Same Script, Different Cast

[Trigger warning for racism; classism; sexual violence.]

A caveat: I have not seen "The Help." I do not plan to see "The Help," yet I feel pretty confident that I have "The Help" all figured out. If you don't know about this film, please see this post. I'm going to ground my thoughts about "The Help" in two other documents I will link: Valerie Boyd's review entitled, "'The Help,' a feel-good movie for white people" and "An Open Statement to the Fans of 'The Help'" from the Association of Black Women Historians (ABWH). A brief description from Boyd:

"The Help" — the film adaptation of the best-selling novel by Atlanta author Kathryn Stockett — is a feel-good movie for a cowardly [wrt to the ways we deal (or don't deal) with issues of race] nation.

Despite its title, the film is not so much about the help — the black maids who kept many white Southern homes running before the civil rights movement gave them broader opportunities — as it is about the white women who employed and sometimes terrorized them.

And there you have it, the problem at the heart of works like "The Help" that blossoms into myriad other problems—the centering of white women in a story that is supposed to be about women of color, the positioning of white women as saviors who give WoC voice. As my colleagues in the ABWH note,

Despite efforts to market the book and the film as a progressive story of triumph over racial injustice, The Help distorts, ignores, and trivializes the experiences of black domestic workers.

I want to meld these critiques of "The Help" with my own, which is rooted in who I am: My name is elle, and I am a granddaughter of "The Help." And while I can never begin (and would never want) to imagine myself as the voice of black domestic workers, I can at least share some of their own words with you and tell you some places you can find more of their words and thoughts.

I. The Help's representation of [black domestic workers] is a disappointing resurrection of Mammy… [p]ortrayed as asexual, loyal, and contented caretakers of whites…—ABWH

Early on in "The Help," we hear the maids complain that they've spent decades raising little white girls who grow up to become racists, just like their mothers. But this doesn't stop Aibileen from unambiguously loving the little white girl she's paid to care for. —Boyd

When you put white women at the center of a story allegedly about black women, then the relationships between those two groups of women is filtered through the lens and desires of white women, many of whom want to believe themselves "good" to black people. That goodness will result in the unconditional love, trust and loyalty of the black people closest to them. They can remember the relationships fondly and get teary-eyed when they think of "the black woman who raised me and taught me everything." They fancy themselves as their black nanny's "other children" and privilege makes them demand the attention and affection such children would be showed.

From a post I wrote some time ago:

I hated, hated, hated that my grandmother and her sister were domestics.

Not because I was ashamed, but because of the way white people treated them and us.

Like… coming to their funerals and sitting on the front row with the immediate family because they had notions of their own importance. "Nanny raised us!" one of my aunt's "white children" exclaimed, then stood there regally as the family cooed and comforted her.

But, as the granddaughter of the help, I learned that the woman my grandmother's employers and their children saw was not my "real" grandmother. Forced to follow the rules of racial etiquette, to grin and bear it, she had a whole other persona around white people. It could be dangerous, after all, to be one's real self, so black women learned "what to say, how to say it, and sometimes, not to say anything, don't show any emotion at all, because even just your expression could cause you a lot of trouble."** They wore the mask that Paul Laurence Dunbar and so many other black authors have written about. It is at once protective and pleasant, reflective of the fact that black women knew "their white people" in ways white people could never be bothered to know them. These were not equal relationships in which love and respect were allowed to flourish.

Indeed, with regard to the white children for whom they cared, black women often felt levels of "ambiguity and complexity" with which our "cowardly nation" is uncomfortable. Yes, my grandmother had a type of love for the children for whom she cared, but I knew it was not the same love she had for us. I think August Boatwright in the film adaptation of "The Secret Life of Bees" (another film about relationships between black and white women during the Civil Rights Era that centers a white girl) voiced this ambiguity and complexity much better. When her newest white charge, Lily, asks August if she loved Lily's mother, for whom August had also cared, August is unable to give an immediate, glowing response. Instead, she explains how the situation was complicated and the fragility of a love that grows in such problematic circumstances.

Bernestine Singley, whose mother worked for a white family, was a bit more blunt when the daughter of that family claimed that Singley's mother loved her:

I'm thinking the maid might've been several steps removed from thoughts of love so busy was she slinging suds, pushing a mop, vacuuming the drapes, ironing and starching load after load of laundry. Plus, I know what Mama told us when she, my sister, and I reported on our day over dinner each night and not once did Mama's love for the [white child for whom she cared] find its way into that conversation: She cleaned up behind, but she did not love those white children.

II. The caricature of Mammy allowed mainstream America to ignore the systemic racism that bound black women to back-breaking, low paying jobs where employers routinely exploited them. Furthermore, African American domestic workers often suffered sexual harassment as well as physical and verbal abuse in the homes of white employers.—ABWH

From films like "The Help," we can't know what life for black domestic workers is/was really like because, despite claims to the contrary, it's not black domestic workers talking! The ABWH letter gives some good sources at the end, and I routinely assign readings about situations like the "Bronx Slave Market" in which black women had to sell their labor for pennies during the Depression. The nature of domestic labor is grueling, yet somehow that is always danced over in films like this.

As is the reality of dealing with poorly-paid work. In her autobiographical account, "I Am a Domestic," Naomi Ward describes white employers' efforts to pay the least money and extract the most work as "a matter of inconsiderateness, downright selfishness." "We usually work twelve to fourteen hours a day, seven days a week," she continues, "Our wages are pitifully small." Sometimes, there were no wages, as another former domestic worker explains: "I cleaned house and cooked. That's all I ever did around white folks, clean house and cook. They didn't pay any money. No money, period. No money, period."**

Additionally, the job came with few to no recognizable benefits. The federal government purposely left work like domestic labor out of the (pathetic) safety net of social security, a gift to southerners who wanted to keep domestic and agricultural workers under their thumbs. After a lifetime of share-cropping and nanny-ing, my grandmother, upon becoming unable to work, found that she was not eligible for any work-based benefit/pension program. Instead, she received benefits from the "old age" "welfare" program, disappearing her work and feeding the stereotype of black women as non-working and in search of a handout. (I want to make clear that I am a supporter of social services programs, believe women do valuable work that is un- or poorly-remunerated and ignored/devalued. So, my issue is not that she benefited from a "welfare" program but how participation in such programs has been used as a weapon against black women in a country that tends to value, above all else, men's paid work.)

The control of black people's income also paid a psychological wage to white southerners:

[Their white employers gave] my grandmother and aunt money, long after they'd retired, not because they didn't pay taxes for domestic help or because they objected to the fact that our government excluded domestic work from social insurance or because they appreciated the sacrifices my grandmother and her sister made. No, that money was proof that, just as their slaveholding ancestors argued, they took care of their negroes even after retirement!

The various forms of verbal and emotional abuse suffered are also glossed over to emphasize how black and white women formed unshakeable bonds. By contrast, Naomi Ward described the conflicted nature of her relationships with white women and being treated as if she were "completely lacking in human dignity and respect." In Coming of Age in Mississippi, Anne Moody says of her contentious relationship with her employer, Mrs. Burke, "Mrs. Burke had made me feel like rotten garbage. Many times she had tried to instill fear within me and subdue me…" Here, I wrote a bit about the participation, by white women, in the subjugation of women of color domestic workers.

And what of abuse by white men? " 'The Help's' focus on women leaves white men blameless for any of Mississippi's ills," writes Boyd:

White male bigots have been terrorizing black people in the South for generations. But the movie relegates Jackson's white men to the background, never linking any of its affable husbands to such menacing and well-documented behavior. We never see a white male character donning a Klansman's robe, for example, or making unwanted sexual advances (or worse) toward a black maid.

This a serious exclusion according to the ABWH, "Portraying the most dangerous racists in 1960s Mississippi as a group of attractive, well dressed, society women, while ignoring the reign of terror perpetuated by the Ku Klux Klan and the White Citizens Council, limits racial injustice to individual acts of meanness."

Why the silence? Well, aside from the fact that this is supposed to be a "feel good movie," when you idolize black women as asexual mammies in a culture where rape and sexual harassment are often portrayed as compliments/acknowledgements of physical beauty (who would want to rape a fat, brown-skinned woman?!), then the constant threat of sexual abuse under which many of them labored and still labor vanishes. But black women themselves have long written about and protested this form of abuse. My own grandmother told me to be careful of white boys who would try to make me "sneak around" with them and an older southern man who was a fellow grad student told me that he and other southern men believed it was "good luck" to sleep with a black woman. Here, in the words of black women, are acknowledgements of how pervasive the problem was (is):

"I remember very well the first and last work place from which I was dismissed. I lost my place because I refused to let the madam's husband kiss me... I believe nearly all white men take, and expect to take, undue liberties with their colored female servants."*

"The color of her face alone is sufficient invitation to the southern white man… [f]ew colored girls reach the age of sixteen without receiving advances from them."*

"I learned very early about abuse from white men. It was terrible at one time and there wasn't anybody to tell."**

These stories abound in works like Stephanie Shaw's What a Woman Ought to Be and Do, Paula Giddings's When and Where I Enter, Deborah Gray-White's Too Heavy a Load and other books where black women are truly at the center of the story. Black women's concern over sexual abuse is serious and readily evident, but "The Help," according to the ABWH, "makes light of black women's fears and vulnerabilities turning them into moments of comic relief."

III. The popularity of this most recent iteration [of the mammy] is troubling because it reveals a contemporary nostalgia for the days when a black woman could only hope to clean the White House rather than reside in it.—ABWH

This mention of the White House is not casual (Boyd opens her review with an Obama-era reference, as well). I'm currently working on a manuscript that examines portrayals of black women and issues of our "desirability," success, and femininity in media. To sum it up, we, apparently, are not desirable or feminine and our success is a threat to the world at large. Many black women are trying to figure out why so much is vested in this re-birthed image of us (because it's not new). One conclusion is that it is a counter to the image of Michelle Obama. By all appearances successful, self-confident, happily married and a devoted mother, she's too much for our mammy/sapphire/jezebel-loving society to take. And so, the nostalgia the ABWH mentions comes into play. It's a way to keep us "in our place."

It happens every day on a smaller scale to black women. I remember someone congratulating me in high school on achieving a 4.0 and saying that maybe my parents would take it easy on me for one-six weeks chore-wise. The white girl standing with us, who always had a snide comment on my academic success, quickly turned the conversation into one about how she hated her chores and how she so hoped the black lady who worked for them, whom she absolutely adored, would clean her room.

Even now, one of my black female colleagues and I talk about how some of our students "miss mammy" and it shows in how they approach us, both plus-sized, brown-skinned black women with faces described as "kind." I do not need to know about the black woman who was just like your grandmother, nor will I over-sympathize with this way-too-detailed life story you feel compelled to come to my office and (over)share.

IV. [T]he film is woefully silent on the rich and vibrant history of black Civil Rights activists in Mississippi. Granted, the assassination of Medgar Evers, the first Mississippi based field secretary of the NAACP, gets some attention. However, Evers' assassination sends Jackson's black community frantically scurrying into the streets in utter chaos and disorganized confusion—a far cry from the courage demonstrated by the black men and women who continued his fight.—ABWH

Embedded in this is perhaps the clearest evidence of the cowardliness of our nation. First, we cannot dwell too long on racism, in this case as exemplified in the Jim Crow Era and by its very clear effects. "Scenes like that would have been too heavy for the film's persistently sunny message," suggests Boyd. I'd go further to suggest that scenes like that are too heavy for our country's persistently sunny message of equal opportunity and dreams undeferred.

Second, when we do have discussions on the Jim Crow Era, we have to centralize white people who want to be on what most now see as the "right" side of history. They weren't just allies, they did stuff and saved us! And so, you get stories like "The Help" premised on the notion that "the black maids would trust Skeeter with their stories, and that she would have the ability, despite her privileged upbringing, to give them voice." Or like "The Long Walk Home," (another film about relationships between black and white women during the Civil Rights Era that centers… well, you get it) in which you walk away with the feeling that, yeah black people took risks during the Montgomery Bus Boycott, but the person who had the most to lose, who was bravest, was the white woman employer who initially intervened only because she wanted to keep her "help."

These stories perpetuate racism because they imply that is right and rightful that white people take the lead and speak for us. (On another note, how old is this storyline? Skeeter's appropriation of black women's stories and voices, coupled with the fact that "Skeeter, who is simply taking dictation, gets the credit, the byline and the paycheck" reminded me so much of "Imitation of Life," when Bea helps herself to Delilah's pancake recipe, makes millions from it, keeps most for herself and Delilah is… grateful?!) The moral of these stories is, where would we have been without the guidance and fearlessness of white people?

I know this moral. That's why I have no plans to see "The Help."

_______________________

*From Gerda Lerner, Black Women in White America.

**From Anne Valk and Leslie Brown, Living with Jim Crow.

_______________________

Shifting the Burden

**Trigger Warning**

So apparently, Oprah Winfrey had Mo'Nique's brother, Gerald Imes, who molested Mo'Nique beginning when she was seven, on her show Monday.

Why? I am asking seriously because I really can't think of a good reason.

And he apologized.

So?

I know it's not my place to be dismissive, but I don't understand what the apology is supposed to do.

I am angry that Oprah gave Gerald Imes such a public, highly visible venue to make his apology. Though Mo'Nique has refused, understandably, to respond, he has created the impression that "the ball is in her court." It as if he has shifted a burden onto her because of the unspoken expectation that she do or say something. He hopes, he says, that they can "come back together as sister and brother," putting further pressure on her to negotiate some kind of relationship.

He gets to re-image himself as penitent and remorseful and as a victim in his own right. And in remaking himself, he tries to disrupt what Mo'nique said, ensuring that he has the final word if she keeps to her silence. According to his story, it's not that she's a liar... exactly. She's just wrong about the details.

From Liss, I learned that their parents were there. That they would join him in this very public forum made me angrier. Yes, I can understand that they don't want to abandon their son, or whatever.

But what does their appearance, as he was giving his apology, mean/say to their daughter? To me it says, "We have forgiven him." What it doesn't say, but seems to imply, is--"You should, too." That's how that sort of pressure works. I don't think I'm far off in my assertion; Mo'Nique's own parents seem to have a "Let's put this behind us" attitude:

The Imeses told Oprah they thought the matter had been addressed when they temporarily asked Gerald to leave the family home after Mo’Nique told them her older brother had “tried to lay on top of me” when she was 15.

(snip)

Imes now regrets not revisiting the sexual assault with her daughter after banished Gerald returned to the family home - but she was hurt when Mo’Nique decided to go public with the family’s secret on national TV.

She added, ..." ‘As a family such as we were, this is something I felt that should have been discussed first privately within the family. Now, if you wanna tell the world, but give us a chance (sic).'

(snip)

“I only hope, with doing this, this can cleanse her hurt.”

I don't think Mo'Nique's hurt is the primary concern here, especially since she is the one being portrayed as betraying the family bonds.

I am viewing this through the lens of someone who has been disheartened by the way many communities rally around men who abuse--that in itself is not a racially specific thing.

But the pressure on women of color not to tell, because men of color already have a difficult time having to deal with a racist/kyriarchal system is well-documented.

As if we don't exist, and as women (!), under that same system.

There may be survivors to whom the apology means something. Mo'Nique is in a situation in which, while the abusers wasn't prosecuted, her story was believed/verified. If an abuser was denying the abuse or walking around as if zie had done nothing and people were doubting or disparaging the survivor, maybe the apology would mean something. Or maybe there are people, in circumstances like hers, to whom the apology means something. I don't know.

I really want to understand why Oprah had him on.

What is that apology supposed to mean or do? Especially, if it is true that Gerald Imes is seeking to make money off the "story."

Hey, This Seems Familiar

trigger warning

I have a new piece up at the Guardian's "Comment Is Free America" about that cartoon that depicts a scene after President Obama has raped the Statue of Liberty. I try to put that cartoon and so much of the related sentiment in historical perspective:

The juxtaposition of this cartoon and the violence/assassination threats [against Obama and his supporters] are significant, as well, in historical context. One of the primary reasons given for mob action that resulted in the death of black men in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was the accusation that a black man had raped a white woman. The cartoonist has accused President Obama, figuratively, of that crime – say what you want about Liberty's greenish hue; women who historically represented the US, from Columbia to other depictions of Liberty, were white. Obama, according to the cartoonist, has violated this symbol of both white womanhood and America. This serves as more justification for retaliating violently against him.

Please check out the whole thing!

A Quick History Lesson

Dear Military Folk,

Read about your idea of requiring "separate bunks for gays" if gay servicepeople are allowed to serve openly.

Wanted to remind you we tried that separate-but-equal thing. It was never equal. It was unfair and stigmatizing.

People grew tired of it and effectively resisted.

The military finally gave it up.

I mean, it was even repudiated legally.

Yet, here you are, contemplating a march backwards. This is wrong for so many reasons, and not solely the ones I mentioned above.

As Vanessa pointed out in another forum, the very premise of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, acknowledges that there are already gays in the military. Why do you expect a problem to develop if they are allowed to serve openly? This idea, that gay servicepeople should be segregated, suborns homophobia, particularly, as a colleague of mine wrote, the idea that gays are indiscriminate in their desires and straight people are in danger/in need of rescue. You are insulting your own personnel with suggestions like this which imply they, as a whole, threaten other service people with sexual aggression and potentially, sexual violence.

If only you were as concerned with the actual and significant problem of sexual violence that occurs within your institution.

Though, I suppose you could flip the argument and try to say it was for the protection of gay personnel, especially given the current political climate towards any so-called "progressive" change. In that case, I'd still accuse you of upholding homophobia and some sort of macho-ethic (okay, I'd accuse you of that, anyway).

Why? Because if your solution to addressing the potential danger openly gay servicepeople would face, is to segregate them, rather than address the military culture which allows for that danger, you've totally missed the point.

Sincerely,

elle
___________________
*And I'm not relying on the opinion of one general as sole evidence that the government would consider this. The article says, "The question of whether changes to housing policies would be necessary is being addressed in a study to determine how to allow gays to serve openly."

On the Death of Michael Jackson

The first video I showed my son then. The title seems appropos to how I'm feeling.

(A cleaned-up version of a comment I made here)

As a feminist, as a rape survivor, as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, as someone who once adored the "King of Pop," how do I process Michael Jackson's death?

I grew up in a little southern, rural town where racism was alive and well. Seeing a black person as glamorous and famous as Michael Jackson meant the world to me. Seeing that his popularity crossed color lines--I mean, I remember distinctly thinking, "White girls scream and pass out over him?" They'd have been ostracized in my town.

It's not that I idolized him as some sort of post-racial icon--I don't believe in that shit, not for this country, in our lifetimes--but that here was a symbol that, my God, it wasn't so bad for us everywhere.

Then there were the other, simpler things. I loved his music. I had a crush on him. I thought he was cool without being "hard."

When the allegations came, I was angry at him, because I believed them. I knew what it was like not to be believed as a survivor, and I didn't want to do that to those children.

And I was angry at me, because I believed them.

Thanks to exposes and the nonstop media fascination, I had given Michael my own, hardly professional diagnosis. I thought he was profoundly hurt and always searching for his childhood, trying to live it vicariously through children. I thought he didn't know how to set appropriate boundaries--he really thought of himself as children's "friend." I thought somewhere along the way, he may have crossed the line in a hurtful, heinous way.

So, yes, I was mad at him.

And felt sorry for him.

And cared about him.

And identified with those children and worried about them.

In short, I was confused, felt guilty for caring for him.

I still am confused. But I know news of his death shook me, saddened me unbelievably. I don't know how to deal with it. I can't pretend that I didn't care, that part of me didn't still care a whole lot about an imperfect, sad man who may have done some unforgivable things.

Sometimes, I realize that I'm human, that how I feel won't always be logical or rational or even, to some, defensible.

But I'm not getting on the defense on this one.

I sincerely hope Michael is happy and at peace now.

Really, Steven?

Trigger warning

Dear Mr. Ward,

I will admit that I don’t watch your show, Tough Love. I think I am exceedingly glad that I don’t.


Still, I was quite nonplussed when I read that you opined that one of the women on the show, Arian, was going to end up “getting raped” if her present pattern of behavior—raunchy and inappropriate, I believe were your words?—continued. She enjoys taking risks, said you, putting herself “in that position,” and there are consequences! Arian should be more “classy!”

Hmmm, I thought, is Mr. Ward really suffering under the ildelusion that “classy” women don’t get raped? That rape occurs because “raunchy and inappropriate” women “ask for it?” Surely not!

But, in case you are, I’d like to point you here (or here or here) and here, where the entirety of the blog deconstructs and proves the fallacies of rape apologies like yours.

And I’d like to challenge you, Mr. Ward, to realize that “in that position” often means existing as a woman or anyone perceived as weaker or more vulnerable in a rape culture.

Yes, a rape culture.

How else would you describe a culture in which the logical consequence of acting a certain way or wearing a certain thing is understood to be the violation of one’s bodily autonomy?

xoxo,

elle

P.S. Oh, and expect more letters.

H/T Alessia via belledame on twitter

Still Trying to Find the "Mysteriously Missing Word, Rape"

Yesterday (Tuesday March 3), Chester Arthur Stiles was convicted of sexually assaulting a two-year-old and a six-year-old.

He videotaped his sexual assault of the two-year-old.

But when I opened up my AOL home page, here is how the case was described:


That link takes you to the article linked in the first line, which has the cleaned-up title "Man Convicted in Toddler Video Case," though the URL still contains "man-convicted-in-toddler-sex-video."

Over at Shakesville, Liss has written a lot about the media's refusal to call rape what it is (two* examples). I don't have much to add, but I was particularly struck (and angered) by this.

(crossposted at Shakesville)
________________________________________
* My title references this post

(Not) Taken

I'd heard much ado about Taken. My friend Tasha invited me to see it this past weekend. "You'll like it, I promise. It stays busy!"

So I texted my sister, who'd seen it. "Go," she sent back, "Even you can watch it. Not very long and very good."

Promises that "it stays busy" and "even you can watch it" are needed because, while I love action movies, I'm not a big suspense fan. I always say my nerves can't handle it. I say that a lot--I need to quit blaming my nerves and find out why some stuff just bothers me disproportionately. Anyway, long, suspenseful movies irk me.

So I saw it. A cute girl asks you, your sister recommends it, what can you do? :-)

Rather than give a synopsis, how about I offer an analysis of some of the characters with lots of exclamation points? Spoilers below.


Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson): A poor, pitiful father who is kept from having a meaningful relationship with his daughter, Kim, because of her uppity bitch of a mother, Lenore. Really, the distance between Kim and him is only partially because of his past government job which kept him from being around. Hey, he never missed a birthday and he had to sacrifice for his country!!!!

Lenore (Famke Janssen): In short, the ex-wife of every MRA. She snaps. She belittles. She's possibly a golddigger. She doesn't even want Bryan at Kim's birthday party (she wants to erase him from her daughter's life) and scoffs at his gift of a karaoke machine. But Bryan is on point; despite the fact that Lenore was a virtual single mother and still is the custodial parent, it's Bryan who knows Kim's true heart, a heart that desires to be a singer!!!!

Lenore doesn't even understand Bryan's manly need to protect. She wants her not-very-mature (see below) 17-year-old daughter to hop across Europe following U-2 (that was so unbelievable to me. Maybe it's a rich people thing?) and thinks Bryan is paranoid and controlling.

Kim (Maggie Grace): A 17-year-old. She still giggles, jumps up and down a lot, and is mega-excited over getting a pony!!!! for her birthday!!!! Why, yes I did say 17, not seven.

Jean-Claude: A typical French man. Bryan thought he was a friend, but really he's an enemy. There's a new angle.

Eastern Europeans (various actors): Shady characters who traffic in women. You know they're the bad guys because they sweat a lot, their hair is greasy, and their eyes shift. And they've had the nerve to "progress" from trafficking in eastern European women to grabbing western white women!!!!

Virginity: The thing that Kim has (she's certified pure!!!!) that keeps her from immediately meeting the fate of all the other "besmirched" girls and makes her worth more than they. While Daddy's racing against time to prevent her permanent disappearance, it's clear that he's racing to prevent the disappearance of that particular "prize" as well. I've been thinking since I saw it, "Is that what those promises at purity balls are about?"

Sheik Raman (Nabil Massad): Your standard Middle Eastern enemy. This character made me think of Bill Napoli's comment about what he thought would "really" be a horrible rape. It's as if the facts that Kim could be trafficked, forcibly addicted to drugs, and raped were not enough. I guess the writer was savvy enough to know that people always look for what women do to invite/"increase their chances" of being raped--and Kim (and Lenore) could be blamed for lying about the nature of her trip and resisting her father's warnings. I mean, Amanda did lie about her cousins' whereabouts and look what happened to her!

Casting Sheik Raman as the rapist might tug the heartstrings of those who would say, "Really, she got herself into this" because the potential perpetrator is a fat! brown! enemy. Now, that would be a horrible rape.

Now, the movie was action-packed. I can't say I was bored. But the overarching, "Father Knows Best"/"I Told You So, Lenore" theme was a bit much for me.

It Does Matter

crossposted at Shakesville

My mom is visiting, which means my T.V. has been on some. I'm having quite the experience. On Sunday, she was watching Keyshia Cole's "The Way It Is." "The Way It Is" is a reality show centered around singer Keyshia Cole's life, but more broadly about a black family reconnecting after having been torn apart by poverty and addiction. Keyshia's sister, Neffie, was speaking to a group of black girls who were pregnant and possibly had high risk exposure to STDs. Neffie shared the story of her own repeated sexual abuse and assault that had begun when she was nine, then encouraged the girls to value their bodies and their sexuality.

One of the girls asked, "What do a female supposed to think, if they've already been touched by eight different people, so it don't matter if I have sex?"

That question, for me, embodied a number of issues, primarily the fetishization of virginity and the horrible silence surrounding the sexual assault of black women.

That girl, 18 and pregnant, believed that because she had "been touched," she no longer had the autonomy, the right to say no. Her "value" was significantly lessened because she was not "innocent."

Every black woman that the camera cut to in that room had tears in her eyes. A symbol of a collective knowing: According to the National Black Women's Health Project, 40% of us "report coercive contact of a sexual nature" by the time we're 18. (Note that's just what is reported.) And no matter our age, we are less likely than white women to report the assault, less likely to seek medical and psychological help.

There are a number of reasons for those facts. Black women have been characterized as "unrapeable" in our society, a stereotype that goes hand in hand with the one that paints us as "insatiable"—always sexually ready and available. These are characterizations that have a long history in the U.S., beginning with the classification of black women as (sexual) property during slavery.

In the aftermath of emancipation, white men justified their continued assault of black women by developing pseudoscientific theories that claimed African Americans were prone to "sexual madness and excess." Thus, while any sexual relation between black men and white women would "damage" white women (because of black men's aggressiveness and large penis size), black women, with their "deep" and "wide" vaginas and their voracious sexual appetites, could not be physically or emotionally hurt by rape.

Rendering black women unrapeable excused the widespread sexual assault and terror that black women and their families experienced during Reconstruction and afterwards. It also thwarted "emancipation"; as Tera Hunter asserted in To 'Joy My Freedom, "Freedom was meaningless without ownership and control over one's own body."

For black women, then, there was no legal definition or protection: "'Rape,' in this sense," noted Angela Harris, "was something that only happened to white women; what happened to black women was simply life."¹

This historic lack of legal recourse is but one factor that discourages us from seeking legal justice. Inviting police into our communities is an attempt fraught with danger—they might disrespect us, paint us as liars, dismiss the significance of our assaults, act violently against community members.

Then there are the barriers that African Americans experience in attaining medical and psychological care—our complaints are not taken seriously, many of us don't have health insurance, we are part of a community that has been regarded as "dirty" or "diseased," treatments and interventions have been typically based on the experiences of white women.

There is often a hesitance to bring negative attention to our communities. No, not because we're "obsessed" with appearances or not airing our dirty laundry, but because we know that we will be treated as a monolith, all cast as violent or criminal. And, so often, black women remain silent, even as Aishah Shahidah Simmons noted, at our own expense. (Also see related video at her site.)

Finally (though this list is not complete), there is the persistent stereotype of the black woman as somehow superhuman—able to "take it," tough, affected differently by assault than other women. Within my community, for example, assault and incest are cast as something that black girls and women just have to deal with. It is not just the victims of sexual assault remaining silent, but whole families and communities. It's as if it is "normal," it happens, there's little we can do, so we must learn to cope.

I wonder how much of that this young woman had internalized, this idea that it "just happens," that it's not a big deal.

And I wonder how much she has internalized the idea that her worth as a sexual being is totally defined by her status as "non-virgin."

When her mother was asked what she had taught her daughter about sex, she replied, "Not to have it." That is a response, I believe, rooted in the influence of religion in African Americans’ lives and a defense mechanism, an attempt to combat the persistent Jezebel stereotype that haunts black women. For example, in the first two minutes of this clip from "Luke's Parental Advisory, Luther Campbell not only tells his daughter to abstain under threat of disease, but also explains to her how many partners will put her in "H-O territory," delivering a double-threat of fearmongering and slut-shaming.

So, what happens when we do "have it?" How many of our parents tell us simply not to have it and leave it at that? I mean, there are plenty of people out there telling girls that having sex makes them "used" or "soiled," that virginity is a gift, something that belongs to a future husband long before they've even met him. Once it is gone, they are dirty and have nothing to offer. They are less desirable as partners.

They are worthless.

It's not as if exemptions are made for rape victims. Sure, people speak of rape as more traumatic, more damaging if the victim was a virgin, but survivors of rape are often characterized as damaged or irreparably harmed, less than whole.

Less, in general.

And, as has been so frequently discussed at Shakesville, the persistent conflation of rape with consensual sex means that young women, in particular, who have been told to "hold onto" their virginity and associate their personal value with it, don't make any distinction when they are raped before consenting to sex. They view themselves as diminished not only by virtue of their victimization, but also by having lost their highly-valued virginity. And they are left with no reason to abstain—because no one's ever given them any reason other than fiercely guarding their virginity.

So, what happens when we do "have it?" My black mother told me, "not to have it," too. But that is a woefully shortsighted reaction, especially given that kids who take chastity pledges tend to break them. For black girls, who are sexually active at an earlier age than other girls and who have higher rates of STIs, we need to answer the question.

We need to help them break the silence surrounding sexual assault.

We need to help them negotiate hostile health care institutions—black girls don't report engaging in riskier behavior than their peers, but barriers to health care prevent diagnosis and treatment of STIs in black communities.

We need to talk to them about healthy, guilt-free sex—when I read that teenagers who take chastity pledges are less likely to use birth control methods, it made perfect sense. Birth control requires forethought, an admission that you plan to have sex, something many teenagers who have simply been told "don't have it," can't do.

We need to tell them that no matter how many times they've "been touched," or how many partners they've had, they still have bodily autonomy, the right to say yes or no. That the language used to fetishize virginity—"saving it" or "giving it" to someone—is not accurate. Their sexuality, their bodies are their own.

We need to tell them that their worth is not tied up in their virginity.

I never want to hear another black girl say, "It don't matter."

--------------------

¹ Angela Harris, "Race and Essentialism in Feminist Legal Theory," Stanford Law Review, February 1990.

Things Seen 11

Some people, for lack of a more accurate, clever phrase, really need to get a life or a clue.

My son and three of my nephews were watching Nickelodeon videos on youtube. I sent them scattering to straighten up my mom's room, the preferred location for video gaming. They left youtube open. My dad and I were in the kitchen, when all of a sudden, we hear "Taps" playing

"What in the world were they watching?" my dad asked.

"I have no idea."

"That is a sad, sad song," he said.

I gave some little noncommital agreement, then went back to cooking. I asked him was it only played at funerals and he said, "Oh, no. Sometimes when you get back from a battle, they play it in honor of those who died. It's especially hard on you when it's a good friend. I got so very tired of hearing that song in Vietnam."

I never think about things triggering my largely stoic dad, but this song had done it. After he went into the living room, I came to the computer to see what the kids could've been listening to that would've included the song. They had it on a Nickelodeon playlist.

The video was called "RIP Nickelodeon 1979-2004." Apparently, whoever posted the video was grievously upset by the decline in quality of Nickelodeon programming.

So upset, that not only did s/he inappropriately use "Taps," s/he likened the decline to rape.

Yes, you heard correctly; offering poor programming = rape.

The exact words:

There once was a time were [sic] a kids network channel awesome... Until it was raped and ruined... by these assholes...

At which point, the offenders are listed.

The belittlement and misappropriation of the word and the meaning of such a violent act make me both furious and frustrated.

There are no comparisons to be made--rape is like nothing else. It isn't funny, it isn't some rare occurrence that women largely makeup.

My point is, it is not something that we should be casual about.

And it is most definitely NOT like the alleged decline in Nickelodeon's programming.

Growing Apart

My son has a biography of Martin Luther King, Jr. The one part that he reads over and over, that just astounds him, is a section in which MLK realizes his childhood friendship with a white boy will not be allowed to continue.

Perhaps, because he wants to talk about that over and over and OVER, the other night, I dreamed of an event that I had not allowed myself to think about in ages.

When I was young, I had girl friends who were white.

As with any of my friends, I had sincere affection for some, a friendly rivalry with others.

My relationship with one girl, Melissa, was characterized by both of those. We were both officers in FHA, first and second clarinet in band, vying to be at the top of our class.

And we really, really liked each other.

But Melissa and I grew apart, as black and white children in the South used to do. Not so rigid a distinction as it was decades ago, but still with the implicit understanding that our adult paths probably would not cross much, that we'd have lives that were separated, in part, along color lines.

And it is a separation that I have abided by. Oh, I've made white friends in the interim, people who share my academic or political interests or who are my co-workers or who share the absolute drudgery of some PTA duties with me. But they are not people who grew up with me in a tiny, rural area where much of the world was still viewed in black and white terms.

I say that I abide by it because when I see my old friends, there is a wall that all the smiles and innocuous questions and plans for class reunions cannot surmount. It is a wall that I uphold based on (unfair?) assumptions. "We'll have nothing in common," I think. There will be mutual disappointment in the way we "turned out."

Sometimes, I am tempted to reach out to them, to ask them how they survive the pressure of being women from (and often, still in) a rural, conservative world. To ask them what memories do they have of our time in school together, of our long-ago shared interests, of people, places, and events. But I cannot. I don't know them the way that I once did. Our shared past has been lost to the present separation for which we were long prepared. The divisions along lines of race and politics are simultaneously very much real and very much constructed inside of us.

And it is not a division that happens suddenly. I brought up Melissa because she was at the center of the dream I mentioned. When we were 17, we traveled to San Antonio for a national FHA meeting. Melissa had a nightmare one night in the room we shared with our advisor; I will never forget her screams.

She'd told me some time before that her mother had been sexually assaulted by a man that had broken into their home. Her mother had not cried out, because he'd threatened her children.

I knew, as a girl, what her nightmare was about, the awful feeling of having someone creep upon you while you're sleeping, the absolute terror of realizing that a place you thought was safe was not, the horror of sexual assault.

The man alleged to have raped her mother was black, and I'd heard another story as well: that Melissa's mother and the man had long had a clandestine relationship, that her mother said she was raped as a protective move after she and the man were discovered together by her husband.

I knew, even then, that women are often accused of lying about rape, that incidents of sexual assault are routinely dismissed on the basis of "she was aking for it" or "she'd had sex with him before, so why is it an issue?"

But (and I've written about this before here and can't find the damned post), I spent a lifetime hearing from my grandmothers and other black women how dangerous white women were to black men, how black men were lynched for consensual relationships, how white women blew through our communities and did whatever the hell they wanted with little regard for the effects.

And so I felt lost. I was not mature enough to understand that, what mattered, at that moment, was Melissa's perceptions, the ones that shaped her fears and escaped her as screams in the middle of a warm spring night. Instead, I lay in bed as our advisor comforted her, wanting to say something, not knowing what to say, to do, to think.

Feeling separated from her, from all the facets of who I am.

We never talked about that night. And, after we went to college, we did not talk about much of anything. We saw each other once, still too young to have forgotten our friendship, began to talk excitedly, simultaneously... then stopped.

The few times I've seen her since then have been appropriately stiff and polite. Small smiles, a quick press of fingers, a question about kids or jobs or the temperature that require only a sweet murmur as a response.

I wonder if she, too, has excised the memories of two girls debating which was the best clarinet reed, complaining about ill-fitting band uniforms, loving English class, pondering the future of R.E.M.

If she has, are they forever buried?

Or do they linger, come to her sometimes in the middle of the night when she least expects or wants them, separated from her by time and place and mores, yet still very much a part of her?

SAFER Launches College Sexual Assault Policies Database

http://www.safercampus.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Students Active For Ending Rape Launches Sexual Assault Policies Database
September 29, 2008--Students Active for Ending Rape (SAFER) is excited to announce the launch of the College Sexual Assault Policies Database. This online database archives sexual assault policies from colleges and universities across the nation. Developed in response to student requests for examples of thorough and effective campus sexual assault policies, the database will give students access to policies from a diverse array of American universities. The database, funded in part by a grant from the American Association of University Women, can be found by visiting SAFER’s website: http://www.safercampus.org/policies.php.
The policies are evaluated based upon how well they fulfill a number of criteria for sound and effective sexual assault programs and practices that have been identified by SAFER. Many policies have also been evaluated to determine whether they are in compliance with all relevant federal legislation relating to sexual assault. Students will be able to search the database to make sure their school fulfills all of the criteria. The database also allows students to comment on the application of the policies at their school, revealing any differences between what appears in school policy and what is actually implemented by the university.

SAFER acknowledges that every campus community is unique, and there is not one model assault policy that will work for every school. However, there are basic guidelines for strong policies: all students should have access to the policy; the policy should be easy to understand; policies should be created with student input and formal oversight; and all policies should include mandatory prevention education for all students, crisis intervention, and long-term counseling. Additional markers of a strong school sexual assault policy include a fill-time staff person dedicated to the issue and the on-campus availability of contraception and STD prophylaxis.
“The policies in the database have turned out to be a very mixed bag,” said Margaret Mikkelsen, director of SAFER. Some schools feature innovative programs, like the
University of New Hampshire’s bystander intervention training. Lehigh University and Columbia University are among the schools that offer online reporting forms. Other schools' policies “don't seem to acknowledge the extent or severity of the problem,” said Mikkelsen, with vague definitions of sexual assault, convoluted reporting procedures, and no discussion of consent.
The Policies Database is an important tool in SAFER’s larger effort to educate and train student activists who want to challenge and reform their university’s sexual assault policies. Currently SAFER offers student organizers a thorough manual on how to create change, a campus activist mentoring program, and organizing workshops for student groups. The Policies Database will further arm students with examples of how to revise policy and provide activists with strong points of comparison when approaching their university administration for change on campus.
Sexual violence remains a major issue on college campuses. Up to 25% of college women will be victims of sexual assault while they are enrolled in school, with an estimated 3% of college women raped each year. Campus sexual assault goes largely unreported—especially by male victims—due to uncertainty among students as to what constitutes rape and a lack of available resources for rape survivors. SAFER began in 1999 at Columbia University when a group of students organized a successful grassroots campaign to improve the school’s response to campus sexual violence. The group expanded across the country as other students expressed a desire to create similar movements on their campuses. To this day, SAFER is primarily run by students, graduate students, and recent graduates.
If you would like to learn more about SAFER, add your campus to the Policies Database, or find out more about organizing a SAFER event at your school, please contact: organizers@safercampus.org. All media inquiries should be directed to: margaret@safercampus.org or 347-293-0953.

The Death Penalty as Punishment for the Rape of Children

Melissa's post reminded me of a topic that I've been meaning to post about. Until about a week ago, the rape of a child in Louisiana was a offense punishable by the death penalty. Last Wednesday, the Supreme Court

struck down a Louisiana law that allows capital punishment for people convicted of raping children under 12. It spares the only people in the U.S. under sentence of death for that crime — two Louisiana men convicted of raping girls 5 and 8.

The ruling also invalidates laws on the books in five other states that allowed executions for child rape that does not result in the death of the victim.

The Supreme Court offered the ruling "despite the 'years of long anguish' for victims." And while I don't dispute the reasoning or evidence behind that phrase, I do find it and similar sentiments problematic.

Since the case originated in Louisiana, it was big news here. The local paper that I read most often carried the news on the front page. It quoted District Attorney Jerry Jones as saying,

The rape of a child is the most heinous crime I can think of. In first-degree murder, it's over. The victim does not continue to suffer. The victims of child rape are destined to a life of misery and suffering.

And immediately, I was piqued by that.

Rape, no matter who the victim is, is a heinous crime. The most terrifying feeling that I have ever had in my life, EVER, is being held down and unable to stop or control what was happening to my own body. I cannot even adequately describe that feeling. And I would be lying if I said I didn't have particular contempt for people who rape children.

But I think the notion that victims of child rape are "destined" to be miserable relies not solely on the survivors' own experiences, but our own biases. Like our obsessions with "purity" and "innocence." Like the idea that rape somehow stigmatizes the victim. Like the belief that virginity is a "gift" to be bestowed upon someone, the mark of a "moral" woman.

I am not at all saying that being the victim of a rape doesn't cause anguish, misery and suffering. I am agreeing with what Melissa said in comments, that

rape is something with which a survivor has to live for the rest of her or his life, which is a true thing, but a lot of people are incapable of saying that without implying the rape is a stain on the soul or the survivor is somehow irreparably broken, damaged goods.

Because it's something we carry doesn't necessarily mean it's a burden; that it has changed us shouldn't mean it marks us differently than the other things that change a person in a lifetime.

(Emphasis mine)

Passing along a Link

Via my co-blogger, Kim, a nod to Mrs. O's post:

Why Black Women Love R. Kelly

I haven't read the whole article myself, but, aside from the notably missing "some" between the words "why" and "black," I'm hoping it's a good analysis.

loving us to death

**Please welcome my best friend, Mrs. O, to the blog -elle**

R. Kelly is a free man! The guy on the radio declared that with such joy and pride, you would have thought he had won the 42 million dollar powerball. Now who am I, you may wonder, to wish ill on the great R. Kelly? Well, I will tell you who I am. I am a hardworking, intelligent African American woman who is so tired of the beatings-physical and emotional- that many women in THIS here United States suffer, at the hands of the men who profess to love them. It seems that the world we live in has lost its mind when it comes to treating women with the decency and fairness one should treat another human being. A man harms or kills his girlfriend or wife, she must have deserved it or she did not save herself is what many headlines scream at me from television news shows, news articles, and magazines.

Being a secondary educator, I have heard every excuse from my young African American students--male and some female--who try to get me to understand that R. Kelly is innocent. To that I respond with a GET THE HECK OUT OF HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! R. Kelly had been a pedophile every since I have been fat (and that has been forever). I can not remember a time when he was not in the news for sexing some young girl up. Whether it was marrying Aaliyah when she was just 15 and her parents having to arrange an annulment or settling out of court with young women to keep himself out of jail. It is common knowledge that while R. Kelly was engaged in many of these liaisons, he was married with children. I count his wife and daughters among the women he has hurt deeply.

And then there is the spectacle of the trial. He was indicted on 14 counts and found not guilty on all 14. So I ask you, how can he be on video tape (and yes it was him) having sex with two young ladies and be found not guilty because he says it was not him, although the other young lady
(who was his girlfriend at the time) testified that it was Kelly, herself, and the thirteen year old in the video? Does money talk that much? Or is it okay because the victim is a young black woman and, well, everyone knows how sexually ready and available we always are...

Elle posted about a case recently that I find especially ironic in light of the R. Kelly verdict. Tracy Roberson can be found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to five years in prison because a judge felt she should be held responsible for her HUSBAND’S actions when he killed her lover. Now, she should be held responsible, BUT here we have R. Kelly on video and he is not responsible because his attorneys say it was not him on the video tape. Why is it that when women do something wrong, something that violates sexual norms, society says let’s burn them at the stake? Men, on the other hand, do something wrong and it seems we (and yes, this time I am looking at some of my sisters angrily) gather around them, sing Kumbayah and pray that God shows them the light? Well guess what? At this point, I do not care if they see the light. I would like to give them a light-under their asses so that they get their shit together.

To the R. Kellys, Bobby Brantleys, and other sexist jackasses(if you are not a sexist jackass then I am not talking to you) please do us women a favor and stop gracing us with your so called love, respect, and care, because you are loving us to death-physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

*Statement of Black Men Against the Exploitation of Black Women*

**On the day we found out about the R. Kelly verdict, my best friend, Mrs. O, called me, very upset. "I'm going somewhere where women matter," she told me. "Good luck with that," was my response. I haven't written about the verdict here because she wants to do so as soon as she gets back from a work-related conference.**

Via BfP

*The statement below was forwarded to me by friend, colleague and comrade William Jelani Cobb. Please feel free to add your name to the statement and to forward it to others.* http://www.petitiononline.com/rkelly/petition.html

–Mark Anthony Neal

*Statement of Black Men Against the Exploitation of Black Women*

Six years have gone by since we first heard the allegations that R. Kelly had filmed himself having sex with an underage girl. During that time we have seen the videotape being hawked on street corners in Black communities, as if the dehumanization of one of our own was not at stake. We have seen entertainers rally around him and watched his career reach new heights despite the grave possibility that he had molested and urinated on a 13-year old girl. We saw African Americans purchase millions of his records despite the long history of such charges swirling around the singer. Worst of all, we have witnessed the sad vision of Black people cheering his acquittal with a fervor usually reserved for community heroes and shaken our heads at the stunning lack of outrage over the verdict in the broader Black community.

Over these years, justice has been delayed and it has been denied. Perhaps a jury can accept R. Kelly’s absurd defense and find “reasonable doubt” despite the fact that the film was shot in his home and featured a man who was identical to him. Perhaps they doubted that the young woman in the courtroom was, in fact, the same person featured in the ten year old video. But there is no doubt about this: some young Black woman was filmed being degraded and exploited by a much older Black man, some daughter of our community was left unprotected, and somewhere another Black woman is being molested, abused or raped and our callous handling of this case will make it that much more difficult for her to come forward and be believed. And each of us is responsible for it.

We have proudly seen the community take to the streets in defense of Black men who have been the victims of police violence or racist attacks, but that righteous outrage only highlights the silence surrounding this verdict.

We believe that our judgment has been clouded by celebrity-worship; we believe that we are a community in crisis and that our addiction to sexism has reached such an extreme that many of us cannot even recognize child molestation when we see it.

We recognize the absolute necessity for Black men to speak in a single, unified voice and state something that should be absolutely obvious: that the women of our community are full human beings, that we cannot and will not tolerate the poisonous hatred of women that has already damaged our families, relationships and culture.

We believe that our daughters are precious and they deserve our protection. We believe that Black men must take responsibility for our contributions to this terrible state of affairs and make an effort to change our lives and our communities.

This is about more than R. Kelly’s claims to innocence. *It is about our survival as a community*. Until we believe that our daughters, sisters, mothers, wives and friends are worthy of justice, until we believe that rape, domestic violence and the casual sexism that permeates our culture are absolutely unacceptable, until we recognize that the first priority of any community is the protection of its young, we will remain in this tragic dead-end.

We ask that you:

o Sign your name if you are a Black male who supports this statement:

http://www.petitiononline.com/rkelly/petition.html

o Forward this statement to your entire network and ask other Black males to sign as well

o Make a personal pledge to never support R. Kelly again in any form or fashion, unless he publicly apologizes for his behavior and gets help for his long-standing sexual conduct, in his private life and in his music

o Make a commitment in your own life to never to hit, beat, molest, rape, or exploit Black females in any way and, if you have, to take ownership for your behavior, seek emotional and spiritual help, and, over time, become a voice against all forms of Black female exploitation

o Challenge other Black males, no matter their age, class or educational background, or status in life, if they engage in behavior and language that is exploitative and or disrespectful to Black females in any way. If you say nothing, you become just as guilty.

o Learn to listen to the voices, concerns, needs, criticisms, and challenges of Black females, because they are our equals, and because in listening we will learn a new and different kind of Black manhood

We support the work of scholars, activists and organizations that are helping to redefine Black manhood in healthy ways. Additional resources are listed below.

Books:
Who’s Gonna Take the Weight, Kevin Powell
New Black Man, Mark Anthony Neal
Deals with the Devil and Other Reasons to Riot, Pearl Cleage
Traps: African American Men on Gender and Sexuality, Rudolph Byrd and Beverly Guy-Sheftall

Films:
I Am A Man: Black Masculinity in America, by Byron Hurt
Hip Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes, by Byron Hurt
NO! The Rape Documentary, by Aishah Simmons

Organizations
The 2025 Campaign: www.2025bmb.org
Men Stopping Violence: www.menstoppingviolence.org

"the penalty for being poor and a child and hungry in africa is to be raped"

Title from BlackAmazon.

Yesterday, via Hysperia, I learned that Human Rights Watch criticized the UN Security Council for doing "little to effectively prevent and address [sexual] violence" against women and girls in war torn areas. HRW urged the UN to correct this "historic failure." Marianne Mollmann, who is named as HRW's advocacy director for women’s rights said, "the council’s response has too often been: ‘Not our problem.’”

Not their problem? I remembered hearing, when I watched The Greatest Silence, how UN peacekeepers engaged in the rape and sexual assault of some of the world's most vulnerable women and girls. And yesterday, shortly after I read Hysperia's post, I read this one at Feministe and this one at What about Our Daughters? that linked to an article entitled Peacekeepers 'abusing children."

I think it's the word 'Peacekeeper' that ought to be in quotes.

When I teach my students about the founding of the UN, I talk about its role in trying to ensure international peace and protecting human rights. And yet representatives of the UN are, as this report by Save the Children states quite bluntly, subjecting children "to every kind of child sexual abuse and exploitation imaginable." As the name of the report implies, when the people who are supposed to render aid and comfort are hurting and humiliating these children, they quite often have no one to turn to.

It is not an anomaly, of course. I know that authors have written much about state/military/police violence against people.* But given the role of the UN--the fact that HRW thinks the Security Council has the authority to take a leading role in addressing and ending sexual violence in areas in conflict, for example--it is quite disturbing.

As is the fact that much of the abuse is never disclosed:

Save the Children says the most shocking aspect of child sex abuse is that most of it goes unreported and unpunished, with children too scared to speak out.

Disturbing, yes.

But I am neither shocked nor surprised.
_________________________________________

* In the blogosphere, BfP, Nadia, and Yolanda Carrington come immediately to mind. And as I am settling into reading Killing the Black Body more thoroughly, I see a lot of connect.

Open Secrets

**I'm putting this at the top again as the reactions from Mommy to Ander and Wife to Box and my best friends really make me realize how much I want people's input/reasoning on this. I think silence can be outright dangerous in certain situations. And, as ABW's post reminds me (to paraphrase Audre Lord), silence will not protect us.**

A few days ago, I noticed this story on Shakesville about another father who held his daughter captive and repeatedly raped her over a period of 11 years. That in itself is incomprehensible; there seems not to be an adjective to describe the horrible fact that she was abandoned by her other family members:

[Eleuterio] Soria's trial revealed that he began abusing his daughter in 1992, when she was 12 years old. The following year she became pregnant by her father, prompting her mother to leave their home in La Matanza, a working class Buenos Aires district.

The family's five other siblings eventually left as well, abandoning the daughter to Soria.

Some commenters there expressed outrage about the family's (in)actions. But I couldn't help thinking that, while I hope this actual physical abandonment is the exception, it's quite common that people abandon the survivors of sexual abuse--not by leaving, but with their silence.

There’s this feeling that I have that I can’t shake. It is this sense of guilt that I abandoned two of my younger cousins to a life of pain and humiliation. Their father, my father’s brother, molested me. Eventually, I told. But my cousins still lived with him. I have always felt that, once I reached adulthood, I should’ve done more to save them. It was and is an open secret in my family and this community that this man is a pedophile. Yet, despite my own pain, I followed the lead of the adults in my family, and stayed silent.

Why do we do that? In part, because we don’t value the lives of our girls and women. And unbelievably, we worry more about the "damage" that would be done to rapists—their lives and reputations. We can excuse abusers who are in other ways “good people.” We don’t want to ruin their lives because of “a mistake.” And remember the judge who banned terms like "rape" and "sexual assault" because the usage of them might be prejudicial to the defendant?

What I also see is the unwillingness to become involved in “other people’s business,” especially in cases of intrafamily sexual abuse. At one time, I would have argued that people don’t like to think or talk about incest, but that’s not quite right, because we do talk about it. In hushed whispers and behind closed doors. Last night, my best friend, Mrs. O, and I sat at my computer and fought back tears as we talked about our abuse, the abuse of our sisters and girlfriends, the abuse of women and girls in our community. And since we know, I know other people do, as well. All these "secrets" that are not secrets, "unspeakables" that are spoken about quite often.

Yet, we are often publicly silent. I think it is a cultural silence—the response of people who live in what some would call a “rape culture.” In such a culture, incest is an unpleasant thing but is accepted, in a sense, as something that invariably happens. The best we can do is hope to protect our children from it.

Just as our silence shields rapists from the consequences of their actions, it also eases the discomfort and pain of everyone except the victim. We have sympathy for family members who don't want to rend their families apart or who can't stand the idea of confrontation or who don't, often for good reason, trust the police, the courts, or other authorities. Talking about sexual abuse and assault is painful for people who know it has occured because they often feel they are caught in a dilemma. And so, we don't talk out loud about it, trying desperately to render it invisible. In a more general sense, Melissa writes a lot about how our media refuses to call rape what it is. Euphemisms are presumed to be much more palatable to our sensitive ears and eyes.

I think, after a while, as a survivor, your goal becomes protecting others’ feelings as well. It as if your own pain is relegated to some small, deep part of you as you try to shield everyone else. For example, I have made peace with the fact that my mother simply could not handle hearing about my abuse. Could not deal with it, refused to do so, in part, because of her own past traumas. And rather than demanding that my family address this open secret, I simply do not attend gatherings of the family on my dad’s side. It would be awkward, and wrongly or not, I identify myself as the cause of that awkwardness and choose not to cast a pall over their celebrations.

And I try to make invisible the abuse by silencing myself, as well. I can tell that my cousin, the older of the two (they are both grown now), wants to talk to me, ask me about "it." But I just can't.

I talked to Mrs. O again today about this subject, this post, and how I was struggling to write it. She was quiet for a minute and then she asked me did I remember when we read The Green Mile? When I nodded, she asked me did I remember John Coffey explaining how Wild Bill was able to kill two little girls--why didn't one of them scream or run away to tell? John Coffey's line was something like, "He killed them with their love." Neither sister would scream for fear of endangering her sister's life.

Mrs. O believes that is one reason some family members refuse to tell sometimes. They fear negative consequences for the survivor. Not just in a retaliatory sense, but in how the survivor will be perceived once the fact of sexual abuse is made public. In a culture obsessed with women's "purity" and "innocence," female survivors of abuse are often portrayed as somehow "damaged" or "soiled." And then there is the prurience. I told of my abuse when I was 13-years-old. Three of my eighth-grade classmates cornered me to ask if I "had just been touched" or if I'd had to "you know." I have no doubt they heard those questions from much older gossipers.

I think that prurience plays a role in the constant quest to blame the victim, to explain away the abuser's behavior. Many people have written about the need some people have to find something the victim was doing that demonstrates s/he "was asking for it" or "consented." In the context of this post, what stands out to me most right now is a post Cara did at The Curvature about an article about Natascha Kampusch, a girl held captive for eight years, headlined "Victim 'had sex with her captor willingly'." According to police, "She admitted that she had had sex with him and that she had done that voluntarily." One of my first thoughts, when I was able to think again, was about the language choice--we usually say people "tell" the truth; they "admit" guilt.

I don't pretend to have all the answers for why people remain silent. I can't even explain why I've remained silent. But it's something I'm trying to work through.

My Thoughts on The Greatest Silence and Rape in the Congo

Watching The Greatest Silence created a dilemma for me: it was both so difficult to watch and impossible to turn away from it. When Lisa Jackson mused that, for many of the survivors whom she filmed at one meeting, this would be the first time their stories were heard outside the meeting room, I was struck not only by how sad and how frustrating that was, but how true.

There are moments, themes from that film that stick with me. First, as An Anxious Black Woman pointed out:

there are TWO kinds of rapists lurking in the shadows (or boldfacedly emerging to terrorize the nation) of the Congo - the local soldiers and multinational corporations. So, these gang rapists - working in SOLIDARITY, I might add! - are perpetuating the violence.

Corporations take untold millions of dollars of natural resources from the Congo--a fact Chris Clarke wrote about a year ago.* Competition over these resources fuels the ongoing war with the catastrophic results on which Jackson focuses.

Then, there were Jackson's chilling interviews with the rapists. On the surface, they described their violent acts in terms of physiological need, portraying rape as a "natural" outcome--what happens when men have been in the bush too long without sex. Jackson attempted to ask them if the rapes were about power and sex. The interpreter dismissed her question, telling her that these men could not understand what she was asking. But I think he was wrong. The more the soldiers talked, the more it became obvious that they very much understood the power dynamic. They raped, some said, because they were ordered to do so. They made women and children suffer because they had suffered. Repeatedly, they said, "If she refuses, then I must..." and one of the soldiers offered an explanation based on men's superiority to women. One of the most chilling statements in that film began with, "Yes, she's a human being, too, but-" Because what follows is the implication that "her" humanity is somehow less than "his."

The nature of the rapes as well--the violent attacks with sticks and razors and hot coals that destroy women's bladders/urinary tracts and their uteruses--points to the fact that soldiers understand that they are waging a total war, that the murder and rape of women and children can destroy "enemy" nations. That is not to dismiss the purported "allies" who rape as well--the UN peacekeepers and the soldiers from these women's own communities, for example.

And so the stories that emerge from the film are disturbing. The women who are isolated from their families and communities because they have been "shamed" and because they can no longer control some bodily functions. The young woman who named her daughter "Lumiere," French for "light." When Jackson tried to grasp some triumph from that name--"She is your light?" she asked the young woman--she is told solemnly "No, I was obliged to accept her." The lack of adequate medical and emotional care--the clearly overwhelmed Panzi Hospital, for example. The dedicated Officer Honorine who reveals the overwhelming nature of her work--she is the only officer for child protection and for investigating crimes of sexual violence.

And the privileged, Western feminist in me railed at the fact that, for many of these women, their only hope is to find a man who will "accept" and help them. They are largely illiterate and lack paid workforce skills. To me, it seemed, so much of their lives was determined by their encounters and relationships with men. That is an analysis, of course, that places my feelings at the center, and so it is sadly insufficient and unfair.

A few days ago, Professor Black Woman wrote that "women's bodies are part of the battleground in wars" and, in that sense at least**, the rape epidemic in the Congo was not exceptional but part of a worldwide pattern. Anxious Black Woman expounded upon that today as she remembered

those Carib, Arawak, Aztec, Mayan, Creek, Cherokee, Iroquois, Inuit, Kanaka Maoli, Warai, and Jingili women whose genitalia were routinely cut out of them and placed on sticks, spears, and hats for proud exhibition. I think of the Khoisan woman from South Africa, Saartjie Baartman, whose genitalia was also placed on proud exhibition - not on a spear, but in a scientific bell jar. I think of imperialism and racism, and how both ideologies depended upon the institution of misogyny to maintain supremacy. I think of this long, long, awfully long history of women in general - and women of color especially - who are often targeted for the most brutal forms of violence and then enveloped in silence so that we dare not dwell on the traumatic memories or, worse, on the traumatic future that is surely set for our daughters.

In recounting how "disturbing" these stories are, I do not mean to discount the fact that these women survived and that spirit of survival comes through loud and clear. I remember how proud one woman was that, after surgery to repair her fistula, she was no longer wetting the bed. In that meeting that I mentioned initially, the nun who works with survivors opined that together, they could help each other, that speaking out, sharing their stories could ease the trauma, foster a sense of connectedness. Jackson filmed survivors learning trades and nurturing their children and tending their gardens.***

She also captured them singing. And laughing, a sound she remembered hearing so little of in the Congo.

Further reading (I'll add to these links):

Anxious Black Woman (to whom I owe so much)
Professor Black Woman
Lauren
SheCodes
Melissa
Marcella
Tasha212
Res Publica
Katie (here, too)

Then, there is always the question of what we can do.**** Here's a non-exhaustive list:
Anxious Black Woman challenges us to call out corporate rapists. (She's provided contact information).
Support Women for Women, International.
Support Doctors without Borders.
Support the International Rescue Committee.
Here is a link to the Panzi Hospital.

From the BBC:

The Panzi Hospital (for Victims of Sexual Violence)
8th Community of Pentecostal Churches in Central Africa (CEPAC)
Medical Department.
GENERAL REFERRAL HOSPITAL OF PANZI,
PO Box: 266
BUKAVU
South Kivu Province,
Democratic Republic of Congo

Christian Relief Network
CRN deal regularly with the Panzi Hospital
CRN, Christian Relief Network
(+47) 22 01 07 00
Email: info@crn.no

______________________
*Thanks, Lauren for the link.
**In speaking of Congolese "exceptionality," I say "in that sense" because Melissa's post points me to a WaPo article that suggests that the prevalence of rape in the Congo is, indeed, exceptional.
***Lex has a wonderful post about how tending our gardens also means tending each other--knowing " how to make each other grow."
**** As a teacher, I've been trying to get my post-45 class to make links, to be not-as-clueless as I was about rape and exploitation and war. We talked about "comfort women" in World War II. And when we covered the My Lai massacre, we talked about the rape of Vietnamese women. I did not assign The Greatest Silence, as I had not seen it, but I did recommend that they watch it. A couple of them did and one young woman asked me "Why do you think it happens?" a question that I re-directed to her classmates.