African American Women in Defense of Ourselves
Amy E. Bartell
Offset, 1992
Latham, New York
4118
CSPG’s Poster of the Week was
produced to support Anita Hill, an African American attorney and law professor,
who was being smeared, defamed and threatened for having the courage to accuse
Clarence Thomas, an African American judge, of intense and ongoing sexual
harassment while he was her boss. President
George H. W. Bush (Bush I) had nominated Thomas to the U.S. Supreme Court to
succeed retiring Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall. To replace one of the most committed Civil Rights justices
with one of the most anti Civil Rights justices truly added insult to
injury.
During the first televised Congressional hearing on the subject in
history, October 11, 1991, Hill testified before an all white male Senate judiciary
committee, about the sexual harassment she had experienced while working for
him at the U.S. Department of Education and at the Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission. Her testimony should
have disqualified Thomas from being nominated to the highest court in the land,
but in the end he was appointed– on a 52-48 vote – and Hill’s
motives and character were
viciously attacked. This
poster is based on a ¾ page ad that first appeared in the New York Times November 17, 1991.
Anita—Speaking Truth to Power is an excellent new film about
the hearings and what has happened since.
Whether you lived through the time or are too young, it is eye-opening, frustrating,
fascinating, moving and uplifting.
And this poster hangs on her office wall.
Poster Text - African American
Women In Defense of Ourselves
As women of African descent, we are deeply troubled by the recent
nomination, confirmation and seating of Clarence Thomas as an Associate Justice
of the U.S. Supreme Court. We know that the presence of Clarence Thomas on the
Court will be continually used to divert attention from historic struggles for
social justice through suggestions that the presence of a Black man on the
Supreme Court constitutes an assurance that the rights of African Americans
will be protected. Clarence Thomas public record is ample evidence this will
not be true. Further, the
consolidation of a conservative majority on the Supreme Court seriously
endangers the rights of all women, poor and working class people and the
elderly. The seating of Clarence
Thomas is an affront not only to African American women and men, but to all
people concerned with social justice.
We are particularly outraged by the racist and sexist treatment of
Professor Anita Hill, an African American woman who was maligned and castigated
for daring to speak publicly of her own experience of sexual abuse. The
malicious defamation of Professor Hill insulted all women of African descent
and sent a dangerous message to any woman who might contemplate a sexual harassment
complaint.
We speak here because we recognize that the media are now portraying the
Black community as prepared to tolerate both the dismantling of affirmative
action and the evil of sexual harassment in order to have any Black man on the
Supreme Court. We want to make
clear that the media have ignored or distorted many African American voices. We will not be silenced.
Many have erroneously portrayed the allegations against Clarence Thomas
as an issue of either gender or race.
As women of African descent, we understand sexual harassment as
both. We further understand that
Clarence Thomas outrageously manipulated the legacy of lynching in order to
shelter himself from Anita Hill's allegations. To deflect attention away from the reality of sexual abuse
in African American women's lives, he trivialized and misrepresented this
painful part of African American people's history. This country which has a long legacy of racism and sexism,
has never taken the sexual abuse of Black women seriously. Throughout U.S. history Black women
have been sexually stereotyped as immoral, insatiable, perverse; the initiators
in all sexual contacts - abusive or otherwise. The common assumption in legal
proceedings as well as in the larger society has been that Black women cannot
be raped or otherwise sexually abused. As Anita Hill's experience demonstrates,
Black women who speak of these matters are not likely to be believed.
In 1991, we cannot tolerate this type of dismissal of any one Black
woman's experience or this attack upon our collective character without
protest, outrage, and resistance.
As women of African descent, we express our vehement opposition to the
policies represented by the placement of Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court.
The Bush administration, have obstructed the passage of civil rights
legislation, impeded the extension of unemployment compensation, cut student
aid and dismantled social welfare programs, has continually demonstrated that
it is not operating in our best interests. Nor is this appointee. We pledge
ourselves to continue to speak out in defense of one another, in defense of the
African American community and against those who are hostile to social
injustice no matter what color they are. No one will speak for us but
ourselves.
This ad represents a grassroots initiative on the 1,603 women of African
descent whose names appear herein. We also thank the hundreds of people of
conscience - women and men of differing racial and ethnic background - who have
contributed to make our statement possible. We would like to hear from those
interested in establishing a progressive network among women of African descent
so that we may more effectively make our voices heard in the future. Within hours of Anita Hill's testimony
before the Senate Judiciary Committee on October 11, 1991, Elsa Barkley Brown,
Barbara Ransby, and Deborah King had launched a nationwide campaign to protest
the events surrounding Clarence Thomas' nomination to the Supreme Court…
This text appears framed in the center of the
poster, surrounded by 1603 names.
Additional Resource:
Once Anita Hill’s name was leaked, the smear campaign began - even
before the hearings started. Maureen
Dowd describes the situation in Washington, D.C. two days before Hill’s
testimony:
