Editor’s Note | For the love of black women, the fight is not over

Election day came and went.

Many Americans went to the voting booth. Many beamed out with their “I Voted” stickers, hopeful that their civic duty would end a centuries-long struggle for freedom by electing a black woman to office over the chaos of 44 white men before – and perhaps – to eliminate even solve world peace.

I’m here to tell you that freedom would never be that easy.

The loss of Kamala Harris is evidence of something many Black women constantly face in their lives: being overqualified and overlooked. Black women, the backbone of the social justice movement, the unloved, the ungrateful – the scapegoat.

For many Americans who have never experienced the heat of bigotry, it is easy to see this as a righteous loss. A simple sports competition in which there is a winner and a loser. “We can all be friends” and “Let’s not be sore losers.”

Honestly, as a black woman, I knew that no matter who won, the fight for liberation would be a long way off.

As I scrolled through social media, I was struck by a deluge of white women talking about how to distance themselves from the 53% of white women who voted for Trump because it’s uncomfortable to be a Trump supporter to be confused – and I’m here to say, you can’t.

Buying blue friendship bracelets, putting black squares on them, and saying “I’m sorry, black women” doesn’t relieve these white women of their guilt. Choosing blue and marrying red doesn’t make you free.

“It’s time for difficult conversations”

The biggest drawback of any freedom movement is resistance to discomfort. To achieve liberation, it is time to have difficult conversations, confront your own bigotry and bias, and give up the luxury of staying out of politics.

The days of performative activism are over. This election should not have been a shock, just a wake-up call for where our country is and where it has always been. The world will not end, the apocalypse is not yet directly behind us. In fact, the consequences of our country’s actions are right before our eyes.

When I think of my grandmother, who was a sharecropper from Mississippi and completed 11th grade twice just to get a high school diploma, I am reminded that my fight is not over.

When I think of my other grandmother who saved all her money to attend Xavier University only for her father to tell her to stay home and be a good Creole Catholic wife, I am reminded that my fight is not over.

Black women have been saying for years that they are exhausted – of being the backbone, of being the one to fix the problem – and that it shouldn’t just be us in the fight. But I will say: If my exhaustion means freedom for my great-great-granddaughters, I will be exhausted for the rest of my life.

It’s time to get uncomfortable. It’s time to think about how we interact with people who are different than ourselves; It’s time to correct the bigotry of our relatives. It’s time to correct the bigotry of your girlfriends, boyfriends and boyfriends.

If this election wasn’t a wake-up call, then I’m not sure what will be.

This MFP Voices essay does not necessarily reflect the views of the Mississippi Free Press, its staff or board members. To submit an opinion for the MFP Voices section, submit up to 1,200 words and sources that verify the information included [email protected]. We welcome a variety of different viewpoints.

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