Women of Color and the Political Economy of Sympathy

Women of Color and the Political Economy of Sympathy

by Stephanie Troutman and David J. Leonard | NewBlackMan (in Exile)

“Given the racist and patriarchal patterns of the state, it is difficult to envision the state as the holder of solutions to the problem of violence against women of color. However, as the anti-violence movement has been institutionalized and professionalized, the state plays an increasingly dominant role in how we conceptualize and create strategies to minimize violence against women—Angela Davis.

Words sadly ring true given the daily realities of state violence, and the limited care and concern for the daily realities of violence in our country. What is wrong with us/U.S.? The endless examples (in a long, sad history of violent acts) act of violence against a woman of color to NOT make headlines is beyond devastating.  It is pedagogical in pointing to the material consequences of the intersections of race and gender.

This has been all too clear with reports about the horrific circumstances of Glenda Moore, a Black mother who lost her two young sons during Hurricane Sandy.  According to The Daily News Moore was “holding onto them, and the waves just kept coming and crashing and they were under,” the mother’s sister told the Daily News at her home. “It went over their heads … She had them in her arms, and a wave came and swept them out of her arms.” In the midst of the storm, Moore knocked on doors searching for help to no avail.  As Moore’s sister recounted to The Daily News "They answered the door and said, 'I don't know you. I'm not going to help you,’”…"My sister's like 5-foot-3, 130 pounds. She looks like a little girl. She's going to come to you and you're going to slam the door in her face and say, 'I don't know you, I can't help you'?'”

Although there seems to be reticence and an unwillingness to talk about racism and sexism – implicit biases – in this case, the limited (yes there has been some media attention) concern and national mourning for the death of these children, and the pain endured by Moore is telling.  While people came together to raise over $313,000 dollars for a tormented school bus monitor, the Moore family is fighting just to raise enough money to bury their children (as of today, there is just short of $11,000 dollars). It is yet another reminder that not all pain, not all suffering is created equal.

While the reports surrounding Sharmeeka Moffitt, who accused several men of attacking her because she wore an Obama t-shirt, proved unsubstantiated, her experiences point to how racism and misogyny is operationalized within contemporary culture.  Yet another reminder of the violence besieging the United States and the media’s silence (and complicity) on the violence experienced by women of color; the fact that Sharmeka Moffitt’s name did not initially warrant front-page news, a lead story on the national news, or national conversation is telling.  The fact that people required more evidence in this stance is revealing.  The fact that people dismissed the initial reports by noting “We don’t know what happened;” “we don’t know the specifics;” “we don’t know if it is a hate crime” is not without consequence.  

Yes, her accusations prove to be false, but this doesn’t tell us anything about the silence and disinterest from dominant media and political leaders unless the claim is that the lack of coverage resulted from their investigations and conclusions that it wasn’t a story worthy of media attention.  If that was the case, why did the media and the national spotlight grow when the police concluded that her injuries were self-inflicted?  In other words, when the reports were that Ms. Moffitt was the victim of an attack, that left her with 60% of her body burned, there were critics.  Yet, when she became the perpetrator, when she became a cautionary tale, when she became a source of contempt, an example of pathology and criminality, the story mattered.  Invisible as victim but seen as threat, Sharmeka encapsulates the lack of care and concern for trauma and violence endured by women of color?

As with Trayvon Martin and countless other incidents, the specter of violence, when its victims are people of color, when its victims are women of color, registers limited attention within the United States. This has been quite clear with the lack of national outrage about the murder of Rekia Boyd. What about Anna Brown, who reveals the lack of care for women of color within our society?  While American media pundits and leaders rightly stand up to condemn the horrific and brutal attack of Malala Yousafzai, why can’t we fight for justice for both Malala and Pakistani victims of drone strikes? 

Why can’t we see the many women deported and the many more families split alongside of the national debates about Saundra Fluke and contraception?  Why can’t we see Glenda Moore as we saw the parents who lost their children in Aurora, Colorado?  Why don’t we mourn the loss of Connor and Brandon Moore as we did when other (white, middle-class) children lost their lives?  Why so casual, disinterested, and otherwise dismissive of the violence and trauma effecting women of color?

This response (or lack thereof) plays to the continuous imperative of neoliberal, color-blind ideology to distance contemporary America from its racial history and legacy of violence- including rape, medical/pharmaceutical testing and sexual assault against black and brown women. At the same time, this lack of response (never mind priority) continues a long tradition of the invisibility of black/brown female suffering. From Malala and Marrisa Alexander, from Rekia Boyd to “4 little girls,” from Glenda Moore to Encarnacion Romero, white supremacy has shown itself to be disinterested in the pain felt by women of color.

The specter of white supremacy, misogyny, and ideologies of hate are all too familiar.  What is also all too common is our silence—our  complicit acceptance of violence, hate, and destruction when it is “over there.”  What is all too familiar is the refusal to stand for justice for all people; all deaths and all brutality are not treated equally. Campaigns against stop and frisk and campaigns to end street harassment, and non-profit organizations working to end rape and sexual violence against women (A Long Walk Home, FAAN Mail and particularly women of color, have stepped in to do the work that rest of our society, including our government and media, should be doing.  Many of us don’t even know (care to know?) the stories of these black and brown women and don’t care about their “Dreams Deferred.” 

The normalization of violence in our culture, due in large part to ongoing foreign conflict and media violence, is not an excuse for apathy—collectively or individually.  And because of the pervasive ugliness of racism, some folks out there are wondering (and possibly hoping) that the men who committed this act turn out to be black or brown. Though all evidence points to the contrary, if the assailants were men of color, we would still be left to deal with issues regarding violence against women as a racialized phenomena. Almost 30% of African American women are the victims of partner violence during the course of their lifetime (rape, physical assault or stalking).  According to Incite,

American Indian women are twice as likely to be victimized by violent crime than women or men of any other ethnic group. In addition, sixty percent of the perpetrators of violence against American Indian women are white and Asian American women are most likely to be victimized by whites as well (Greenfield and Smith 1999). Rates of violence against African American women as well are higher than the national average (Rennison 2001). In general, forty-three percent of women will be raped (including marital rape) and one-half of women in the U.S. will be battered in their lifetime (MacKinnon 1987, 23-24).

The silence and erasure of women of color victims, the blind neglect to the missing womenand children, and the overall disregard for the abuse, violence, and pain endured by women of color reflects the logic of racism and sexism.

These young women, and countless others have all faced violence under similarly disturbing circumstances.  All should have prompted national outrage and action or, at the least, for us to say their names.  How meaningful would it have been for President Barack Obama to suggest a moment of silence for Marissa Alexander, Glenda Moore  and/or Malala? Would this have been seen as race baiting…dog whistling? Who cares? It would have been seen as a gesture, signaling at least awareness if not a deep concern, for the safety and well being of black and brown women in the U.S. 

Please pause for a moment to consider the irony of a presidential debate on foreign policy and references to Malala but silence about drone attacks and countless other policies that inflict pain and suffering on women of color throughout the world.  Please pause to think about the narrow framing of foreign policy and “women’s issues,” which has seemingly erased the trauma and violence faced by women of color.  Norma Ortiz put this rather starkly:

In their second debate, the candidates for president talked —finally— about immigration, violence and women. What they did not talk about was violence against immigrant women and how our country's anti-immigrant laws make it worse for us and our children. 

Too many immigrant women, forced into the shadows of society, have had to make the choice between protecting themselves or keeping their families together.

I have had to make that choice.

I endured abuse by my partner, while worrying constantly about my then three-year-old son. But, because of my immigration status, I feared what would happen if I contacted the authorities. 

When I finally did make the decision to call, my fears turned out to be all too real.

Instead of helping us get away from my abusive partner, police arrested me. I spent five days in jail, separated from my son, before authorities moved me to immigration custody and began deportation proceedings.

Why don’t we know her name or that of Encarnacion Romero, whose parental rights were revoked because the court concluded that, “she abandoned her child when she was imprisoned after a 2007 immigration sting at a poultry processing plant.”  Where’s the outrage; where’s the appeal to justice and/or family values?

The selective invoking of violence elsewhere should give us pause? Why are we so comfortable looking for pain, suffering and violence elsewhere? U.S. exceptionalism . . . manifest Destiny . . . white man’s burden?  Yet, there is no reason to look at the outside for the horrific violence when it continues to plague our communities all while the media and “the leaders” remain silent, co-conspirators in the persistence of violence.  All point to the fallacy of a post-racial America and the shared level of violence between those who “we” see as uncivilized and “our” neighbors and society.  This same post-racial society has spawned notable and newsworthy reverse-discrimination claims and anti-affirmative action cases that only detract from the clear and present danger of such thinking as it manifests in the persistent inequality and violence, both structural and in cases of Alexander, Malala and countless others–physical, that black and brown men and women now experience at record levels since the abolition of slavery.

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Stephanie Troutman is Assistant Professor of Women & Gender and African-American Studies at Berea College, Berea, KY. 

David J. Leonard is Associate Professor in the Department of Critical Culture, Gender and Race Studies at Washington State University, Pullman. He is the author of the just released After Artest: Race and the War on Hoop (SUNY Press) as well as several other works. Leonard is a regular contributor to NewBlackMan, layupline, Feminist Wire, and Urban Cusp. He is frequent contributor to Ebony, Slam, and Racialicious as well as a past contributor to Loop21, The Nation and The Starting Five. He blogs @No Tsuris.