I have recently discovered the community of black feminist bloggers on tumblr and worlds have been opened to me that I never knew existed. My entire life there have been feelings and thoughts about society inside of me that I have been unable to express. I do not have a beautiful style or a beautiful manner of expressing myself. I view my writing as that of some kind of dumbed down Hemingway. It has always been hard to know if my feelings are legitimate when there has been no support system or any group of people to tell me that it is okay to feel these things, that my thoughts are more than a loner's delusions. It has been difficult to accept my feelings as legitimate when I can barely find the words to express what is going on in my mind. How can anyone understand what I'm thinking, if I cannot express my thoughts and seem to barely understand them myself?
My voice has been institutionally silenced over the years, an intelligent voice that thinks critically about society and wants to understand the world around her. I feel like all I needed was to be educated by someone like me: someone young, black and intellectually capable who continues to defy what society tries to enforce. I understand that what I struggle with is different from what a 100% black female struggles with; I will never be able to really understand what someone darker than me struggles with, but I am willing to educate myself about it. Along with my struggle to find my own identity, I have been educated about the true depth of a black woman's struggle. I have been educated about what it means to reconcile my desires to be a feminist and my desire for racial equality without compromising my culture.
There is so much that I have yet to learn. Reading a few blog posts here and there is not going to be enough, but it's a start in becoming really educated. There is so much that I want to learn and my journey is just beginning. The education I'm receiving is never taught in schools. God forbid you give women, black women in particular, a way to empower themselves. God forbid you teach them about their true potential to impact society. I want anyone who reads this blog to become acquainted with the issues I am talking about. Tomorrow, I will look for some good posts that I've read and link them here. I don't have confidence in my eloquence in rewording them.
It doesn't matter if you are white, black, biracial or multiracial, we can all learn something by standing together with our human sisters. Racism is a social construct that we can begin to destroy as individuals.
My voice has been institutionally silenced over the years, an intelligent voice that thinks critically about society and wants to understand the world around her. I feel like all I needed was to be educated by someone like me: someone young, black and intellectually capable who continues to defy what society tries to enforce. I understand that what I struggle with is different from what a 100% black female struggles with; I will never be able to really understand what someone darker than me struggles with, but I am willing to educate myself about it. Along with my struggle to find my own identity, I have been educated about the true depth of a black woman's struggle. I have been educated about what it means to reconcile my desires to be a feminist and my desire for racial equality without compromising my culture.
There is so much that I have yet to learn. Reading a few blog posts here and there is not going to be enough, but it's a start in becoming really educated. There is so much that I want to learn and my journey is just beginning. The education I'm receiving is never taught in schools. God forbid you give women, black women in particular, a way to empower themselves. God forbid you teach them about their true potential to impact society. I want anyone who reads this blog to become acquainted with the issues I am talking about. Tomorrow, I will look for some good posts that I've read and link them here. I don't have confidence in my eloquence in rewording them.
It doesn't matter if you are white, black, biracial or multiracial, we can all learn something by standing together with our human sisters. Racism is a social construct that we can begin to destroy as individuals.
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