does modern society hate black women?

This year has been so taxing mentally and emotionally. I can't be the only Black woman feeling the weight of the losses we've had personally and publicly and in some case both. I always find it strange when I try to talk about the facts around the issues Black women face and people try to tell me all the reasons why I'm wrong while even a blind person could plainly see that attacks on Black women have ramped up exponentially in the last 5 years. Don't get me wrong other people of color get their fair share of bias too BUT can we just pause for a second and be honest about the fact that not just America but the entire world has a special kind of pent up hatred for Black women, especially those who have the audacity to challenge our deep-seated stereotypes about them? I'll admit, I didn't realize how much Black women were hated until I started law school and then once I started working at a firm, I realized it was a whole thing. For me the strangest thing was having non-Black people think they could come and disrespect Black women with me and then get mad when I would ask them the rationale for their suppositions about said Black women. That still happens. It's like when I go on a date with a non-Black person and they start to rant about how I'm not like other Black people 🙄, when I'm just letting them show me exactly how racist they are just not to me though right?

I pay attention to the world I currently live in and the amount of Black women that have been on those layoff lists can't be a coincidence. I would bet money that somewhere in their record we will show they've been top performers in predominantly white departments, they are usually the only Black person in their departments (gosh or even companies) and when you compare the release of Black employees as compared the total Black employees hired, it is evident something is amiss. I know 20 Black woman attorneys that were released from their firms because they weren't a good fit - not because they were doing poorly and their was evidence to support the same, not because they were not team players, not because they were missing deadlines, not because they were falling behind, not because they were under-qualified (Black women are usually overqualified - remember when people weren't getting roles they applied for in the 90s and early 2000s, they were mostly Black women and a recent HBS report says Black women are the most educated people in society right now with more than 80% of us with at least a Bachelor's degree).

I think in this job market, we should assume if a Black woman left a job suddenly, she was probably harassed, she probably complained until she quit or worst until they retaliated. It's weird the stories out there. It's scary. It's brain crushing. It's rage instilling. Have you seen the news lately? How are all these ABWs being obliterated publicly by white owned and operated institutions and they just go in hiding, or resign, or start a business? Aren't aggressive people supposed to fight back? I want recruiters and hiring managers to do a better job of assessing the world we live in and stop pretending it's safe out here for Black women. Maybe instead of asking a Black woman why she left the last place she worked, asked her whether she felt safe in her last workplace. Ask her about her biggest wins at her last workplace and her biggest losses if asking her about whether she felt safe is uncomfortable. Then spend some time explaining how your workplace would be safer for her by showing your receipts. Show her your retention and attrition rates for folks that look like her and show her the path to leadership, career advancement and the like. If only 13 of your ~300 managers/partners/directors/leaders are Black (4.6% of the decision-making power) and 70% of them are non-equity partners (actually only 1.38% have decision making power) and the numbers look the same if they're Asian or Hispanic, I'm sorry but those receipts are not indicative of safety for any of these groups.

When people see me they see Black and it's usually how I describe myself because it's easier (but my multicultural background among other diverse traits always have me wondering if they count me 3 or 4 times in their diversity reports 🙄 ). I made the mistake of asking about that once - LOL workplaces hate when you ask pointed questions like that. I understand why they would , especially if they (i) never thought to do that and now I've exposed their lack or creativity or (ii) are actively engaging in the unethical behavior and now everyone's considering it as an actual possibility. Like Dr. Monica Cox says all the time, we really gotta stop playing diversity. This whole week, I was trying to think of something uplifting to say because I don't want this newsletter to just be about ranting but lawdamercy, did you hear about that Tory donor Hester saying “You see Diane Abbott on the TV, and you’re just like I hate, you just want to hate all Black women because she’s there, and I don’t hate all Black women at all, but I think she should be shot”? I think that's why this darn article turned into such mishmosh. It makes me sad because she didn't even get an opportunity to speak on her own behalf while they discussed the gross statement in parliament.

I know the reality for Black women in the modern world makes us perpetually tired. I know it makes us want to give up, even when things are going well for us - it's mentally exhausting. Compartmentalizing doesn't work when you've run out of compartments. How can we enjoy our wins when we see so many that look like us losing the things, the spaces, the opportunities they sacrificed so much to achieve. We can't give up though. We need to band together. We need to exude everything that we are every single day no matter who is watching us. We need to call out evil in real time and stop pontificating about how it could harm us to speak up when we really need to consider all the other Black women that will be impacted by that evil if we don't kill it dead like David killed Goliath with his slingshot. We can no longer wait for time to heal our wounds - it hasn't and it won't as long as evil gets to repeat behaviors and we witness its harm to other people we could have saved by speaking up. I read somewhere that silence only protects the people who are doing the harm. We can no longer rely on someone else or karma to settle the score. I know people have kids but what's the sense in you trying to keep your job to protect your kid only for them to be treated like garbage when they're in public? We can no longer rely on others to put themselves on the line for us when we refuse to do the same for ourselves -- and that works in every possible way you can think.

We have to love ourselves, especially when they show us how much they hate us.