Alexis Simmons 16 October 2019 EN279: Women’s Writing Professor Melissa Tombro

IMAGINE HOW TIRED WE ARE.mp4

I’m of the belief that being a human being is exhausting. I think that having a body that needs to be taken care of is a burden. I often wish for less responsibility when it comes to my own needs, simply because… I’m tired.

Having a physical form is a solid 3/10 experience. But when you add on the layers that many of us have—the ones that make our bodies a site for hate groups to prey, feed, and breed on—it becomes a whole lot worse.

It feels something like a game of baseball—you step up to bat, the pitcher sizes you up, makes a decision, and throws.

Being female? Strike one. Queer? Strike two. A person of color? Why did you even get in the game?

…or something like that.

To say that it’s easy to connect with all of the elements of such a dynamic existence would be false. If existing in and of itself is a radical, problematic act: how can black, queer women even begin to fight for the rights of one marginalized group, knowing there are two (or more) groups that are missing a troop?

I’m a Black, queer, female, and I am incredibly worn out (and about to contradict Taylor Swift’s 2019 comeback single “ME!” from her new album, Lover); but I’m not the only one of me.

1. FUCK IT, I’LL DO IT MYSELF The Combahee River Collective Statement was published in 1977 by the Combahee River Collective, a Black feminist lesbian organization that was active in Boston from 1974 to 1980. The group was formed out of necessity, not unlike most other art, spaces, etc. created by, and for, minority groups. They were intentional in their decision to identity as Black feminists, because the feminist movement they were witnessing was—in the words of the seventh track on ’s fourth studio album, Father of the Bride—Unbearably White.

Though they no longer meet regularly, their beliefs live on through the power of their words and in the spirits of the women they’ve inspired. Their words explain the particular politics of Black feminism—what it is, who it benefits, what their efforts are, and problems that they face. The overarching message is simple: Black women are inherently valuable.

Translation for anyone confused: Black (usually more of a dark brown when seen in real life) women (females, girls, occasional vagina-havers) are inherently valuable (people, human beings, homo sapiens, and should be treated as such) (i.e. not garbage or trash). Through the different elements of the statement, they ultimately express that in the “mainstream,” or “traditional” feminist movement, the needs of Black women are different than those of white women. No matter how black and white a concept, “…it is apparent that no other ostensibly progressive movement has ever considered our specific oppression as a priority or worked seriously for the ending of that oppression” (10). So, in true fed-up-black-woman fashion, they decided to do it their damn selves.

Black Girl Dangerous: On Race, Queerness, Class, and Gender by Mia McKenzie is a series of essays that were originally posted on Black Girl Dangerous (BGD), a blog/forum she created in 2012 after one of her (white) ex-girlfriends told her that she thought, “…black people were scary. Sexy, she said. But scary, too” (1).

Nearly every essay in the book is able to analyze the truths of living a multiply-marginalized life, even if the essay appears to only be about one of the many oppressed groups McKenzie is a part of. At first glance, McKenzie’s 2013 essay titled, On Defending Beyoncé: Black Feminists, White Feminists, and the Line In the Sand is about the so-called controversy that is Beyoncé’s feminist persona despite her relationship with Jay-Z, a cheating Scorpio who occasionally raps about abusing women. But, if you really listen to what McKenzie is saying, it’s about the entitlement of white women and the importance of solidarity between Black women. It’s about continuing to speak when privilege is hell-bent on silencing you.

Because the thing about living in a body that is deemed political by others means that existing feels like a warzone. When the personal is political, every interaction with a member of the opposing party feels like a battle.

So, “we defend Beyoncé because she is one of us, she is of us, and we’re not about to turn our backs while white women do to her what they have done to us throughout history” (148). And because white women shelling out their unwarranted opinion on whether or not Beyoncé is allowed to sit at their table at the ~feminist movement~ is the most White Woman thing white women could possibly do.

2. I’M NOT LIKE OTHER GIRLS I’ve always had what I described as a, “weird relationship” with feminism. I’ve been to the marches, I’ve associated myself with the label—though I didn’t go around making it my main personality trait like many of my white peers—and yet it took me years to understand what it was that made me so uncomfortable with the word. After years of feeling invisible and building up a(n) (un)healthy amount of resentment for white people, I concluded that I didn’t see a movement that included me—despite the main criteria being: be female. Which, last time I checked, I am.

McKenzie perfectly sums up the relationship that I’ve come to find I, as well as many other Black women, have with feminism in the aforementioned Beyoncé essay with this excerpt: “I rarely embrace the term feminist. It often feels too disconnected from my particular experience as a black woman. But while I often reject the term itself, my ideals, my politics, and the work I put out into the world does reflect those values” (145).

To be a minority and find written words—a form of evidence, proof that you aren’t crazy, something that you can cling on to and use as a reference tool—that validate and transcribe any unidentifiable, off-putting, or downright confusing feelings is an experience that still makes my otherwise fatigued mental and physical self feel… electric.

It's scenarios like the blatant disconnect felt between the word “feminism” and actual females who just-so-happen to be Black that make pieces like the Combahee River Collective Statement so valuable. The range of issues covered in the statement thoroughly answer the “…but why do I feel like this?” question that manifests inside our bodies and minds, convincing us that we are the problem and that the systems, or movements, in place are not.

3. CHOOSE YOUR WORDS CAREFULLY While the very idea of intersectional feminism is the point that the Combahee Collective River Statement advocates for, the choice to call it “Black Feminism” is intentional. The phrase comes off as exclusionary; when in reality, it’s anything but. The hard-to-swallow truth is that once society cares about and advocates for the Black woman, the remainder of the marginalized will be well on their way to equality.

McKenzie’s essay, The Myth of Shared Womanhood and How It Perpetuates Inequality, grabs the broad feminist movement by the balls. Like the Combahee River Collective, she stresses the need for specificity within the movement. McKenzie says, “…and continuing to talk about ‘women’ as this vagina-having-but-otherwise-unspecific group, rather than looking closer and breaking down the ways in which our specific experiences of the world are impacted by race, sexuality, etc., only perpetuates the inequalities we’re supposed to be trying to eradicate” (111).

“Feminism” is a blanket term that privileged women use when they’re bored and need to feel a little oppressed to spice things up. It’s used by these women to defend their contribution to the marginalization of other minority groups while silencing their voices while hiding behind nothing more than the conceptualization of real oppression.

There was no direct hit to white women in the Combahee River Collective Statement until the very end, where they fired the last shot, saying: “As Black feminists we are constantly and painfully aware of how little effort white women have made to understand and combat their racism, which requires among other things that they have a more than superficial comprehension of race, color, and Black history and culture. Eliminating racism in the white women’s movement is by definition work for white women to do, but we will continue to speak and demand accountability on this issue” (35).

Even while calling others out on their shit, the word choice wasn’t accusatory. In fact, they said that while they know it’s not their job to teach white women how to not be racist, they would continue to do so until a white woman stepped up to the plate. 4. THREE STRIKES AND YOU’RE OUT (OF EVERYWHERE EXCEPT THE CLOSET) I, self-proclaimed Queen of Compartmentalizing, have genuinely not had the time to even consider tackling my sexuality. While royal, I am also a 21-year-old, moderately functional human adult person. My inability to delve into who/what/when/where/how/why the attraction I may-or-may-not feel towards one/two/five/twelve genders has impacted and further complicated my relationship with both myself and others, but it was a subconscious decision. My brain literally could not fathom the idea that I could be so unlucky to have three strikes against me. In all of my self-preservation—i.e., denial—I wasn’t just sitting around avoiding any conversation about sexuality and relationships. I was sitting around hyperfixating on what it means to be Black and female while avoiding any and all conversation about sexuality and relationships.

The difference between preaching about the need for intersectional feminism and residing in the intersection is the difference between night and day disguised as dusk or dawn. There are multiple kinds of oppression that most humans fall under, each dealing with a struggle specific to that group. However, the failure to acknowledge that in the reality of the world we live in, some marginalized groups have it worse than others, is counterproductive at best. At worst, it’s an enabler.

My specific life experience as a mostly abled, Black, semi-closeted femme queer woman is different than that of a mental or physically handicapped Black trans woman. Both Black and queer and female, but I am substantially more privileged than her.

There are levels to this shit (Meek Mill, Levels, 2013).

The Combahee River Collective Statement and Mia McKenzie’s Black Girl Dangerous were both written by Black, female queer persons, but they were published decades apart in response to different situations. One is a collection of digitally native essays written by one woman who later published them as one cohesive work, and the other is a statement that was physically published and distributed by a group of women pre-Internet. Despite their differences, their message is clear: Black women have it substantially worse than any and all variations of white women.

Both pieces are a plea for visibility, inclusion, or even just a shred of humanity to be shown towards Black women. Both are expressions of queer females, a group that is actively oppressed and fought against, but a majority of the pain expressed in the author’s words are about being Black. Not female, not queer—but being Black.

I’m a Black, queer, female, and I am incredibly worn out; but the knowledge, the tangible evidence found in literary pieces by and for people like me, assures that I’m one of many. I am not alone in this feeling, and that is enough to encourage me to keep fighting.

Works Cited

McKenzie, Mia. Black Girl Dangerous: on Race, Queerness, Class and Gender. BGD

Press, Inc., 2014.

“The Combahee River Collective Statement.” 1977.