black people

00:18:39.310 --> 00:18:41.870
were taken up by white women

00:18:41.870 --> 00:18:44.560
who were already enjoying
a lot of privilege.

00:18:44.560 --> 00:18:46.360
And so it just seemed unfair.

00:18:46.360 --> 00:18:49.070
So, the idea of feminism left a bad taste

00:18:49.070 --> 00:18:51.790
in a lot of the mouths of people of color.

00:18:51.790 --> 00:18:54.480
- I reject the notion that feminism

00:18:55.560 --> 00:18:58.390
isn't for black women.

00:18:58.390 --> 00:19:02.730
It's true that in a lot of the
previous waves of feminism,

00:19:02.730 --> 00:19:06.370
the white majority's kind
of sucked all the air

00:19:06.370 --> 00:19:07.950
out of the movement.

00:19:07.950 --> 00:19:11.710
But that's kind of what they
do in a lot of movements.

00:19:11.710 --> 00:19:13.086
- In the second wave, I feel like

00:19:13.086 --> 00:19:16.410
it's kind of the one
people think of the most.

00:19:16.410 --> 00:19:17.854
When you think of feminism,

00:19:17.854 --> 00:19:18.790
you think of the 60s,

00:19:18.790 --> 00:19:22.400
you think of burning bras, topless women,

00:19:22.400 --> 00:19:26.510
you know, advocating for
your reproductive rights,

00:19:26.510 --> 00:19:28.760
which we're still doing today.

00:19:28.760 --> 00:19:30.150
Things like that.

00:19:30.150 --> 00:19:33.480
But I also think a lot of
those women specifically

00:19:33.480 --> 00:19:35.750
from like the 60s to the 80s

00:19:35.750 --> 00:19:37.900
was very whitewashed.

00:19:37.900 --> 00:19:39.820
Even before that too, but specifically,

00:19:39.820 --> 00:19:41.490
'cause that's kind of a lot of the image

00:19:41.490 --> 00:19:44.220
we have in our heads of feminism.

00:19:44.220 --> 00:19:45.220
Very whitewashed, you know,

00:19:45.220 --> 00:19:47.900
they were really only
fighting for only white women.

00:19:47.900 --> 00:19:50.560
- It is impossible for me to separate

00:19:50.560 --> 00:19:52.920
my blackness from my woman-ness.

00:19:52.920 --> 00:19:54.310
They go hand in hand.

00:19:54.310 --> 00:19:57.370
They are essentially how people view me

00:19:57.370 --> 00:19:58.950
and how I live my life.

00:19:58.950 --> 00:20:01.240
I cannot be just a woman one day

00:20:01.240 --> 00:20:03.210
and I cannot be just black one day.

00:20:03.210 --> 00:20:04.940
It just doesn't work like that.

00:20:04.940 --> 00:20:07.820
I am a black woman all day, every day.

00:20:07.820 --> 00:20:12.110
And even for those who may
not want to acknowledge it,

00:20:12.110 --> 00:20:14.140
the world sees us as a black woman.

00:20:14.140 --> 00:20:15.310
Not just as a woman.

00:20:15.310 --> 00:20:17.500
And that is unfortunate
to a certain extent

00:20:17.500 --> 00:20:18.990
but it's also empowering as well

00:20:18.990 --> 00:20:21.430
because, again, it's about groups.

00:20:21.430 --> 00:20:25.367
- Feminism allows us to see
people as nuanced individuals

00:20:25.367 --> 00:20:27.580
and telling those nuanced individuals

00:20:27.580 --> 00:20:29.770
that they have space to exist.

00:20:29.770 --> 00:20:32.450
- I don't believe in
trickled down liberation,

00:20:32.450 --> 00:20:34.950
so if black people are going to get free,

00:20:34.950 --> 00:20:38.680
that's going to have to mean
black men and black women.

00:20:38.680 --> 00:20:40.720
It's going to mean straight black people

00:20:40.720 --> 00:20:41.960
and gay black people.

00:20:41.960 --> 00:20:44.520
It's going to have to mean
middle class black people

00:20:44.520 --> 00:20:46.050
and poor black people.

00:20:46.050 --> 00:20:48.590
So I think it's important
that we not just think

00:20:48.590 --> 00:20:51.020
in terms of the ways
that our race affects us

00:20:51.020 --> 00:20:52.200
and our community,

00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:55.240
but also the ways those
other things affect us,

00:20:55.240 --> 00:20:56.720
including gender.

00:20:56.720 --> 00:20:59.240
Black women are extremely vulnerable,

00:20:59.240 --> 00:21:03.610
more so because on top
of a racial oppression

00:21:03.610 --> 00:21:05.840
we've gotta deal with gender as well.

00:21:05.840 --> 00:21:10.010
- Well, certainly the face of
American feminism is white.

00:21:10.010 --> 00:21:12.920
Traditional American
feminism has been white.

00:21:12.920 --> 00:21:13.970
It has been straight.

00:21:14.990 --> 00:21:17.583
It has been of an older generation.

00:21:18.490 --> 00:21:20.660
And none of that is true.

00:21:20.660 --> 00:21:22.530
None of that is based in reality.

00:21:22.530 --> 00:21:26.230
- I think that as
professional and as an adult

00:21:27.610 --> 00:21:28.760
there are more issues that come up

00:21:28.760 --> 00:21:31.930
around race and sexuality;

00:21:31.930 --> 00:21:33.520
being black and gay.

00:21:33.520 --> 00:21:38.310
I think that I do get,
not marginalized per se,

00:21:38.310 --> 00:21:40.420
again, because I just
don't play into that,

00:21:40.420 --> 00:21:42.337
so I never enter a room and think,

00:21:42.337 --> 00:21:44.350
"I'm the only black person here,"

00:21:44.350 --> 00:21:46.090
until I am the only black person there

00:21:46.090 --> 00:21:47.350
and then I'm like, "What's up with that?"

00:21:47.350 --> 00:21:49.860
- I do work with a lot of black woman now.

00:21:49.860 --> 00:21:52.870
I would say that earlier
in my career, I did not.

00:21:52.870 --> 00:21:54.950
There were many times where
I was the only black woman.

00:21:54.950 --> 00:21:57.630
For example, when I was
working at The Tribune RedEye,

00:21:57.630 --> 00:21:59.410
I was the only black woman on staff.

00:21:59.410 --> 00:22:01.130
I was not the only black person,

00:22:01.130 --> 00:22:02.650
they had other people of color

00:22:02.650 --> 00:22:04.100
and it was a very diverse staff

00:22:04.100 --> 00:22:06.060
compared to a lot of newspaper staffs,

00:22:06.060 --> 00:22:08.580
but still I was the
only black woman there.

00:22:08.580 --> 00:22:12.930
- I would definitely
say that I have never,

00:22:12.930 --> 00:22:14.850
knock on wood real fast,

00:22:14.850 --> 00:22:18.060
I've never been a victim
of explicit racism

00:22:18.060 --> 00:22:20.450
or explicit discrimination.

00:22:20.450 --> 00:22:24.010
But my research is based on
the implicit discrimination

00:22:24.010 --> 00:22:26.760
that we experience on a day to day.

00:22:26.760 --> 00:22:28.887
It's those microaggressions
where people say,

00:22:28.887 --> 00:22:32.380
"Oh, you sound like a white girl."

00:22:32.380 --> 00:22:36.110
Whoa, okay, I got an education, yes.

00:22:36.110 --> 00:22:39.800
- As an obstetrician-gynecologist,
I only see women.

00:22:39.800 --> 00:22:42.833
And practicing at the
University of Chicago,

00:22:43.930 --> 00:22:47.160
the vast majority of my
patients are African-American.

00:22:47.160 --> 00:22:51.270
When you look at a number
of all causes of mortality;

00:22:51.270 --> 00:22:54.623
so heart disease, stroke, obesity,

00:22:55.960 --> 00:23:00.020
maternal mortality, breast
feeding rates, infant mortality.

00:23:00.020 --> 00:23:03.510
All of those things are higher
among African-Americans.

00:23:03.510 --> 00:23:08.440
And so we continue to face wide variation

00:23:08.440 --> 00:23:09.430
and wide disparities

00:23:09.430 --> 00:23:12.030
between African-American
women and white women.

00:23:12.030 --> 00:23:14.430
- So the epidemic, as you stated,

00:23:14.430 --> 00:23:18.700
is astonishing for black
women and breast cancer.

00:23:18.700 --> 00:23:23.700
The cancer industry is
dominated by wealthy men.

00:23:24.330 --> 00:23:26.003
Wealthy powerful men.

00:23:26.940 --> 00:23:30.580
And they have no desire
to cut their bottom line

00:23:30.580 --> 00:23:32.710
with knowledge of the people,

00:23:32.710 --> 00:23:34.340
particularly black women.

00:23:34.340 --> 00:23:37.270
The cancer industry knows very well

00:23:37.270 --> 00:23:41.030
that there is one nutrient, one,

00:23:41.030 --> 00:23:42.340
and it's free.

00:23:42.340 --> 00:23:46.750
If all of the black women
would take vitamin D,

00:23:46.750 --> 00:23:49.350
would eat healthy, would sit in the sun.

00:23:49.350 --> 00:23:51.430
If you don't wanna sit in the sun,

00:23:51.430 --> 00:23:53.727
because I hear that
often in my own family.

00:23:53.727 --> 00:23:55.950
"I don't wanna get darker."

00:23:55.950 --> 00:23:58.080
That's a trivial thing to say

00:23:58.080 --> 00:24:01.630
when you can slash your cancer risk by 77%

00:24:01.630 --> 00:24:03.030
by taking this one nutrient.

00:24:03.990 --> 00:24:05.620
- Okay, so I need to
talk to the white women

00:24:05.620 --> 00:24:06.864
for a minute, okay?

00:24:06.864 --> 00:24:08.370
(audience laughs)

00:24:08.370 --> 00:24:09.893
We're gonna talk, okay?

00:24:11.180 --> 00:24:16.140
So, I know that many of us
are feeling alone and ignored

00:24:16.140 --> 00:24:18.650
and threatened and abused,

00:24:18.650 --> 00:24:20.690
and we're feeling like our
bodies are being threatened

00:24:20.690 --> 00:24:23.180
and that our children's
education is at risk.

00:24:23.180 --> 00:24:25.450
That we can be grabbed at any minute,

00:24:25.450 --> 00:24:29.490
and that our degradation
and our objectification

00:24:29.490 --> 00:24:32.230
and our discrimination
has become normalized

00:24:32.230 --> 00:24:35.450
and accepted in ways that are chilling.

00:24:35.450 --> 00:24:36.883
And this is painful.

00:24:37.910 --> 00:24:39.280
But what we need to remember

00:24:39.280 --> 00:24:42.470
is that this is just a touch of the pain

00:24:42.470 --> 00:24:45.070
that so many marginalized
people in this country

00:24:45.070 --> 00:24:47.705
have been feeling for ages, right?

00:24:47.705 --> 00:24:49.874
(audience claps)

00:24:49.874 --> 00:24:51.420
From Black people and Brown people

00:24:51.420 --> 00:24:53.280
and trans people and gay people

00:24:53.280 --> 00:24:55.300
and Muslim people and Native Americans

00:24:55.300 --> 00:24:57.310
and poor people, right?

00:24:57.310 --> 00:25:00.570
This is just a touch of
what they've been feeling.

00:25:00.570 --> 00:25:04.310
And what sucks is that it took
us being personally affected

00:25:04.310 --> 00:25:06.090
to finally show up.

00:25:06.090 --> 00:25:07.010
- As a white woman,

00:25:07.010 --> 00:25:10.890
I feel like throughout my life

00:25:10.890 --> 00:25:12.710
I have not spoken up enough.

00:25:12.710 --> 00:25:15.310
- I have friends that are
women of color and I think

00:25:16.280 --> 00:25:19.060
they stand up for themselves.

00:25:19.060 --> 00:25:21.840
Like I've never had to be in
a situation with them as well

00:25:21.840 --> 00:25:26.400
where they have been
insulted, assaulted, anything.

00:25:26.400 --> 00:25:29.720
I think in theory I have their back

00:25:29.720 --> 00:25:32.190
and I'm gonna speak up
for them when needed,

00:25:32.190 --> 00:25:37.110
but I'm almost nervous for the
moment that it does happen.

00:25:37.110 --> 00:25:38.740
But I think the more I talk about it,

00:25:38.740 --> 00:25:39.790
the more I feel prepared,

00:25:39.790 --> 00:25:44.430
the more ready I am to speak
up when it does happen.

00:25:44.430 --> 00:25:47.180
- I know that growing up in Memphis,

00:25:47.180 --> 00:25:51.470
many of my friends discovered

00:25:51.470 --> 00:25:55.120
that they had to be doubley excellent.

00:25:55.120 --> 00:25:57.970
They had to be excellent
as black Memphians

00:25:57.970 --> 00:26:02.970
because they were representative
of so many people,

00:26:03.510 --> 00:26:05.780
and they had to be excellent as women

00:26:05.780 --> 00:26:08.210
because they had to fight
against the misogyny

00:26:08.210 --> 00:26:10.650
and the patriarchy of
never quite being enough.

00:26:10.650 --> 00:26:12.520
- It's interesting. I'll
tell you a little story.

00:26:12.520 --> 00:26:15.710
Last year, when they had the
Women's March here in Chicago,

00:26:15.710 --> 00:26:19.000
my daughter, and we live in
a pretty diverse community,

00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:21.570
it's overwhelmingly white but
it's still pretty diverse,

00:26:21.570 --> 00:26:23.960
and she knew that a lot of
her friends and their mothers

00:26:23.960 --> 00:26:26.060
were gonna be going to
the Women's March downtown

00:26:26.060 --> 00:26:27.040
and she wanted to go.

00:26:27.040 --> 00:26:29.710
And I explained to her
why we would not be going

00:26:29.710 --> 00:26:30.880
to the Women's March.

00:26:30.880 --> 00:26:32.530
We are not going to the Women's March

00:26:32.530 --> 00:26:35.180
specifically because the issue
that they are talking about

00:26:35.180 --> 00:26:37.670
are not those issues that
directly relate to us

00:26:37.670 --> 00:26:39.043
and our community.

00:26:39.043 --> 00:26:41.140
So I drew a Venn diagram for her,

00:26:41.140 --> 00:26:42.690
I love Venn diagrams.

00:26:42.690 --> 00:26:44.070
I drew her a Venn diagram.

00:26:44.070 --> 00:26:45.380
These are white women's issues.

00:26:45.380 --> 00:26:47.390
There are black women's issues.

00:26:47.390 --> 00:26:49.080
These are Latino women's issues.

00:26:49.080 --> 00:26:50.790
These are immigrant women's issues.

00:26:50.790 --> 00:26:52.180
These are gay women's issues.

00:26:52.180 --> 00:26:53.257
These are low income women.

00:26:53.257 --> 00:26:56.640
And we start putting all
these circles together.

00:26:56.640 --> 00:26:59.940
And you realize that in order
for the women's movement

00:26:59.940 --> 00:27:02.580
to be incredibly intersectional,

00:27:02.580 --> 00:27:04.570
they are going to have to expand

00:27:04.570 --> 00:27:06.750
beyond just the concerns of white women

00:27:06.750 --> 00:27:08.040
to recognize that black women

00:27:08.040 --> 00:27:11.050
are tired of their children
being shot on the street.

00:27:11.050 --> 00:27:14.260
That Latino women are tired
of having to figure out

00:27:14.260 --> 00:27:17.210
how to educate their kids in a system

00:27:17.210 --> 00:27:19.960
that refuses to acknowledge
cultural differences.

00:27:19.960 --> 00:27:21.473
- Girl, no.

00:27:22.720 --> 00:27:26.400
Feminism is not pink pussy ears

00:27:26.400 --> 00:27:28.580
or cat ears on your head.

00:27:28.580 --> 00:27:29.863
That's not feminism.

00:27:31.270 --> 00:27:32.103
It's not.

00:27:32.938 --> 00:27:34.900
- You know, I don't know if white women

00:27:34.900 --> 00:27:37.970
don't understand intersectionality

00:27:37.970 --> 00:27:40.750
as much as they're unwilling

00:27:40.750 --> 00:27:44.100
to own their role in racial oppression.

00:27:44.100 --> 00:27:45.890
'Cause that's a hard thing to do.

00:27:45.890 --> 00:27:49.200
I mean, our privileges are
hard for us to embrace.

00:27:49.200 --> 00:27:51.060
And so I think it's very hard.

00:27:51.060 --> 00:27:53.820
It's easier for I think white women

00:27:53.820 --> 00:27:55.537
to look at women of color and say,

00:27:55.537 --> 00:27:58.740
"Let's be unified and let's move forward,"

00:27:58.740 --> 00:28:01.600
in the same way that
it's easier for black men

00:28:01.600 --> 00:28:03.497
to put their arms around
black women and say,

00:28:03.497 --> 00:28:05.710
"Let's be unified around race."

00:28:05.710 --> 00:28:08.950
But until you can see all
the layers of my humanity,

00:28:08.950 --> 00:28:11.600
then we cannot possibly be unified.

00:28:11.600 --> 00:28:14.130
And until you make amends

00:28:14.130 --> 00:28:16.970
for the ways that you
are also oppressing me,

00:28:16.970 --> 00:28:18.630
we can't be unified.

00:28:18.630 --> 00:28:21.740
- Racism is a feminist issue

00:28:21.740 --> 00:28:26.040
simply because of what
feminism is in theory.

00:28:26.040 --> 00:28:30.903
It is the movement to liberate women.

00:28:32.590 --> 00:28:33.460
All women.

00:28:33.460 --> 00:28:35.300
That includes poor women.

00:28:35.300 --> 00:28:38.650
That includes women in
the LGBTQ community.

00:28:38.650 --> 00:28:39.890
That includes black women.

00:28:39.890 --> 00:28:41.900
That includes immigrant women.

00:28:41.900 --> 00:28:44.660
That includes women with disabilities.

00:28:44.660 --> 00:28:45.760
That includes all women.

00:28:45.760 --> 00:28:50.433
So race is a part of liberating all women.

00:28:51.600 --> 00:28:53.740
- Chapter four, boy band.

00:28:53.740 --> 00:28:55.423
Black men and black feminism.

00:28:56.390 --> 00:28:58.280
Black women faced constant sexism

00:28:58.280 --> 00:29:00.400
during the Black Liberation Movement.

00:29:00.400 --> 00:29:01.233
The movement,

00:29:01.233 --> 00:29:03.640
though primarily for the
liberation of the black race,

00:29:03.640 --> 00:29:08.010
was in word and in deed for the
liberation of the black man.

00:29:08.010 --> 00:29:09.900
- [Interviewer] What's
the most absurd thing

00:29:09.900 --> 00:29:11.710
a man has ever said to you?

00:29:11.710 --> 00:29:13.910
- Oh, absurd?

00:29:13.910 --> 00:29:16.720
Well, that would probably be my husband.

00:29:16.720 --> 00:29:20.440
He is the biggest feminist non-feminist,

00:29:20.440 --> 00:29:23.320
oppressive... (laughs)

00:29:23.320 --> 00:29:25.236
Oh, are you recording this?

00:29:25.236 --> 00:29:29.410
Oh God. (laughs)

00:29:29.410 --> 00:29:31.850
Oh gosh, maybe I should take that back.

00:29:31.850 --> 00:29:34.090
Oh but I am about the truth.

00:29:34.090 --> 00:29:37.310
- Women who find the word bitch offensive

00:29:37.310 --> 00:29:39.640
are being racist to animals.

00:29:39.640 --> 00:29:42.387
- Women aren't supposed to have periods.

00:29:42.387 --> 00:29:44.680
How the hell you know?

00:29:44.680 --> 00:29:46.840
Do you have a vagina?

00:29:46.840 --> 00:29:47.923
Do you got ovaries?

00:29:48.990 --> 00:29:51.090
Do you have a uterus?

00:29:51.090 --> 00:29:53.490
Are your chromosomes X and X?

00:29:53.490 --> 00:29:54.323
No?

00:29:55.730 --> 00:29:56.940
- Back when I was single,

00:29:56.940 --> 00:29:59.370
I was in my 20s and I was at a party,

00:29:59.370 --> 00:30:00.470
and this guy was like,

00:30:00.470 --> 00:30:01.593
you know, I was talking to him, you know,

00:30:01.593 --> 00:30:05.060
what you do, you tell him where
you work and all this stuff.

00:30:05.060 --> 00:30:06.687
And he was like, you know,

00:30:06.687 --> 00:30:10.810
"You're attractive, you've got
a good job, you're educated."

00:30:10.810 --> 00:30:13.950
Like he named all of this positive stuff,

00:30:13.950 --> 00:30:14.783
and then he was like,

00:30:14.783 --> 00:30:15.677
"But you don't have a boyfriend,

00:30:15.677 --> 00:30:18.370
"so there must be
something wrong with you."

00:30:18.370 --> 00:30:19.630
- I was new to the business.

00:30:19.630 --> 00:30:23.220
I was new to the job and
new to these clients,

00:30:23.220 --> 00:30:27.110
and we had a big meeting with about 12

00:30:28.302 --> 00:30:30.750
or 15, mostly men.

00:30:30.750 --> 00:30:33.633
There was like two women,
but mostly men in the room,

00:30:34.470 --> 00:30:36.290
and they were all about 40 and up.

00:30:36.290 --> 00:30:40.330
And then aside from that
was myself and my boss

00:30:40.330 --> 00:30:41.670
and my colleague.

00:30:41.670 --> 00:30:46.670
And lunch came in and one of
them told me to fix his plate.

00:30:49.610 --> 00:30:51.223
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

00:30:53.410 --> 00:30:54.840
- [Latoya] Take for example

00:30:54.840 --> 00:30:58.220
the assumption that racism
is more harmful to black men

00:30:58.220 --> 00:30:59.650
than it is to black women

00:30:59.650 --> 00:31:03.780
because the real tragedy of
racism is the loss of manhood.

00:31:03.780 --> 00:31:05.370
This assumption illustrates

00:31:05.370 --> 00:31:07.570
both an acceptance of masculinity

00:31:07.570 --> 00:31:10.300
defined within the context of patriarchy

00:31:10.300 --> 00:31:12.560
as well as a disregard for the human need

00:31:12.560 --> 00:31:17.070
for integrity and liberty
felt by both men and women.

00:31:17.070 --> 00:31:18.250
- What's good, my name is Charity Croff.

00:31:18.250 --> 00:31:19.510
You know what's super annoying?

00:31:19.510 --> 00:31:21.540
When we as black people
try to talk to white people

00:31:21.540 --> 00:31:22.860
about their privilege.

00:31:22.860 --> 00:31:24.010
We'll be like, hey friend,

00:31:24.010 --> 00:31:26.390
I know that you're not a
racist murder-y slave owner,

00:31:26.390 --> 00:31:28.810
but you still benefit
from a historical system

00:31:28.810 --> 00:31:29.660
of white supremacy

00:31:29.660 --> 00:31:31.280
that has put your people at the top

00:31:31.280 --> 00:31:32.620
and my people at the bottom.

00:31:32.620 --> 00:31:34.447
And then they respond like,

00:31:34.447 --> 00:31:35.557
"No, bro, my nigger.

00:31:35.557 --> 00:31:37.317
"I'm the furthest thing from privilege.

00:31:37.317 --> 00:31:40.187
"Racism is basically over,
I'm struggling just like you.

00:31:40.187 --> 00:31:41.127
"And in all honesty,

00:31:41.127 --> 00:31:43.967
"if you guys would just focus
on building up your families

00:31:43.967 --> 00:31:46.307
"and stop, you know, selling drugs,

00:31:46.307 --> 00:31:47.540
"you'd be better off."

00:31:47.540 --> 00:31:49.787
Of course this is a response
completely rooted in privilege

00:31:49.787 --> 00:31:52.550
and only someone that is
totally unaffected by racism

00:31:52.550 --> 00:31:56.950
can say something as crazy as
racism is ,basically, over.

00:31:56.950 --> 00:31:58.030
Well, check this out.

00:31:58.030 --> 00:32:00.470
That's the same type of
stuff that we as black men

00:32:00.470 --> 00:32:03.520
always say to black women
every time they try to check us

00:32:03.520 --> 00:32:05.940
on our male privilege and sexist ways.

00:32:05.940 --> 00:32:07.430
We just act like they
don't want us tripping

00:32:07.430 --> 00:32:09.440
and we tell them they're really
not being oppressed by men

00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:11.000
and it's all in their heads.

00:32:11.000 --> 00:32:13.200
We can only say something as crazy as that

00:32:13.200 --> 00:32:15.530
because we are not the ones being affected

00:32:15.530 --> 00:32:17.300
by that type of oppression.

00:32:17.300 --> 00:32:19.360
And that's why straight black men

00:32:19.360 --> 00:32:23.680
are the white people of black people.

00:32:23.680 --> 00:32:25.387
And I know what all the bros are thinking.

00:32:25.387 --> 00:32:27.017
"No, bro, you're tripping.

00:32:27.017 --> 00:32:28.157
"Don't you know we're out here

00:32:28.157 --> 00:32:30.057
"getting shot by the police like dogs?

00:32:30.057 --> 00:32:33.627
"Michael Brown, Freddie Gray,
Eric Garner, Trayvon Martin?

00:32:33.627 --> 00:32:34.690
"Women ain't got to deal with that,

00:32:34.690 --> 00:32:37.000
"they ain't gotta deal
with that like we do."

00:32:37.000 --> 00:32:37.833
Yeah, bro, that is messed up,

00:32:37.833 --> 00:32:39.990
but have you ever heard
of Alberta Spruill,

00:32:39.990 --> 00:32:42.250
Miriam Carey and Michelle Cusseaux?

00:32:42.250 --> 00:32:44.140
Yeah, me neither before I
started making this video,

00:32:44.140 --> 00:32:46.300
but those are the names
of unarmed black women

00:32:46.300 --> 00:32:47.760
who were also killed by the police

00:32:47.760 --> 00:32:49.470
but got no media attention.

00:32:49.470 --> 00:32:51.550
In fact, black women are
actually murdered by the police

00:32:51.550 --> 00:32:53.240
at higher rates than black men are,

00:32:53.240 --> 00:32:54.710
but their stories are left untold

00:32:54.710 --> 00:32:58.480
because it's not as interesting
to talk about women who die.

00:32:58.480 --> 00:33:01.060
This means that even in death

00:33:01.060 --> 00:33:04.890
black men are acknowledged
more than black women.

00:33:04.890 --> 00:33:06.300
We black men are not nervous

00:33:06.300 --> 00:33:07.910
walking past a group of black women,

00:33:07.910 --> 00:33:10.170
while on the other hand they are petrified

00:33:10.170 --> 00:33:11.570
walking past a group of us

00:33:11.570 --> 00:33:13.640
because one in five black women

00:33:13.640 --> 00:33:17.030
will be brutally raped at
some point in their lives.

00:33:17.030 --> 00:33:18.850
Black women are expected
to be independent,

00:33:18.850 --> 00:33:19.840
but not too independent

00:33:19.840 --> 00:33:22.140
that they're not a little
submissive to their king.

00:33:22.140 --> 00:33:24.160
Black women are expected
to be smart and pretty,

00:33:24.160 --> 00:33:25.580
but not too pretty 'cause then we'll think

00:33:25.580 --> 00:33:26.413
they're not that smart

00:33:26.413 --> 00:33:27.610
and that they only got to where they are

00:33:27.610 --> 00:33:28.710
because they're pretty.

00:33:28.710 --> 00:33:30.780
And you know what happens
when a black woman gets angry,

00:33:30.780 --> 00:33:34.320
we say, "See, that's why
you ain't got no man."

00:33:34.320 --> 00:33:37.870
- Misogyny is a byproduct
of a patriarchal mindset.

00:33:37.870 --> 00:33:40.273
The patriarchal mindset
is essentially telling men

00:33:40.273 --> 00:33:41.610
that you have to rule.

00:33:41.610 --> 00:33:43.210
You have to be in a certain way.

00:33:43.210 --> 00:33:46.530
Essentially what you are seeking is power

00:33:46.530 --> 00:33:50.150
and you're also seeking validation.

00:33:50.150 --> 00:33:52.620
The issue with seeking
power is the fact that

00:33:52.620 --> 00:33:55.660
power in order to be
recognized has to be exercised

00:33:55.660 --> 00:33:57.110
and somebody has to be oppressed

00:33:57.110 --> 00:33:59.720
in order for you to
show what that power is,

00:33:59.720 --> 00:34:01.990
what that power has the ability to do.

00:34:01.990 --> 00:34:05.300
- Number one, to say that black women

00:34:05.300 --> 00:34:07.730
are borrowing the rhetoric of white women

00:34:07.730 --> 00:34:09.500
when we talk about feminism

00:34:09.500 --> 00:34:11.750
is to say that black women are stupid.

00:34:11.750 --> 00:34:13.393
So it's actually insulting.

00:34:14.420 --> 00:34:17.870
It's basically saying
that we are incapable

00:34:17.870 --> 00:34:20.013
of forming our own thoughts,

00:34:20.970 --> 00:34:25.470
our own opinions, our own theories,

00:34:25.470 --> 00:34:28.160
and we're incapable of doing this

00:34:28.160 --> 00:34:30.803
without borrowing the
framework of our oppressors.

00:34:31.990 --> 00:34:35.950
It's completely negating
our personal experiences

00:34:35.950 --> 00:34:37.790
with sexism, with misogyny,

00:34:37.790 --> 00:34:41.120
with any discrimination
inside of our communities

00:34:41.120 --> 00:34:42.660
that we've had.

00:34:42.660 --> 00:34:44.870
- The people who argue that black feminism

00:34:44.870 --> 00:34:46.740
is anti-black men

00:34:46.740 --> 00:34:48.900
miss how the work of black feminists

00:34:48.900 --> 00:34:50.450
is central to social movements

00:34:50.450 --> 00:34:52.930
that end up centering black men anyway.

00:34:52.930 --> 00:34:54.460
Angela Davis, for example,

00:34:54.460 --> 00:34:58.500
is an iconic black feminist
and noted prison abolitionist.

00:34:58.500 --> 00:35:00.200
That movement has centered

00:35:00.200 --> 00:35:02.200
the over-incarceration of black men.

00:35:02.200 --> 00:35:04.120
And let's talk about Black Lives Matter,

00:35:04.120 --> 00:35:07.040
a movement begun by three black feminists.

00:35:07.040 --> 00:35:08.470
And I'd argue that it is

00:35:08.470 --> 00:35:12.420
the most inclusive movement
for racial justice ever.

00:35:12.420 --> 00:35:16.100
We absolutely don't get
to Black Lives Matter

00:35:16.100 --> 00:35:18.100
without a framework that recognizes

00:35:18.100 --> 00:35:20.910
the interactions of multiple
systems of oppression.

00:35:20.910 --> 00:35:22.060
With that being said,

00:35:22.060 --> 00:35:24.950
the most visible actions
around Black Lives Matter

00:35:24.950 --> 00:35:28.770
still center cisgender
heterosexual black men.

00:35:28.770 --> 00:35:30.070
- I primarily work with students,

00:35:30.070 --> 00:35:31.680
I primarily work with middle school

00:35:31.680 --> 00:35:33.070
and high school students,

00:35:33.070 --> 00:35:35.317
and I started noticing

00:35:35.317 --> 00:35:38.377
where these ideals started to form from,

00:35:38.377 --> 00:35:40.736
and it seems like puberty
is kind of like the point

00:35:40.736 --> 00:35:42.477
where it all kind of comes to a head.

00:35:42.477 --> 00:35:44.760
It's like essentially what happens is

00:35:44.760 --> 00:35:47.152
for men, for boys, actually,

00:35:47.152 --> 00:35:48.888
let's be very clear, for boys,

00:35:48.888 --> 00:35:52.780
you reach puberty and
everything becomes sexualized.

00:35:52.780 --> 00:35:55.943
This idea of just ,like,
now you are a man ,and such,

00:35:55.943 --> 00:35:58.084
and now in order for you to be this man

00:35:58.084 --> 00:36:01.050
you have to dominate
and assert your power.

00:36:01.050 --> 00:36:03.703
So you are telling this,
say, 12-year-old boy,

00:36:04.750 --> 00:36:06.960
you have to go out into the
world and assert your dominance.

00:36:06.960 --> 00:36:08.220
And on top of that,

00:36:08.220 --> 00:36:10.480
their primary source of emotional support;

00:36:10.480 --> 00:36:12.130
their parents, their
mother and their father,

00:36:12.130 --> 00:36:14.510
tend to pull back from them at that point.

00:36:14.510 --> 00:36:17.071
For mothers, it is the idea of
this I don't wanna coddle him

00:36:17.071 --> 00:36:17.904
and everything like that.

00:36:17.904 --> 00:36:19.793
He has to grow up and be a man.

00:36:20.744 --> 00:36:24.620
I.e. I cannot make him soft.

00:36:24.620 --> 00:36:27.370
I understand that he
has to be hard and rigid

00:36:27.370 --> 00:36:29.760
in order to navigate through
the world moving forward

00:36:29.760 --> 00:36:32.400
because the world now sees him as a man.

00:36:32.400 --> 00:36:34.660
- A world of happier men and happier women

00:36:34.660 --> 00:36:36.560
who are truer to themselves.

00:36:36.560 --> 00:36:38.110
And this is how to start.

00:36:38.110 --> 00:36:40.600
We must raise our daughters differently.

00:36:40.600 --> 00:36:42.963
We must also raise our sons differently.

00:36:44.130 --> 00:36:47.870
We do a great disservice to
boys in how we raise them.

00:36:47.870 --> 00:36:50.580
We stifle the humanity of boys.

00:36:50.580 --> 00:36:53.210
We define masculinity
in a very narrow way.

00:36:53.210 --> 00:36:56.730
Masculinity becomes this hard, small cage,

00:36:56.730 --> 00:36:59.010
and we put boys inside the cage.

00:36:59.010 --> 00:37:01.640
We teach boys to be afraid of fear.

00:37:01.640 --> 00:37:05.453
We teach boys to be afraid of
weakness, of vulnerability.

00:37:06.340 --> 00:37:08.850
We teach them to mask their true selves,

00:37:08.850 --> 00:37:13.419
because they have to be, in
Nigerian speak, hard men.

00:37:13.419 --> 00:37:14.770
(audience laughs)

00:37:14.770 --> 00:37:16.230
- [Latoya] Many black men in the movement

00:37:16.230 --> 00:37:20.040
were interested in controlling
black women's sexuality.

00:37:20.040 --> 00:37:21.840
Bell hooks comments that

00:37:21.840 --> 00:37:25.080
during the Black Liberation
Movement of the 1960s,

00:37:25.080 --> 00:37:26.780
black men overemphasized

00:37:26.780 --> 00:37:30.210
white male sexual exploitation
of black womanhood

00:37:30.210 --> 00:37:32.630
as their way to explain their disapproval

00:37:32.630 --> 00:37:34.830
of interracial relationships.

00:37:34.830 --> 00:37:38.440
It was, however, no contradiction
to their political views

00:37:38.440 --> 00:37:41.480
to have interracial
relationships themselves.

00:37:41.480 --> 00:37:45.190
Again, part of the freedom and manhood

00:37:45.190 --> 00:37:48.250
was the right of men to have
indiscriminate access to

00:37:48.250 --> 00:37:50.743
and control over any woman's body.

00:37:51.780 --> 00:37:53.910
Black men in the Black Liberation Movement

00:37:53.910 --> 00:37:55.790
often made sexist statements

00:37:55.790 --> 00:37:58.980
which were largely
accepted without criticism.

00:37:58.980 --> 00:38:02.850
It must be stressed that it
was not only many of the men

00:38:02.850 --> 00:38:04.910
but also a great number of the women

00:38:04.910 --> 00:38:06.830
in the Black Liberation Movement

00:38:06.830 --> 00:38:10.080
who were enforcing strict
gender roles on black women.

00:38:10.080 --> 00:38:13.010
In much the same way that
women in dominant societies

00:38:13.010 --> 00:38:15.990
do not resist, but encourage sexism,

00:38:15.990 --> 00:38:18.870
black women fell prey to
perpetuating patriarchy

00:38:18.870 --> 00:38:20.220
within the black community.

00:38:22.930 --> 00:38:27.050
- Because I think the same narrow

00:38:27.050 --> 00:38:31.480
gender prescriptive ideas about gender

00:38:31.480 --> 00:38:33.430
that impact black women

00:38:33.430 --> 00:38:35.300
impact black men too.

00:38:35.300 --> 00:38:39.510
I mean, it's patriarchy
that forces young black men

00:38:39.510 --> 00:38:43.990
to have to be macho and
boss up and carry guns

00:38:43.990 --> 00:38:45.190
and have to always feel,

00:38:45.190 --> 00:38:48.360
you know, present themselves
as violent and aggressive.

00:38:48.360 --> 00:38:49.640
That's patriarchy.

00:38:49.640 --> 00:38:52.355
- Because of the fact that I as a man,

00:38:52.355 --> 00:38:53.620
the fact that I am a man

00:38:53.620 --> 00:38:55.373
is the thing that gives me access.

00:38:56.667 --> 00:39:00.490
I could see how men see feminism

00:39:00.490 --> 00:39:05.280
and what they focus on primarily
is the fem part of it all,

00:39:05.280 --> 00:39:07.856
because they don't realize
that that includes them,

00:39:07.856 --> 00:39:09.379
because they have to reject this idea

00:39:09.379 --> 00:39:10.610
of anything that is feminine,

00:39:10.610 --> 00:39:12.343
just like you have to
completely push it away

00:39:12.343 --> 00:39:13.950
because you are a man.

00:39:13.950 --> 00:39:16.040
- It's also patriarchy that robs them

00:39:16.040 --> 00:39:18.790
of the ability to be vulnerable,

00:39:18.790 --> 00:39:22.690
that robs them of the ability
to access their femininity.

00:39:22.690 --> 00:39:25.450
It's patriarchy that says

00:39:25.450 --> 00:39:28.890
unless they're making a
certain amount of money,

00:39:28.890 --> 00:39:30.330
they're not valuable.

00:39:30.330 --> 00:39:34.170
It's not black women who
say that, that's patriarchy.

00:39:34.170 --> 00:39:38.220
So I mean the point is liberating us all

00:39:38.220 --> 00:39:43.100
from those very, very narrow
and sexist gender prescriptions

00:39:43.100 --> 00:39:44.720
because they hurt us both.

00:39:44.720 --> 00:39:46.637
- You get individuals like Hoteps.

00:39:47.903 --> 00:39:50.890
- A Hotep, according to Maiya Sinclair.

00:39:50.890 --> 00:39:53.710
Probably vegan or vegetarian.

00:39:53.710 --> 00:39:56.040
Has denounced Christianity.

00:39:56.040 --> 00:39:58.350
Joined some crazy cult religion.

00:39:58.350 --> 00:39:59.990
Believes men are to lead

00:39:59.990 --> 00:40:03.860
and women are only goddesses
on earth for reproduction.

00:40:03.860 --> 00:40:07.870
Claims to be well-read but
hasn't read anything at all.

00:40:07.870 --> 00:40:11.547
Homophobic, problematic, transphobic.

00:40:13.585 --> 00:40:16.030
Any other -ics you could
probably come up with.

00:40:16.030 --> 00:40:18.967
Only wants liberation for black men,

00:40:18.967 --> 00:40:21.940
and their advocacy isn't intersectional.

00:40:21.940 --> 00:40:26.300
Basically, a man who
claims to be fake deep

00:40:26.300 --> 00:40:28.800
but is usually problematic

00:40:28.800 --> 00:40:32.380
and his thinking is shortsighted,

00:40:32.380 --> 00:40:33.810
usually based in violence,

00:40:33.810 --> 00:40:36.270
and does no real good
in the black community.

00:40:36.270 --> 00:40:38.290
Eric Killmonger.

00:40:38.290 --> 00:40:41.840
He only aspires to have
the privilege of white men,

00:40:41.840 --> 00:40:46.840
leaving women, black women,
still two steps behind him.

00:40:47.820 --> 00:40:50.993
Also believes feminism is
destroying the black community.

00:40:52.584 --> 00:40:55.970
- Who are essentially trying to replace

00:40:55.970 --> 00:40:57.740
a white dominant structure

00:40:57.740 --> 00:40:59.900
with essentially a black dominant one.

00:40:59.900 --> 00:41:01.140
But what they don't see is

00:41:01.140 --> 00:41:04.010
while you're trying to ascend
to this position of power,

00:41:04.010 --> 00:41:06.950
you still leave behind all
these other individuals

00:41:06.950 --> 00:41:07.980
who are in your community,

00:41:07.980 --> 00:41:09.740
who you have the most access to.

00:41:09.740 --> 00:41:11.150
Because as a black man I understand

00:41:11.150 --> 00:41:13.460
I have access to black women

00:41:13.460 --> 00:41:16.280
in the way white men
and white women do not,

00:41:16.280 --> 00:41:18.170
because we are in
community with each other.

00:41:18.170 --> 00:41:20.366
You know, if I walk
into an all-black space,

00:41:20.366 --> 00:41:22.780
people aren't automatically like perked up

00:41:22.780 --> 00:41:26.180
and just like one of these
things is not like the other.

00:41:26.180 --> 00:41:27.180
And so because of the fact

00:41:27.180 --> 00:41:29.200
that I have that access to those spaces,

00:41:29.200 --> 00:41:31.340
I need to also understand the fact

00:41:31.340 --> 00:41:34.050
that I am also in a position
to cause the most damage,

00:41:34.050 --> 00:41:36.730
because everybody's guard is
down when I'm in the space

00:41:36.730 --> 00:41:39.510
because people don't see
me as an inherent threat.

00:41:39.510 --> 00:41:41.990
But if I'm striving for an idea

00:41:41.990 --> 00:41:43.620
that is not found in an all-black room,

00:41:43.620 --> 00:41:46.880
I.e. a white supremacist construct,

00:41:46.880 --> 00:41:50.110
and that is where my validation
and my power comes from,

00:41:50.110 --> 00:41:53.560
then I have the ability
to harm all individuals

00:41:53.560 --> 00:41:56.070
that I have the closest contact with,

00:41:56.070 --> 00:41:58.777
which tends to be other
people in the black community.

00:41:58.777 --> 00:42:03.777
- When I think about toxic
masculinity and how that kinda,

00:42:05.110 --> 00:42:06.440
we've seen how that kinda rearranged

00:42:06.440 --> 00:42:08.280
in how the family structure is set up.

00:42:08.280 --> 00:42:10.550
And so when I think about

00:42:11.540 --> 00:42:13.070
feminism destroying the black family,

00:42:13.070 --> 00:42:16.730
I think about this hetero-cisgender family

00:42:16.730 --> 00:42:18.820
that was already flawed to begin with.

00:42:18.820 --> 00:42:22.450
And I also think about the
history of black people

00:42:22.450 --> 00:42:24.600
I guess transitioning to America, right?

00:42:24.600 --> 00:42:27.110
And so we think about
the Atlantic slave trade,

00:42:27.110 --> 00:42:31.620
black people being on boats
on top of each other, right?

00:42:31.620 --> 00:42:33.470
And think about how the
black family dynamic

00:42:33.470 --> 00:42:34.550
was changed then,

00:42:34.550 --> 00:42:38.200
how the black family dynamic
was changed during slavery,

00:42:38.200 --> 00:42:41.130
how the black family dynamic was changed

00:42:41.130 --> 00:42:42.980
during so many parts in history

00:42:42.980 --> 00:42:45.580
where we see black people
and black narratives

00:42:45.580 --> 00:42:47.580
be erased in silence.

00:42:47.580 --> 00:42:51.640
And so I think once we
become investigative

00:42:51.640 --> 00:42:54.250
in discovering what we want a family to be

00:42:54.250 --> 00:42:58.203
and how families will fit
everyone's descriptions,

00:42:59.160 --> 00:43:01.080
we will learn that
feminism was just a part

00:43:01.080 --> 00:43:04.050
in making that family more strong,

00:43:04.050 --> 00:43:06.120
making that family more strengthened.

00:43:06.120 --> 00:43:08.820
- I came out here today because
I thought it's imperative

00:43:08.820 --> 00:43:10.821
that men not only stand with women,

00:43:10.821 --> 00:43:12.680
but they stand for women.

00:43:12.680 --> 00:43:13.513
And by standing for women,

00:43:13.513 --> 00:43:14.550
we have to acknowledge

00:43:14.550 --> 00:43:18.700
that there's a culture of sexual violence,

00:43:18.700 --> 00:43:21.760
a rape culture that men
have benefited from.

00:43:21.760 --> 00:43:22.920
And in order for it to change,

00:43:22.920 --> 00:43:24.320
men have to change it.

00:43:24.320 --> 00:43:26.710
The same way we're asking
white people as black people

00:43:26.710 --> 00:43:28.480
to change white supremacy

00:43:28.480 --> 00:43:31.060
and stand up in the
face of white supremacy.

00:43:31.060 --> 00:43:33.290
We have to call ourselves
to that same duty

00:43:33.290 --> 00:43:35.530
when it comes to changing rape culture.

00:43:35.530 --> 00:43:36.930
- Rape culture believes that

00:43:38.390 --> 00:43:40.390
there's almost anything a women can do,

00:43:40.390 --> 00:43:42.100
just like a black man with the police,

00:43:42.100 --> 00:43:44.410
there's nothing you can do
to not be shot by the police,

00:43:44.410 --> 00:43:47.040
and the same thing with rape
culture does with women,

00:43:47.040 --> 00:43:51.460
is that there's nothing you
can do to not be harmed by men.

00:43:51.460 --> 00:43:52.440
- The definition of rape culture

00:43:52.440 --> 00:43:55.830
is like the normalization of harm

00:43:55.830 --> 00:43:57.197
that comes specifically through sex

00:43:57.197 --> 00:44:00.080
and our ideas that we have of sex,

00:44:00.080 --> 00:44:02.923
and pushing them away as
though they are not real things

00:44:02.923 --> 00:44:04.980
that actually have the
ability to cause harm.

00:44:04.980 --> 00:44:07.077
Because of the patriarchal construct,

00:44:07.077 --> 00:44:08.828
because of the fact that it's telling men

00:44:08.828 --> 00:44:11.150
that you have to be
dominant in this culture

00:44:11.150 --> 00:44:13.200
and you are in a position of power,

00:44:13.200 --> 00:44:15.210
and you are essentially being told

00:44:15.210 --> 00:44:17.060
that in order to assert yourself

00:44:17.060 --> 00:44:19.740
or to categorize yourself as a man,

00:44:19.740 --> 00:44:21.840
you need to be having sex.

00:44:21.840 --> 00:44:23.830
And then there's a crime
occurring in a society

00:44:23.830 --> 00:44:25.330
that is specifically connected

00:44:25.330 --> 00:44:28.820
to somebody using sex in
order to harm other people.

00:44:28.820 --> 00:44:29.710
At the end of the day,

00:44:29.710 --> 00:44:31.940
you feel that you are the
person that's going to be blamed

00:44:31.940 --> 00:44:34.180
for the fact that this person is harmed.

00:44:34.180 --> 00:44:35.950
But ultimately what rape culture is

00:44:35.950 --> 00:44:39.590
is the byproduct of a construct
that nobody can live up to.

00:44:39.590 --> 00:44:42.090
You know, in order to be all-powerful,

00:44:42.090 --> 00:44:43.990
what are you gonna do with that power?

00:44:45.970 --> 00:44:47.517
You're probably gonna harm
some people along the way,

00:44:47.517 --> 00:44:49.460
especially if they do not follow

00:44:49.460 --> 00:44:51.401
what it is that you want them to do.

00:44:51.401 --> 00:44:56.401
- I think men to need to
understand that feminism is not

00:44:56.850 --> 00:45:01.610
a mechanism to destroy their manliness

00:45:01.610 --> 00:45:04.343
or their place.

00:45:06.340 --> 00:45:09.010
It's a voice that we're
using right now to say,

00:45:09.010 --> 00:45:11.220
"hey, we exist."

00:45:11.220 --> 00:45:15.330
We expect equality.

00:45:15.330 --> 00:45:17.860
We expect respect.

00:45:17.860 --> 00:45:22.860
We expect to be included
in certain things.

00:45:23.810 --> 00:45:27.230
And you need us,

00:45:27.230 --> 00:45:28.950
because we need you.

00:45:28.950 --> 00:45:32.790
- I want black men to understand

00:45:32.790 --> 00:45:35.580
that if you aren't about
liberation for everyone

00:45:35.580 --> 00:45:38.930
then you aren't about liberation at all.

00:45:38.930 --> 00:45:41.620
And so I need you to see the ways

00:45:41.620 --> 00:45:44.110
that black women are uniquely oppressed

00:45:44.110 --> 00:45:45.450
and I need you to see the ways

00:45:45.450 --> 00:45:48.300
that you are uniquely oppressing us,

00:45:48.300 --> 00:45:49.760
and then we can work on that

00:45:49.760 --> 00:45:53.180
and we can work together
to solve this racism thing.

00:45:53.180 --> 00:45:57.320
- What I really want in life in general

00:45:57.320 --> 00:46:00.780
is for all people to be valued.

00:46:00.780 --> 00:46:05.780
I really wanna abolish imperial
capitalism and patriarchy.

00:46:08.240 --> 00:46:12.160
I want people to know
that gender is a scam

00:46:12.160 --> 00:46:13.950
and gender is a social construct

00:46:13.950 --> 00:46:15.760
and we shouldn't believe in it

00:46:15.760 --> 00:46:17.600
and it's bullshit.

00:46:17.600 --> 00:46:21.710
- I want black women to see themselves

00:46:21.710 --> 00:46:23.360
throughout this documentary.

00:46:23.360 --> 00:46:25.820
I want them to be able to learn

00:46:27.320 --> 00:46:30.700
how the word feminism has transformed

00:46:30.700 --> 00:46:35.690
from back in the day until present day.

00:46:35.690 --> 00:46:39.460
I want them to understand, you know,

00:46:39.460 --> 00:46:41.762
what it means to be a womanist,

00:46:41.762 --> 00:46:43.823
what it means to be a black feminist.

00:46:43.823 --> 00:46:46.220
And I want them to understand

00:46:49.951 --> 00:46:51.850
just the struggles we've been through.

00:46:51.850 --> 00:46:55.020
- I want people to pay attention;

00:46:55.020 --> 00:46:56.170
to stay woke,

00:46:56.170 --> 00:47:01.170
to understand that while
there are gender differences

00:47:01.760 --> 00:47:05.780
and there are racial
differences and all of that,

00:47:05.780 --> 00:47:09.700
ultimately we're still human
and we are without a doubt,

00:47:09.700 --> 00:47:12.100
and it seems almost foolish to say equal.

00:47:12.100 --> 00:47:14.770
But more than equality, it's like,

00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:20.170
we have to move beyond race
and gender and sexuality

00:47:20.170 --> 00:47:21.950
and be human,

00:47:21.950 --> 00:47:23.840
and understand each other as humans.

00:47:23.840 --> 00:47:26.150
And everyone's experience
is going to be different.

00:47:26.150 --> 00:47:27.640
So every black person isn't the same.

00:47:27.640 --> 00:47:30.150
Every white person, every
woman, every gay person;

00:47:30.150 --> 00:47:31.480
we're not the same.

00:47:31.480 --> 00:47:34.910
But if we listen to each other,

00:47:34.910 --> 00:47:38.190
we can work together and make
amazing and beautiful things.

00:47:38.190 --> 00:47:41.523
- For white people, we
have a lot of work to do.

00:47:43.520 --> 00:47:48.520
To let go of our belief

00:47:48.680 --> 00:47:51.580
that because we are not
that kind of white person,

00:47:51.580 --> 00:47:53.173
that we should get a pass.

00:47:55.950 --> 00:47:59.020
That's probably one of the
biggest obstacles and barriers,

00:47:59.020 --> 00:48:01.660
because why on earth
would a person of color

00:48:01.660 --> 00:48:04.193
have any reason to trust you or me?

00:48:06.031 --> 00:48:07.960
We have to do a little bit

00:48:07.960 --> 00:48:10.750
of continual proving
ourselves over and over again

00:48:10.750 --> 00:48:14.200
if we want to show that we're
serious about doing this.

00:48:14.200 --> 00:48:16.660
We have to regularly show up.

00:48:16.660 --> 00:48:20.530
We have to be more inclusive
and intersectional ourselves.

00:48:20.530 --> 00:48:22.840
As white people, we have to say,

00:48:22.840 --> 00:48:26.080
"hey, this is the fourth time this week

00:48:26.080 --> 00:48:29.190
I have been around a
table making decisions

00:48:29.190 --> 00:48:30.840
and it has been all white people.

00:48:31.810 --> 00:48:33.170
This is not okay."

00:48:33.170 --> 00:48:34.550
- So what I would like for someone to do

00:48:34.550 --> 00:48:36.100
is come into it with an open mind.

00:48:36.100 --> 00:48:36.933
Look at people.

00:48:36.933 --> 00:48:38.180
look at different women's stories

00:48:38.180 --> 00:48:41.250
knowing that no one woman
is standing for everybody

00:48:41.250 --> 00:48:42.370
and can represent everybody.

00:48:42.370 --> 00:48:45.570
But if this isn't your
experience, don't deny it.

00:48:45.570 --> 00:48:47.270
Try to understand something from it

00:48:47.270 --> 00:48:50.080
so that you can carry
yourself a different way.

00:48:50.080 --> 00:48:52.480
- I need people to realize that

00:48:54.750 --> 00:48:57.650
black women come in a
lot of different shades

00:48:57.650 --> 00:49:00.380
and heights and sizes and backgrounds

00:49:00.380 --> 00:49:01.490
and all of these things.

00:49:01.490 --> 00:49:04.930
If I brought to you a
picture of all of my cousins

00:49:04.930 --> 00:49:06.540
and my daughter's cousins and all of them,

00:49:06.540 --> 00:49:08.060
you would literally see,

00:49:08.060 --> 00:49:10.300
I call them the little rainbow coaliltion.

00:49:10.300 --> 00:49:13.460
These are just the prettiest
faces that I've ever seen,

00:49:13.460 --> 00:49:14.430
the sweetest girls,

00:49:14.430 --> 00:49:15.810
and none of them look alike.

00:49:15.810 --> 00:49:18.370
And it's gonna be interesting

00:49:18.370 --> 00:49:19.710
because all of them are gonna have

00:49:19.710 --> 00:49:21.970
very different experiences

00:49:21.970 --> 00:49:23.610
largely because of this.

00:49:23.610 --> 00:49:25.220
Some of them have black mothers,

00:49:25.220 --> 00:49:26.480
some of them have white mothers.

00:49:26.480 --> 00:49:28.510
And I need them to know

00:49:28.510 --> 00:49:30.550
that your blackness is your blackness,

00:49:30.550 --> 00:49:32.560
whatever it is that you want it to be.

00:49:32.560 --> 00:49:34.340
And you can be as feminine

00:49:34.340 --> 00:49:36.480
or as not feminine as you want to.

00:49:36.480 --> 00:49:38.420
You are a black woman, regardless.

00:49:38.420 --> 00:49:40.150
You deserve the upmost respect,

00:49:40.150 --> 00:49:40.983
and you're magic.

00:49:40.983 --> 00:49:42.093
And if people don't recognize that,

00:49:42.093 --> 00:49:44.270
it's their loss, not yours.

00:49:44.270 --> 00:49:46.260
- Most women around the world,

00:49:46.260 --> 00:49:49.150
if you wanna believe that
feminism is for all women,

00:49:49.150 --> 00:49:50.760
most women around the world

00:49:50.760 --> 00:49:53.600
are never gonna sit in
a women's studies class.

00:49:53.600 --> 00:49:55.530
They're never gonna read Bell Hooks.

00:49:55.530 --> 00:49:58.420
They're never gonna read
feminists foundational texts.

00:49:58.420 --> 00:50:01.550
So if that's the criteria
for being a feminist,

00:50:01.550 --> 00:50:04.170
then feminism is awfully elitist,

00:50:04.170 --> 00:50:07.010
which seems to stand in defiance

00:50:07.010 --> 00:50:10.310
of everything that we
say feminism is about.

00:50:10.310 --> 00:50:13.170
So feminism is as much about Amber Rose

00:50:13.170 --> 00:50:15.440
as it is about Michelle Obama

00:50:15.440 --> 00:50:17.080
as it is about Tiffany Haddish

00:50:17.080 --> 00:50:18.920
as it is about Beyonce.

00:50:18.920 --> 00:50:21.330
We are all working to do this.

00:50:21.330 --> 00:50:23.720
It is not just an academic exercise,

00:50:23.720 --> 00:50:25.290
it's a life exercise

00:50:25.290 --> 00:50:27.210
that has to include all kinds of women.

00:50:27.210 --> 00:50:30.710
- Black women made this for black women,

00:50:30.710 --> 00:50:32.500
for the plight of the black woman,

00:50:32.500 --> 00:50:34.940
for the understanding of the black woman.

00:50:34.940 --> 00:50:36.360
And after watching this,

00:50:36.360 --> 00:50:41.270
I really hope that you can see
how strong black women are.

00:50:41.270 --> 00:50:43.840
How we have been a part of this movement

00:50:43.840 --> 00:50:45.700
since its inception.

00:50:45.700 --> 00:50:50.700
How we have given so much to this world

00:50:50.840 --> 00:50:52.900
that has not been reciprocated to us.

00:50:52.900 --> 00:50:55.120
- This is ultimately a
conversation about community.

00:50:55.120 --> 00:50:57.573
Like, how do you build a
community that you want?

00:50:58.750 --> 00:51:01.230
Allow everybody in that
community to have a voice.

00:51:01.230 --> 00:51:03.740
Allow all those individuals
to navigate their lives

00:51:03.740 --> 00:51:04.573
the way that they want.

00:51:04.573 --> 00:51:07.687
And listen to them when
they're telling you directly

00:51:07.687 --> 00:51:11.190
what it is that you are doing
is negatively affecting them.

00:51:11.190 --> 00:51:14.820
- I want you to understand
that black liberation

00:51:14.820 --> 00:51:17.810
is about the liberation
of all black people.

00:51:17.810 --> 00:51:22.810
And if you are not seeking
to liberate all black people,

00:51:22.950 --> 00:51:25.083
you only want black male supremacy.

00:51:27.000 --> 00:51:29.740
- Remember, take a look at
all the wonderful sources

00:51:29.740 --> 00:51:31.450
we've cited in the credits.

00:51:31.450 --> 00:51:33.530
Share this film with your family,

00:51:33.530 --> 00:51:36.746
your friends, your
classmates, your coworkers.

00:51:36.746 --> 00:51:39.350
Share this film with everybody.

00:51:39.350 --> 00:51:42.610
May black feminism continue to undergird

00:51:42.610 --> 00:51:44.233
and uplift our community.

00:51:45.236 --> 00:51:48.319
(upbeat jazz music)

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Black Feminist

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