BLM

The Black Lives Matter short video on debunking myths is something that I need to show a few people. I find that when I try to talk and educate others on such important topics such as this, my words do not do my thoughts justice. I have heard from a few people that "black lives matter means that their lives are more important" and that "ALL lives matter". I heard someone say that at a family party in front of my friends and I became so embarrassed and felt as if I had to apologize for on their behalf. I try and explain as best I can, but this video does such a wonderful job eloquently addressing opposing opinions and advocating and explaining the moment using analogies and stats. Every single comment one would say in rebuttal to the black lives matter is what I hear when I try to present facts, "blue lives matter" being an example.

Reading through the website, Black Lives Matter Herstory, I was very inspired and proud that 3 strong women started this influential movement. It is such a time of celebrating and empowering women I can't get enough of it! I had never been educated on the specifics of who, where and exactly when this movement was born so I enjoyed reading and learning more. There are 40 chapters in existence. I scrolled through to see where all the chapters reside and noticed Rhode Island doesn't have one. The closest is Boston MA.

I wanted to learn more about Opal, Patrisse and Alicia the women who created such a powerful movement. I found a TED talk where these 3 women have an open discussion and share their personal stories and also provide insightful statistics and facts. The video is on the longer side at around 16 minutes, but it is totally worth it!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbicAmaXYtM

Lastly, I have never read the term herstory before, at first I thought maybe it was a pun. Like...it is her story and it is also making history? I do not know it that made sense, but anyhow I found it intriguing and ended up researching the term herstory. American feminist writers Kate Swift and Casey Miller provided a fuller explanation what herstory is all about. As they wrote in Words & Women, “When women in the movement use herstory, their purpose is to emphasize that women’s lives, deeds, and participation in human affairs have been neglected or undervalued in standard histories.”

 Overall I found the readings/video to be engaging and insightful. I am open to suggestions if anyone has them on how to eloquently have an open discussion about the topic of black lives matter. I end up getting too overwhelmed with emotions including being annoyed when I try to explain what black lives matter is trying to do and the message they are spreading and I am met with close mindedness and "ALL lives matter".

Comments

  1. Victoria RestlerFebruary 5, 2018 at 7:33 AM

    Thanks for this post Danielle and thanks for sharing that wonderful video. BLM is a unique movement in that it is in some ways leaderless, and in other ways leader-full--there are lots of folks who have become leaders and activists in this work. However, that the three founders and powerful voices in this movement are three queer Black women is fantastic! How do you think their queerness and gender shape the movement or their approach to leadership?

    Best
    Victoria

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  2. Heidi FoxFebruary 5, 2018 at 4:34 PM

    Hi Danielle,

    I am so glad you blogged about the word "herstory." When I did the readings this week I read that word only as a story told by women, like a word mashup, which is funny because it is so clearly a play on the word "history" too. After reading your blog post I looked it up in Urban Dictionary:

    Herstory: a word invented in the late 20th century to mean "history", that is, history not written by men but by women, hence "herstory" (her story) rather than "history" (his story).

    A pretty good definition, I think. In continuing the conversation about words, I understand from a sociological perspective why people who don't know much about the BLM movement may respond negatively to the name of the movement, that whole "but all lives matter" response. I think the knee-jerk reaction for many is that the movement is exclusive. Because the organization is pro-black it must then be anti-other. It's a philosophical flaw, maybe stemming from insecurity. The BLM movement is of course inclusive, but for many it's impossible to even see that fact if they impulsively feel they've been excluded from something because of their non-blackness. I think we have to respond to this mindset with empathy rather than anger and if the feeling is exclusion we have to push harder to find common ground to make these people feel included.

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