Myths to divert Black women from our own freedom:
1. The Black woman is already liberated.
2. Racism is the primary (or only) oppression Black women have to confront.
3. Feminism is nothing but man-hating.
4. Women's issues are narrow, apolitical concerns. People of color need to deal with the "larger struggle."
5. Those feminists are nothing but Lesbians.
These myths illustrate long-held misconceptions about black women,
including the belief that the extraordinary strength black women have
shown in the face of tremendous oppression reveals their liberation.
In fact, this "freedom"-working outside the home, supporting the
family economically as well as emotionally, and heading the
household-has been thrust upon black women. Women of all races,
classes, nationalities, religions, and ethnicities are sexually
oppressed; black women are no exception. Upon further examination, the
other myths prove to be false. Racism and sexism must be confronted at
the same time; to wait for one to end before working on the other
reflects an incomplete understanding of the way racism and sexism, as
forms of oppression, work to perpetuate each other. Black feminism
struggles against institutionalized, systematic oppression rather than
against a certain group of people, be they white men or men of color.
While it often requires no stretch of the imagination to infer
man-hating in some early (and some recent) feminist writings, the goal
of feminism is the end of sexism. It is only a sane response of an
oppressed people to work toward their own liberation. Finally, the
assumption that feminists are nothing but lesbians reveals the
homophobia which persists in many black communities as well as a
misunderstanding of both lesbians and motivations for joining the
feminist movement.
