The Future is Another Country
The fact is that the struggle for equal rights will outlive all of us. Substantive and systemic changes are very slow to come, and they are made slower still by the reality of intersectional struggle. When you are struggling not only for your own freedom, but freedom for all oppressed peoples, you increase the chances of encountering opposition from erstwhile allies.
The objectification of women is not a new occurrence. Yet when Black women are objectified, those who are routinely shocked and appalled seem to fall silent.
The Diversity Industrial Complex makes overtures toward diversity without acknowledging that the conversations and demands of marginalized communities have moved well beyond mere tokenization.
I had found my calling. I wanted to be an academic. Little did I know that, more than a decade later, I would leave the profession because, like my time in Hollywood, I was not willing to play the game of sexual harassment or intimidation to accelerate my career.
When the Harvey Weinstein scandal broke, it seemed that almost every day brought another survivor with their own accusations, their own story. The Martins investigation has sparked no such watershed, or at least not yet.
Your demand that we live in an equitable society grounded in a sound understanding of the ways historic inequalities continue to shape the present gives us hope for a brighter future. Thank you!
Our work as historians involves studying prior forms of exploitation, abuse, and inequality. Doing this work, we believe, requires that we struggle against their iterations in the present.
It is impossible to ignore how television heroes and stories have described our society. They blur the line between fantasy and reality, revealing much about us through who we admire and aspire to become.
Esquire suggests that men are destined to incur sexually aggressive feelings at music festivals. But if they simply dress and act in a way that will attract female attention, it will ensure an Esquire man gets (consensually) laid.
Men may feel shame that they should have been stronger and able to fight off the perpetrator. These feelings hinder the survivor’s ability to seek out support or services they may need after an assault.
The Activist History Review