iNever have super long captions. But this has been weighing on my heart, all my life. “Black women are routinely killed, raped, and beaten by the police, (but) their experiences are rarely foregrounded in popular understandings of police brutality.” The traumas and abuses faced by Black men in this country are an abomination - and what’s even scarier is that Black women fare even worse in terms of awareness and outcry than Black men. We comprise over 40% of domestic sex trafficking victims in the U.S. While our brothers’ bodies are often publicly discarded after suffering torture, abuse, and worse (because they are the visible representation of so-called virility and other things that threaten the fragile status-quo), so often we as Black women are used, abused, maligned, and then tossed away like trash . Black Women’s Blueprint, an organization that advocates policy centered on Black women and girls, reports that approximately 60% of Black girls are sexually assaulted before turning 18 - and that’s only for those reporters who have been granted a safe space to admit what has happened to us. “Missing White Women” are real, while Black women are typically classed as “fast,” runaways, or just creatures or jonts to be ignored altogether, angry people who are there to do the work but not equal citizens. Black women are usually conditioned to support and protect all of society, but when it comes to what happens to us, cis/bi/trans/“traditional,” we are left to the wayside. Per the HRC, fatal violence disproportionately MOST affects transgender women of color (and in America that means Black women)and the intersections of racism, sexism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia and unchecked access to guns conspire to deprive them of employment, housing, healthcare and other necessities, barriers that make them/us vulnerable. No more. Please. Say Her Name. Say Their Names. Whether they are cis/bi/straight/mixed, people perceived as Black women deserve our support. Always. #SayHerName #IyannaDior #BreonnaTaylor #SandraBland #AshantiCarmon #AniahBlanchard #KimberlyArrington #LaQuantaRiley #aminext #blacklivesmatter #pride #blackpride #supportBlackWomen (at Chocolate City) https://www.instagram.com/p/CBCAxFWhqbT/?igshid=11ixwn2v4mxe4
