The Collision of Race and Gender at the Intersection of Sexual Assault

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Sexual assault is a crime against humanity. But not all victims of sexual abuse elicit the same level of compassion and support from the media and society. Some victims’ stories are little more than whispers on the voice of public consciousness while other stories scream for our attention; we take notice. We are horrified and disgusted, but our horror and disgust has limitations because even in a crime as horrific as rape we still discriminate. 

Since the beginning of the year the media have saturated us with rape stories. We learned of a woman who was gang raped on a bus in New Delhi, India and died from her injuries. Numerous other rapes in India put the spotlight on sexual assault in India, but India was not alone as we learned of rape cases in the United States and Canada. There were the members of the U. S. Armed Forces who worked in sexual prevention and were charged with sexual misconduct. 

A string of stories involving rape and social media in America and Canada in which the acts of violation were recorded and posted online seemed to happen one after another. Two of the victims committed suicide, and the rape conviction of two football players divided the small town of Steubenville in Ohio. New stories kept coming. I was wondering if there actually more rapes, or were we just paying more attention? I was hopeful that the constant attention would force us to address these crimes against women and girls. 

 Then in May, we learned of the Cleveland, Ohio kidnapping case that continues to dominate the headlines as the captives speak out. Ariel Castro lured three young women into his home and held them hostage for 10 years. He recently pleaded guilty to 937 felony accounts including, rape, assault and kidnapping. The repeated rapes resulted in pregnancy for one of the victims. Castro was sentenced to life without parole plus 1000 years. This story has been everywhere, as it should have been, but there was another sordid story of rape and torture unfolding in another courtroom, and if it had not popped up in a news feed on my Face book page, I would have missed it. As I read the details, I couldn’t help but wonder where was the coverage? And where was the outrage? 

Aswad Ayinde whose real name is Charles McGill was sentenced to 50 years in prison for raping and impregnating his daughters. This was the second of five such trials. He received a 40-year sentence in the first trial totaling 90 years in prison. Ayinde raped five of his daughters, and fathered six children with three of them. He was said to have a God-complex and was trying to create a “pure” bloodline. Ayinde was the director for the Fugees “Killing Me Softly” video.

This story reeks of sadness and anger. The rapes were happening with the mother’s knowledge, and on the child welfare agency’s watch. It was reported that the rapes took place in various homes and even in a funeral home. It has all the makings of a titillating tale to entice public attention, but it was a widely under reported story. A Google search yielded 34,000,000 hits including such notable sites as Fox, CNN, and the Huffington Post for the Cleveland kidnapping case, but a Google search yielded a mere 208,000 hits on less prominent news sites and blogs for Ayinde. Why wasn’t this story just as newsworthy as the others? Why was there such a huge disparity in the coverage?

I’m in this place again. and  it’s hard to stomach the silence around stories of sexual assault and Black women and girls. Unless it involves a big-time celebrity (R. Kelly and Mike Tyson) or the story has some lurid angle (the rape and murder of Ryan Harris in which two young boys were brought in for questioning), we don’t give too much time or attention to these stories. Why? I remember feeling the same sense of rage and despair when I read about the woman in Dunbar Village back in 2007.  She was raped, sodomized and forced to perform oral sex on her own son!  I felt the same way when I read that James Bevel, a former top adviser to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who was convicted of incest. Neither of these stories was widely reported, and if I had not been surfing the internet, I would have missed them.

There’s a part of me that understands that the Cleveland case is one of hope for families with missing children. I recognize how rare it is that after such a traumatic event that there could possibly be a happy ending. The young women are united with their families and moving forward with their lives. That’s wonderful. They deserve that. But all girls and women who survive sexual assault deserve our sympathy. How can we pick and choose?

Ayinde’s story bothers me on so many levels. This man raped and tortured his daughters. He delivered the babies at home, and when two of the babies died, he buried them. He home-schooled his children and threw up his middle finger at authorities, and he got away with it for 30 years. I am standing in the gap of race and gender, and the two have collided wrecking the lives of five young women and their children. The daughters of Ayinde and Bevel, the woman in Dunbar Village represent the lifeless, human carnage at the intersection of race, gender and sexual assault.  When will we recognize that sexual assault really is a crime against all of humanity—and not just those of a lighter hue?

Enough of the Monkey Business Already!

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Last week, I was sitting in a room full of white people, and I pulled out my banana and ate it. I wasn’t the only brown face in a sea of whiteness. There was another woman of color in the two-day workshop, but there’s something markedly different about being the only Black person in a room full of white folk.

On Day 2, it was my intention to arrive early so that I could eat my on-the-go banana and yogurt breakfast of choice before the workshop began. I left home with time to spare, but traffic was heavier than I anticipated. My trip was supposed to take 42 minutes. I gave myself a 90-minute window to account for traffic and my penchant for getting lost, but to no avail.

I was hungry and knew that the lions in my stomach would start to roar before the noon lunch hour. I thought the yogurt was too cumbersome to try and eat while following along in the binder that took up the entire desk space. The banana was the better choice to tide me over. So, I went for it.

The weird thing is that I was consciously aware that I was eating a banana in the presence of white people. It didn’t freak me out; I laughed as I fed the beasts in my belly. But I couldn’t help but think about the whole white people still think Black people are apes scenario. And that’s the problem with stereotypes. They are broad, sweeping statements that are grounded in myth--good or bad. All Black people eat fried chicken, all Mexicans eat tacos, all Asian eat rice, right? So, I was sitting there thinking, “Am I feeding a stereotype by eating this banana?”

 It’s not as if I was given any special attention, I was just there.  And judging from the conversations around me during the breaks on Day 1, I knew this was a conservative Christian crowd—God help me! Not exactly the place I wanted to be considering the heightened level of racial tension in society. It was too soon after the Zimmerman verdict, so it wasn’t quite warm and fuzzy. Being the only fly in the buttermilk, I stood out even if it was only in my mind. Two tapes played back in my head which fed my angst.

The first incident involved Cecile Kyenge, the Black woman who was appointed Integration Minister in Italy in April who has been met with quite a bit of resistance since taking office. Those on the far-right do not agree with her stance on immigration. Twice in the month of July she was likened to some species of ape first by a senior parliamentarian in the anti-immigration movement who compared her to an orangutan. Then on July 27, bananas were thrown at her during a speech. My workshop was July 30 and 31.

The second incident happened in Paris, and was shared with me by a friend.  She was visiting her daughter and granddaughters who live there. The girls are 10 and 6. Their father is a Black Frenchman, and their mother is a Black American. The girls are bilingual—speaking both French and English fluently. My friend, her daughter, and granddaughters were on a bus, and the oldest accidentally bumped a white woman’s bag. The child apologized, and the woman nodded as if she accepted the apology. She then turned to her teen-age daughter and said in French, “See, they are monkeys, and that is how monkeys act.” Understanding what the woman said, the little girl turned to her mother and whispered that the woman had called them monkeys. Her mother was livid and admonished her daughter for whispering. She told her daughter in a voice loud enough to be heard by all that when someone insults her; she is to speak out even if they are adults. 

It’s 2013, and as Black people, we cannot get away from the association to apes. And the fact that we have an African-American president seems to provide even more ammunition to people who are afraid of true evolution. The incidents involving apes and the First Family are too numerous to name. The one thing about the many references to people of African ancestry is that it does not discriminate by nationality or gender. Let the fools who fear change tell it, we all swing from trees.

So, while I was amused that I was actually thinking about the ridiculous notion of being identified as monkey, I was also disturbed that my mind even went that way. When I got home that evening, I thought about Melissa Harris-Perry’s book, Sister Citizen—Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America in which she describes our plight as that of trying to stand up right in a crooked room. 

 Harris-Perry uses the analogy of the crooked room to describe how Black women must navigate space in a world that is hostile to their presence because of race and gender. Harris-Perry says, “When they confront race and gender stereotypes, black women are standing in a crooked room, and they have to figure out which way is up.” Perry says that the perception of Black women is shaped by common stereotypes that have relentlessly followed us over time—Mammy, Sapphire, Jezebel and others. “Bombarded with images of their humanity, some Black women tilt and bend themselves to fit the distortion.” Was I in a crooked room, or had I tilted it myself?

Kyenge was in a crooked room. My friend, her daughter, and granddaughters were in a crooked room. If I had decided not to eat my banana, I would have confined myself to a crooked room. Too often we bend and bow down in an effort to make others comfortable. We stoop, slouch and squeeze into these pre-conceived spaces. We stop breathing. Stop living. 

Crooked rooms poke and prod us with sharp and jarring edges of blame and shame. We stare at ancient angles of stereotypes steeped in race, class and gender.  And if we stare at them long enough, we begin to believe that they are real. We see flat, one dimensional representations of ourselves and we cannot stand up straight.

It requires energy and effort to stand up right in a room designed to stunt our growth. But we must. We have to straighten our backs, square our shoulders push our chests out and hold our heads up high. We have to push and stretch beyond the confines of the Crooked Space. We do it for ourselves; we do it to pay homage to those who navigated the crooked spaces before us; we do it for the next generation of Black girls and women trying to find to reclaim their authentic selves.

Banana anyone?

Church and Me

 “Stephanie, why is it that you don’t go to church?”  A friend of mine recently caught me off-guard with this question.  So, I tried explaining to her what really wasn’t clear in my mind at the time. I gave her the usual spiel about not liking mega preachers, not feeling a sense of fellowship yada, yada, yada. But rolling this question around in my mind later, I had more questions than answers: Why don’t I go to church? I used to go to church, what happened? Am I going back to church?

Though most of my friends are regular church-goers (as is this one), no one ever point-blank asked me why I didn’t go to church. I never explained why I didn’t go anymore than they had to explain why they went. My standing joke whenever people talked about church was that I had back slid so far that I was standing still. And it’s not that I’m anti-church; I go when I want, but I don’t go regularly even though my name is on the membership role of a local church. My spotty church attendance dates back to my childhood. 

Unlike many African-American families, mine was not a church-going family, but we were neither atheist nor agnostic; we believed in God. But God showed up in our house in different ways. I grew up in an eclectic Christian-based household.  On Sundays we listened to church on the radio, and watched Jubilee Showcase on TV. We only went to church on Easter, and for me it was more about the fashion than the faith because I always got a new outfit. 

I am from a house where we had to be quiet during thunderstorms because God was doing His work; I carry a protective Saint in my car to avoid accidents. Then there was the round Buddha- like figure that sat and still sits on my mother’s dresser. For some it smacks of blasphemy, but for me it was about finding God in various places and spaces. 

Even though I started attended church semi-regularly as a teenager and then as an adult, my thoughts constantly returned to the spirituality of my childhood. My upbringing allowed God to be bigger than a name or a place to me. It allowed to me to accept that there is more than one path to God. One of those paths is church, and I do venture down that path from time to time, not just every Sunday.

Peace in the Storm

I could smell it; the scent of the first drops of rain against my brain registering that there was a storm stirring in my soul. It’s been said that in life you are always doing one of three things: entering a storm, exiting one or trying to hold on in the midst of one. Except for an occasional shower or two, the sun was radiating brightly in my life. But I knew the rain was coming. Felt it swirling around me. Didn't know the direction it was coming. I couldn’t anticipate the extent of the downpour. I just knew that I was going to need something to get me through.

It started as soon as the school year ended. A trip to the emergency room turned into a hospital stay for my elderly mother. She had pneumonia. She stayed a few days, followed up with her primary care physician and things were on the mend. Then I had to leave and go out of state to be with my niece who was having surgery. I have been in and out of hospitals so many times that I almost hate them. I said goodbye to both my father and my oldest sister in the hospital. But in spite of my fear, I ignored the knots in my stomach and push forward. My mother was fine; my niece would be, too.

Her surgery went well, so I thought I’d a reprieve from the rain until I returned from vacation. Wrong! My friend and traveling partner was complaining constantly of pain and malaise. And for someone who doesn’t like going to doctor until she falls over—sometimes literally--was actually doing what she was supposed to, but she wasn’t feeling any better. She felt so bad that she decided not to take the trip. I knew then that she felt bad because she would never miss a trip! Then my mother started feeling bad again. It was raining on my head. I wanted to stay home. 

I am not my mother’s only child, and I could not do anything for my friend. I felt helpless, but I had to relinquish my false sense of control. I had to accept that I am a mere mortal and to let go and let God take control. So, I decided to take my trip because I knew it would be still raining when I returned. The storm was brewing, but I had a temporary shelter.

The trip was to Toronto for a literary treat with the Literary Sisters. The Literary Sisters, started by Ruth Bridges, is a group of women from all over the country who gather in different places to discuss literature and anything else on their minds. Sometimes they gather in a place to talk to authors about their works, and other times they’re traveling around the world. This was my third trip.  

And for me, it was a much needed retreat. I sat in the company of brilliant and beautiful Black women from all over the country and from all walks of life with a shared passion for literature; it was and/ is a gratifying experience. I am a reader, and every time I’m in the company of the Literary Sisters I learn how much reading I still have left to do! Being with them is like sitting in the front row of the classroom of life.  

There’s no cattiness. No competition. It is a gathering of warm and wonderful women. We talked about books, current events, our lives. We experienced the beauty of Niagara Falls and the hustle and bustle of Toronto. Due to bad weather, only one author was able to fly in for the retreat. But in this day of Kindles and Nooks, it was good to listen to the New York Times best-selling author Kimberla Lawson Roby to not only read from her book, Perfect Marriage, but to also autograph keepsake copies of her other books.

For an extended weekend, I found peace in the midst of the storms swirling around in my life. I shared meals, conversations, and knowledge with a wonderful group of women who cocooned me from the pellets being hurled at my heart.

I returned home refreshed, renewed and ready to do battle with the health care system that is denying my mother the right to quality health care, and to support my friend who was diagnosed with cancer. I maybe be standing in the eye of the storm, but thanks to my Literary Sisters, I am also able to find a sliver a peace in this place. Thank you!

Letter to My Nephew and Other Black Males in America

Author’s Note: In 2005, I sat down to pen this piece for my then nine-year-old great nephew. At the time it was more of a passing thing, but today I am pressed to write this piece as I grapple with the tragedy of Trayvon Martin and other Black males in America. This writing is urgent because of my relationships with the Black boys and men in my life. I write to make sense of what does not make sense in an attempt to maintain my sanity.

Dear Nephew,

Then: Your saucer-shaped, deep brown eyes look innocently from underneath long lashes as though you are not capable of any wrong doing. A big smile creases your face as your cinnamon brown hands reach up and grab me around the neck as you plant a wet, slimy kiss on my cheek.  But before your arms come down, those innocent eyes become devilish and you tickle my neck.

I looked at you then and I was afraid and I’m afraid now because I know the world does not love you like I do. So, I am fractured in how I deal with you. On the one hand, I want you follow the words of the U. S. Army and be all that you can be. I want you to grab life by the proverbial horns and ride it as I cheer you on from the sidelines. And I do! But I must also teach you the ways of world that you were born into. In his 1963 essay, My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the EmancipationProclamation” James Baldwin said, “You were born into a society which spelled out with brutal clarity, and in as many was as possible, that you were a worthless human being.” And here we are 50 years later, and the essay is just as relevant today as it was then.

Now:  You’re 16 almost 17 now. And I look into your and face I worry about what the future holds for you. I wonder if your bigger-than-life personality will take you places or hold you back. You know that you are loved, but I don’t know how to tell you that many in world will not love you back. Should I tell you like Baldwin told his nephew that the best that you can hope for is acceptance? Is that enough?

We have sheltered and protected you, and I wonder if we have done you a disservice as a Black male in America? You know that you are special, but what happens when you are outside the circle of our influence? When I try to explain to you about being stopped by the police for no other reason than Breathing While Black you tell me that you will never be spread eagle across a police car. It’s hard for me to get you to understand that this is probably an unfortunate right-of-passage for you. And there is a part of me that applauds the fact that this not how you see yourself, but it’s not enough. So, I take you to see documentaries like The Central Park Five so that you know what’s real in the world you live in.

You are forever asking me to drop you off somewhere so that you can ride public transportation, and I keep telling you, no. You resent that we pick you up and drop you off. You accuse us of treating you like a baby because you think you are invincible to the dangers lurking in the world. It’s hard for me to explain to you that because of the world that you live in, the enemy will many times be someone who looks like you. Yes, I can talk to you about Emmett Till, and Trayvon Martin, but I must also talk to you about Darion Alberts.

You are one more in a long-line of Black males that I love, and what I’ve learned is that to love you-a Black male in America- is to love you with rubber-band like tension taut across my heart. I have to love you with trepidation. I have to love you in a schizophrenic kind of way—pull you close, push you away. I have to love you and let you go so that you’ll grow. It is your growth that is frighteningly beautiful because it is both a necessity and a threat to your survival. But to love you and all other Black males in America is to embrace the fear and beauty that surrounds you.

Love you to life!

TTSteph