Women, Race & Class

“This bears repeating: Black women were equal to their men in the oppression they suffered; they were their men’s social equals within the slave community; and they resisted slavery with a passion equal to their men’s. This was one of the greatest ironies of the slave system, for in subjecting women to the most ruthless exploitation conceivable, exploitation which knew no sex distinctions, the groundwork was created not only for Black women to assert their equality through their social relations, but also to express it through their acts of resistance.”

This quote explains the realities of the lives of Black women during slavery. Davis hopes to emphasize that the 19th-century ideologies that defined femininity and social relations among white people did not apply among enslaved people. As she notes, Black women were not viewed as weak or feminine; they were equally oppressed as enslaved men in the fields while also experiencing sexual abused. However, Davis argues that slaveowners’ treatment of Black women backfired because they resisted slavery as fiercely as their male counterparts. Implicit in this is also an argument about Black women’s contributions (actual and potential) to feminism: Since Black women generally do not inherit the same legacy of submissiveness that middle-class white women do, they are well positioned to fight for women’s liberation.

“It would be a mistake to regard the institutionalized pattern of rape during slavery as an expression of white men’s sexual urges, otherwise stifled by the specter of white womanhood’s chastity. That would be far too simplistic an explanation. Rape was a weapon of domination, a weapon of repression, whose covert goal was to extinguish slave women’s will to resist, and in the process, to demoralize their men.”

Davis uses this quotation for two purposes. First, it rejects the “simplistic” characterization of rape during slavery as arising from white men’s sexual urges. Second, it explains one of Davis’s key arguments: that rape was a weapon against enslaved women meant to force Black women into submission and discourage resistance from all enslaved people, including men. Davis later discusses this in other contexts (e.g., the Vietnam War), her point being that rape is not simply an act of patriarchal violence, but one that can also shore up white supremacy and/or capitalism.

“It was those women who passed on to their nominally free female descendants a legacy of hard work, perseverance and self-reliance, a legacy of tenacity, resistance and insistence on sexual equality—in short, a legacy spelling out standards for a new womanhood.”

Davis ends Chapter 1 with this quote about the legacy and impact of the cruel realities of slavery. In stating that Black women set out “standards for a new womanhood,” Davis emphasizes the fact that 19th-century ideology defining womanhood in terms of weakness or submissiveness was exclusively applicable to white women. Davis hopes to tell a story of these Black women who redefined womanhood for themselves and their descendants.

“Frederick Douglass assumed an admirably anti-sexist posture and proclaimed that he hardly felt demeaned by the label ‘women’s rights man. […] I am glad to say that I have never been ashamed to be thus designated.’”

This is one of many quotes that Davis cites to evidence Frederick Douglass’s valuable and supportive role in fighting for women’s rights. By repeatedly highlighting Douglass’s commitment to women’s suffrage, Davis contrasts his behavior with Stanton and Anthony’s shift from their anti-slavery roots to their embrace of racist arguments and positions, abandoning Black people in their time of need.

“An ideological consequence of industrial capitalism was the shaping of a more rigorous notion of female inferiority. It seemed, in fact, that the more women’s domestic duties shrank under the impact of industrialization, the more rigid became the assertion that ‘woman’s place is in the home.’”

Davis here connects sexism and capitalism. As she explains in this quote, industrialization led directly to women’s roles being defined as housewife and mother. This supports Davis’s argument that we cannot look at one issue or factor alone, but must instead look at how multiple forms of oppression relate to one another. To Davis, combatting sexism alone would not solve women’s oppression because capitalism is also an underlying cause of sexual inequality.

“Ain’t I a Woman?”

Davis here quotes formerly enslaved abolitionist and women’s rights activist Sojourner Truth delivering her most famous speech of the same name. Davis gives this historical example to illuminate Black women’s contributions to the women’s rights effort while contrasting those contributions with the racism Truth experienced before, during, and after the speech. Davis references this in her discussion of the early limitations of the women’s rights movement with respect to race and class. Davis argues that this repeated phrase in Truth’s speech—often interpreted as a jab at patriarchal conceptions of women’s nature—also “exposed the class-bias and racism of the new women’s movement” by showing that “[a]ll women were not white and all women did not enjoy the material comfort of the middle classes and bourgeoisie” (63).

“As a rule, white abolitionists either defended the industrial capitalists or expressed no conscious class loyalty at all. This unquestioning acceptance of the capitalist economic system was evident in the program of the women’s rights movement as well. If most abolitionists viewed slavery as a nasty blemish which needed to be eliminated, most women’s righters viewed male supremacy in a similar manner—as an immoral flaw in their otherwise acceptable society.” 

This quotation highlights what Davis believes was a key deficiency in the thinking of abolitionists and women’s rights leaders: their “unquestioning acceptance” of capitalism. Davis criticizes these otherwise progressive minds for missing the exploitative nature of capitalism that affected the working class. Davis argues that had they recognized capitalism’s flaws, they would have understood the needs of women beyond middle-class society and consequently would have been able to tackle issues of racism or sexism more effectively.

“The assumption that emancipation had rendered the former slaves equal to white women—both groups equally requiring the vote for the completion of their social equality—ignored the utter precariousness of Black people’s newly won ‘freedom’ during the post-Civil War era.”

This quotation reflects the underlying assumption of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony’s opposition to granting Black male suffrage if white women did not simultaneously receive suffrage. Davis finds the assumption to be erroneous: Post-emancipation Black people’s free status was in constant jeopardy, and they continued to face economic, political, and social oppression. By highlighting this, Davis signals her sympathy with the opposing faction that understood the immediate need for Black people to obtain the vote.

“Since slavery, the vulnerable condition of the household worker has continued to nourish many of the lingering myths about the ‘immorality’ of Black women. In this classic ‘catch-22’ situation, household work is considered degrading because it has been disproportionately performed by Black women, who in turn are viewed as ‘inept’ and ‘promiscuous.’ But their ostensible ineptness and promiscuity are myths which are repeatedly confirmed by the degrading work they are compelled to do.”

This quote supports Davis’s illumination of Black women’s post-emancipation work in domestic service. Davis brings attention to the ways in which Black women suffered racism, sexism, and class exploitation in this work by giving this example of the “catch-22” situation they were caught in. Davis hopes to help readers understand the triple oppression of Black women and thus the need for intersectional analysis of their struggles.

“Racism and sexism frequently converge—and the condition of white women workers is often tied to the oppressive predicament of women of color. Thus the wages received by white women domestics have always been fixed by the racist criteria used to calculate the wages of Black women servants. Immigrant women compelled to accept household employment earned little more than their Black counterparts. As far as their wage-earning potential was concerned, they were closer, by far, to their Black sisters than to their white brothers who worked for a living.”

Davis underscores the importance of solidarity between different groups that may share goals and have an interest in uniting against a common source of oppression. Davis argues that the racism affecting Black women spilled over into the sexist and classist oppression of working-class white women, who therefore had a stake in combating white supremacy as well. Davis builds on her theme of showing that race, class, and gender have been systematically linked in a multitude of ways with this quote.

“Sisterhood between Black and white women was indeed possible, and as long as it stood on a firm foundation—as with this remarkable woman and her friends and students—it could give birth to earthshaking accomplishments. Myrtilla Miner kept the candle burning that others before her, like the Grimke sisters and Prudence Crandall, had left as a powerful legacy.”

This quote reflects the theme of the power of solidarity. Davis praises the work of white women like Miner, the Grimke sisters, and Crandall as examples of what she wishes other historical figures, like Stanton or Anthony, would have done, emphasizing the “earthshaking” possibilities of “sisterhood” between Black and white women. Through this example, Davis also emphasizes the lessons that we can learn from past examples of solidarity at work.

“The last decade of the nineteenth century was a critical moment in the development of modern racism—its major institutional supports as well as its attendant ideological justifications. This was also the period of imperialist expansion into the Philippines, Hawaii, Cuba and Puerto Rico. The same forces that sought to subjugate the peoples of these countries were responsible for the worsening plight of Black people and the entire US working class. Racism nourished those imperialist ventures and was likewise conditioned by imperialism’s strategies and apologetics.”

Davis uses this quote to emphasize the insidious power of racism and its mutually reinforcing relationship with capitalism. Here, she argues racism was the underlying force for continuing violence and terrorism (such as lynchings) against Black people as well as for the imperialism that subjugated peoples around the world. Meanwhile, the reference to the “plight” of the “entire US working class” points to the economic factors driving various forms of oppression. Davis hopes to demonstrate that by recognizing the complicity of racism in various situations, we can form a more complete analysis.

“How could Susan B. Anthony claim to believe in human rights and political equality and at the same time counsel the members of her organization to remain silent on the issue of racism? Bourgeois ideology—and particularly its racist ingredients—must really possess the power of dissolving real images of terror into obscurity and insignificance, and of fading horrible cries of suffering human beings into barely audible murmurings and then silence.”

This is a statement with powerful language and word choice. It is a simultaneous condemnation of the linked forces of capitalism and racism. To Davis, the suffering that Black people were experiencing toward the end of the 19th century was so obvious that white women like Susan B. Anthony could hardly fail to notice it. In search of any explanation for Anthony’s silence, Davis concludes that there is only one explanation: the power of “bourgeois ideology” and its racism are so strong that they can silence the cries of human suffering. This is a chilling description that seeks to invoke an emotional response of anger or disappointment.

“As racism developed more durable roots within white women’s organizations, so too did the sexist cult of motherhood creep into the very movement whose announced aim was the elimination of male supremacy. The coupling of sexism and racism was mutually strengthening. Having opened its doors to the prevailing racist ideology more widely than ever before, the suffrage movement had opted for an obstacle course which placed its own goal of woman suffrage in continuous jeopardy.”

Davis frames sexism and racism as forces that feed off each other. By doing so, she links together the fates of Black women and white women, thereby showing the need to look beyond one’s own immediate interests or needs and to act in solidarity. By establishing that sexism and racism are “mutually strengthening,” Davis also provides support for her critique of the suffrage movement, arguing that its embrace of racism backfired by entrenching sexism in the movement.

“What set such women apart from the white club leaders was their consciousness of the need to challenge racism. Indeed, their own familiarity with the routine racism of US society linked them far more intimately to their working-class sisters than did the experience of sexism for white women of the middle classes.”

Davis states this within the context of her discussion of the Black club movement being primarily led by Black middle-class women. Davis distinguishes these leaders from their white counterparts by linking Black middle-class women with Black working-class women through the common experience of racism. By contrast, sexism did not unite middle-class and working-class white women in the same way, perhaps because the experience of sexism varied radically by class (e.g., working-class women definitionally could not conform to the era’s feminine ideal). Through this insight, Davis demonstrates her argument that racism is a key ingredient of Black women’s oppression that must be taken into consideration when analyzing their experience of sexism.

“As Anthony and Stanton attacked Black men when they realized that the ex-slaves might receive the vote before white women, so they lashed out in a parallel fashion against the men of the working class. Stanton insisted that the exclusion from the NLU proved ‘[…] what the Revolution has said again and again, that the worst enemies of Woman Suffrage will ever be the laboring classes of men.’”

Davis compares the suffragists’ response to arguments for extending Black male suffrage to their response when they were excluded from the National Labor Union for encouraging female printers to “work as scabs” (140)—a proposal that would undercut the efforts of male workers on strike. Davis reminds readers that the suffrage movement marginalized or dismissed the voices of women who were not white and middle-class, further highlighting missed opportunities for unity.

“As for the woman suffrage campaign, it appears that all those concessions to Southern women made very little difference in the end. When the votes on the Nineteenth Amendment were tallied, the Southern states were still lined up in the opposition camp—and, in fact, almost managed to defeat the amendment.” 

Davis’s inclusion of this quotation solidifies her argument that the suffrage movement’s leaders were hugely mistaken in choosing to appeal to racist Southern members rather than support their Black sisters. Even accepting the premise of this choice—its supposed expediency—it proved misguided, which is not surprising if, as Davis argues, sexism and racism are intimately linked. Davis uses this quote as a lesson to readers about the importance of solidarity.

“Black women were generally caught in a threefold bond of oppression.”

This quotation comes in the context of Davis’s spotlight on the life of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn: a white communist leader who serves as a prime example of someone who showed solidarity with Black women. Davis states that Flynn recognized the “triple jeopardy” of Black women’s oppression arising from their race, sex, and class. This quotation succinctly represents not only the title of the book, but also a recurring theme of the need for intersectional analysis of all three factors.

“In the history of the United States, the fraudulent rape charge stands out as one of the most formidable artifices invented by racism.”

As part of Davis’s extensive analysis of the Black rapist myth in Chapter 11, she succinctly asserts the gravity of the myth and its deadly effects. Of note is her use of the word “invented,” which she uses to emphasize that the myth was not just something that came about, but something that was developed to justify lynchings.

“One of racism’s salient historical features has always been the assumption that white men—especially those who wield economic power—possess an incontestable right of access to Black women’s bodies.” 

Davis brings to light institutionalized rape and sexual abuse during slavery and the underlying racist assumption it relied on: that Black women and their bodies were the property of white slaveowners or masters. By noting the economic power imbalance that defined the relation between slavemaster and enslaved person, Davis also ties her discussion of racism and sexism to capitalism; under slavery, slaveowners had a quite concrete economic incentive to rape enslaved women—any resulting children would be enslaved as well—but as Davis goes on to argue, the legal immunity that men in positions of economic power effectively enjoy incentivizes sexual abuse regardless.

“Racism has always served as a provocation to rape, and white women in the United States have necessarily suffered the ricochet fire of these attacks. This is one of the many ways in which racism nourishes sexism, causing white women to be indirectly victimized by the special oppression aimed at their sisters of color.” 

Davis’s assertion that “racism nourishes sexism” is another reminder for readers that an analysis of social issues like rape must consider the multiple factors that are at play. Davis’s argument that sexual violence against Black women has also led to white women being victimized provides a basis for connecting racism and sexism and, consequently, a basis to link any effort to combat them.

“An effective strategy against rape must aim for more than the eradication of rape—or even of sexism—alone.”

As part of her criticism of the anti-rape movement for not understanding the concerns of Black women, Davis concludes Chapter 11 by urging the incorporation of resistance to racism and capitalism into the overall strategy to combat rape and sexism. This reflects the recurring theme of the need to engage in a multi-factor analysis that carefully considers how multiple issues present themselves in the oppression of various groups.

“More and more, it was assumed within birth control circles that poor women, Black and immigrant alike, had a ‘moral obligation to restrict the size of their families.’ What was demanded as a ‘right’ for the privileged came to be interpreted as a ‘duty’ for the poor.”

In highlighting the racism within the birth control movement, Davis makes an astute point about the different language used in arguments for birth control depending on the subject of the argument. By describing poor, immigrant, or Black women as having a “duty” to use birth control but middle-class white women as having a “right” to it, advocates exposed the racism and anti-poor sentiments within the birth control movement.

“Carl Shultz, director of HEW’s Population Affairs Office, estimated that between 100,000 and 200,000 sterilizations had actually been funded [in 1972] by the federal government. During Hitler’s Germany, incidentally, 250,000 sterilizations were carried out under the Nazis’ Hereditary Health Law. Is it possible that the record of the Nazis, throughout the years of their reign, may have been almost equaled by US government-funded sterilizations in the space of a single year?”

This shocking data indicates the scale of sterilization abuse in the United States and consequently, the powerful influence of racism and the eugenics movement. Such data supports Davis’s explanation of why many Black women and other women of color were hesitant to involve themselves in the abortion rights movement. The comparison to Nazi Germany is rhetorically effective since most Americans take that regime’s monstrosity as a given.