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White vs. Black Feminism

Frances Beal’s main message regarding oppression is that the current capitalist society systematically exploits black women based on race, sex, and class and that all these factors are inextricable. She criticized white feminism in her book “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female” by stating how it is a mostly middle class movement and how white women are still privileged economically and therefore cannot fathom the full oppression that black women face. “Black people are engaged in a life and death struggle with the oppressive forces of this country and the main emphasis of black women must be to combat the capitalist, racist exploitation of black people” (Beal 174). The common factor that united black and white feminists was the understanding that society was patriarchal and women needed to be placed in power to redefine society. “Black women accused white feminists of narrowly defining the categories of sisterhood and women to include only those who were white and middle class. It was not merely race that was divisive for black women, but also white women’s class privilege as it dictated the goals of the women’s movement. In issues such as abortion or employment, black women detected white women’s reluctance to look deeper into how race and class simultaneously impacted access to legal, affordable abortions and better employment for women already working outside the home” (Springer 116). If feminism wasn’t broad and inclusive, black feminists like Beal didn’t want anything to do with it.

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Any white group that does not have an anti-imperialist and anti-racist ideology has absolutely nothing in common with the black women's struggle.

Frances Beal, Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female

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International Women’s Day greeting card, United Front Press, San Francisco, 1973.

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“The cliché that when women are liberated men will be liberated too shamelessly slides over the raw reality of male domination — as if this were an arrangement in fact arranged by nobody, which suits nobody, which works to nobody’s advantage. In fact, the very opposite is true. The domination of men over women is to the advantage of men; the liberation of women will be at the expense of male privilege. Perhaps afterwards, in some happy sense, men will be liberated too — liberated from the tiresome obligation to be ‘masculine.’ But allowing oppressors to lay down their psychological burdens is quite another, secondary sense of liberation. The first priority is to liberate the oppressed.  Never before in history have the claims of oppressed and oppressors turned out to be, on inspection, quite harmonious. It will not be true this time either.”

— From “The Third World of Women,” by Susan Sontag. Partisan Review, Vol. 40, No. 2 (1973).

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‘Triple Jeopardy’, Third World Women’s Alliance, New York, [early 1970s].

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The TWWA, of which Frances Beal helped found, began their newspaper “Triple Jeopardy” in 1971

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Having an African-American father and a Jewish mother in a town that was very reactionary was difficult for the children. All children want to belong, and I had a great need in that direction.

Frances Beal

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An iconic black feminist anthem

Four Women- Nina Simone

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Black Women’s Health in the 1960s

When we talk about women’s health issues today, we often discuss it in terms of two extremes. The abortion issue is reduced to pro-life versus pro-choice. We don’t really see the discussion of sterilization in the mainstream media too much anymore. But these complex issues have a long history with many nuanced views, as the black feminist movement of the ‘60s sought to address the root causes and effects of the government and societal control over and mutilation of black women’s bodies.  

Forced sterilization was once a common occurrence for black women in America. It was used as a means to control the population, to have a more “favorable” future demographic. This was able to occur because the government threatened to take away financial support to lower class black women unless they undergone the procedure. “The emerging black feminist community was no doubt aware of, and to some degree mobilized by, the involuntary sterilization of black women and girls, such as the twelve- and fourteen-year-old Relf sisters in Montgomery, Alabama” (Springer 121). The Black Women’s Leadership Council took on many health issues that concerned women of color. For white women, the reproductive movement was all about freedom of choice and bodily autonomy; for black women, it was about survival and having enough resources to plan for a family. In a recent interview, Frances Beal said that, “We found many black women had been sterilized without their knowledge. That convinced us of the need for good, safe, birth-control methods” (Hartmann). The SNCC and other social justice groups fought hard to ensure safer health practices and to end forced sterilization of black women.

Abortion was another controversial issue of the time. Beal wrote in her book, “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female,” that “The lack of availability of safe birth control methods, the forced sterilization practices, and the inability to obtain legal abortions are all symptoms of a decadent society that jeopardizes the health of black women (and thereby the entire black race) in its attempts to control the very life processes of human beings. This repressive control of black women is symptomatic of a society that believes it has the right to bring political factors into the privacy of the bedchamber” (Beal 174). During the 1960s, abortion wasn’t just something a woman could get for any reason at any time. They were extremely difficult to get and most were illegal and highly dangerous. “Beal and Margaret Sloan of the NFBO both claim that in New York State, Puerto Rican and black women had the highest incidence of death from illegal abortion.To complicate matters, the black liberation movement labeled abortion and oral contraception genocidal acts by white supremacists” (Springer 120). A cultural belief as polarizing as this one is enough to guilt black women into going through with unwanted pregnancies as to keep the black population growing. Abortion was never a simple medical practice; it always came with societal baggage.

Female health procedures were questioned and challenged during the black women’s liberation movement. Frances Beal was aware of the unimaginable horrors going on behind hospital doors and by government decree. She and other like-minded individuals worked to speak out about injustices black women faced and to remedy them.

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In this clip, Beal explains that the SNCC Black Women’s Liberation Committee was the first group to explain how oppression was an intersection of race, class, and gender.

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However, it is a gross distortion of fact to state that black women have oppressed black men. The capitalist system found it expedient to enslave and oppress them and proceeded to do so without signing any agreements with black women.

Frances Beal. “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female.” The Black Woman’s Manifesto. pamphlet. 1969. (via jmjafrx)

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Liberation Now! Writings from the Women’s Liberation Movement I. Why Women’s Liberation Why Women’s Liberation? / Marlene Dixon; The next great moment in history is ours / Vivian Gornick Cutting loose / Sally Kempton What it would be like if women win / Gloria Steinem II. Discrimination on the job Job discrimination and what women can do about it / Alice S. Rossi Metamorphosis into bureaucrat / Marge Piercy Drowning in the steno pool / Madeline Belkin Pie in the sky / Gene Reece Pages from a shop diary / Olga Domanski The labor and suffrage movement: A view of working-class women in 20th century / Susan Reverby III. Inside the family - and outside Where is it written? / Judith Viorst The politics of housework / Redstockings The liberation of children / Deborah Babcox On day care / Louise Gross and Phyllis Mac Ewan Women and Economics / Charlotte Perkins Gilman The political economy of women’s liberation / Margaret Benston Planned obsolescence: The middle-aged woman / Rose Gladstone “In trouble” / Jane Harriman Marriage and love / Emma Goldman IV. Caste, Class and Race Story lives: Growing up middle class / Ellen Maslow To my white working-class sisters / Debby D'Amico “Freedom is something that all of us need” / Mabel Hobsen Double Jeopardy: to be black and female / Frances M. Beal Colonized women: the chicana / Elizabeth Sutherland  V. Woman’s cultural identity A work of artifice / Marge Piercy “Conclusion” from Sex and temperament in the primitive societies / Margaret Mead “Facts and myths” from the second sex / Simone de Beauvoir “Sex and semantics” / Eva Merriam “Shakespeare’s Sister” from A room of one’s own / Virgina Woolf Women: the longest revolution / Juliet Mitchell Psychology constructs the female, or the fantasy life of the male psychologist / Naomi Weisstein The Womam-identified woman / Radicalesbians The education of women / Florence Howe  VI. Control of our bodies The myth of the vaginal orgasm / Anne Koedt Health care may be hazardous to your health / Alice Wolfson An abortion testimonial / Barbara Susan  VII. Sisters in revolution Liberation must also include the women of Africa / Sonya Okoth Asian women in revolution / Charlotte Bunch-Weeks On Cuban women / Chris Camarano